Kirsha Kaechele
Encyclopedia
Kirsha Kaechele is an American contemporary art curator, artist, and practitioner of sustainable architecture. She is founder of KKProjects | Life is Art Foundation.
, Micronesia
and Japan. Her father was a retired RAND Corporation aerospace engineer and early practitioner of Rolfing
, and mother, a painter. In 1994, Kaechele began an informal education with travel over land to more than fifty countries in a seven year period- a hands-on investigation of the idea that life designs itself. During this period, she met and mentored with a variety of thinkers, including Biosphere 2
creator John Allen
, chemist Albert Hoffman
, writers Tom Robbins
and John C. Lilly
, John Perry Barlow
, Rodleen Getsic
, psychiatrist Oscar Janiger
, artist Peter Nadin, musician Mike Watt
and a pair of German architects building sustainably in Maui
, Hawaii. In 1999, Kaechele lived in remote southern Lebanon and worked with a group of leading writers, philosophers and historians in Sur (Tyre). In 1995, she worked with the Shipibo ayahuasca
shamans in the Peruvian Amazon. In 1996, she performed with La Mama theater
in New York City.
Kaechele co-founded the first sustainable architecture major at University of California, Santa Cruz
, and co-taught the Sustainable Design
studio.
In 1995, Kaechele began curating large-scale, site-specific installation art with musician Perry Farrell
in Los Angeles, including work on the first Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival
. In 2000, she moved to New Orleans and began collaborating with artist/musicians Quintron and Miss Pussycat on performance art projects.
In 2007 she founded Life is Art Foundation | KKProjects, an art space composed of six abandoned houses in the St Roch Neighborhood of New Orleans. The foundation invites local and international artists to create site-specific installations utilizing the houses and surrounding ecological and social environment as medium. Exhibitions have included artists from emerging to Tony Oursler
, Mel Chin
, Keith Sonnier
and Robert Rauschenberg
.
Kaechele also purchased several houses in post Katrina New Orleans for purposes as an art project. The Life is Art Foundation is founded on an appreciation for ecological systems and natural order. The application of systems-based thinking to life and art is the core mission, as expressed through projects that marry art with architecture, ecology
, agriculture and human social order. The foundation serves as a test site for cutting edge ideas in these fields.
As of April 2011, Kaechele's houses in New Orleans have been abandoned.
Kaechele's current curatorial work includes a land art exhibition of an acre and a half living sugar cane sculpture in Theriot, rural Louisiana, by Norwegian artist Anne Senstad, as well as twenty, large-scale site-specific installations in New Orleans’ City Park and Botanical Gardens in partnership with Voodoo Experience
.
Kaechele’s work has been exhibited at the A+D Museum: Los Angeles
, and covered in international publications including the New York Times’ T Magazine, Interview, Newsweek, Art in America, Art Papers, GQ and the RISD interior architecture Journal.
Life and career
Kaechele was born in Topanga Canyon, California and raised in GuamGuam
Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...
, Micronesia
Micronesia
Micronesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising thousands of small islands in the western Pacific Ocean. It is distinct from Melanesia to the south, and Polynesia to the east. The Philippines lie to the west, and Indonesia to the southwest....
and Japan. Her father was a retired RAND Corporation aerospace engineer and early practitioner of Rolfing
Rolfing
Rolfing is a therapy system created by The Rolf Institute of Structural Integration and is a system whereby the alleged manipulation of the fasciae by specific methods is theorized to yield therapeutic benefit....
, and mother, a painter. In 1994, Kaechele began an informal education with travel over land to more than fifty countries in a seven year period- a hands-on investigation of the idea that life designs itself. During this period, she met and mentored with a variety of thinkers, including Biosphere 2
Biosphere 2
Biosphere 2 is a structure originally built to be an artificial, materially-closed ecological system in Oracle, Arizona by Space Biosphere Ventures, a joint venture whose principal officers were John P. Allen, inventor and Executive Director, and Margret Augustine, CEO...
creator John Allen
John Allen
-Politicians:*John Allen , U.S. Representative from Connecticut*John B. Allen , first U.S. Senator from Washington*John Clayton Allen , U.S. Representative from Illinois...
, chemist Albert Hoffman
Albert Hoffman
Albert Hoffman may refer to:*Albert Hoffman , American artist*Albert Hoffmann , German politician and Nazi Gauleiter*Albert Hoffmann , German rosarian...
, writers Tom Robbins
Tom Robbins
Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins (born July 22, 1936 is an American author. His best-selling novels are serio-comic, often wildly poetic stories with a strong social and philosophical undercurrent, an irreverent bent, and scenes extrapolated from...
and John C. Lilly
John C. Lilly
John Cunningham Lilly was an American physician, neuroscientist, psychoanalyst, psychonaut, philosopher and writer....
, John Perry Barlow
John Perry Barlow
John Perry Barlow is an American poet and essayist, a retired Wyoming cattle rancher, and a cyberlibertarian political activist who has been associated with both the Democratic and Republican parties. He is also a former lyricist for the Grateful Dead and a founding member of the Electronic...
, Rodleen Getsic
Rodleen Getsic
Rodleen Getsic is an American singer, activist, actress, film producer and performance artist.-Biography:...
, psychiatrist Oscar Janiger
Oscar Janiger
Oscar Janiger was a University of California Irvine Psychiatrist who was best known for his LSD research, which lasted from 1954 to 1962....
, artist Peter Nadin, musician Mike Watt
Mike Watt
Michael David Watt is an American bassist, singer and songwriter.He is best known for co-founding the rock bands Minutemen, dos, and Firehose; , he is also the bassist for the reunited Stooges and a member of the art rock/jazz/punk/improv group Banyan as well as many other post-Minutemen...
and a pair of German architects building sustainably in Maui
Maui
The island of Maui is the second-largest of the Hawaiian Islands at and is the 17th largest island in the United States. Maui is part of the state of Hawaii and is the largest of Maui County's four islands, bigger than Lānai, Kahoolawe, and Molokai. In 2010, Maui had a population of 144,444,...
, Hawaii. In 1999, Kaechele lived in remote southern Lebanon and worked with a group of leading writers, philosophers and historians in Sur (Tyre). In 1995, she worked with the Shipibo ayahuasca
Ayahuasca
Ayahuasca is any of various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from the Banisteriopsis spp. vine, usually mixed with the leaves of dimethyltryptamine-containing species of shrubs from the Psychotria genus...
shamans in the Peruvian Amazon. In 1996, she performed with La Mama theater
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club is an off-off Broadway theatre founded in 1961 by Ellen Stewart, and named in reference to her. Located on Manhattan's Lower East Side, the theatre grew out of Stewart's tiny basement boutique for her fashion designs; the boutique's space acted as a theatre for...
in New York City.
Kaechele co-founded the first sustainable architecture major at University of California, Santa Cruz
University of California, Santa Cruz
The University of California, Santa Cruz, also known as UC Santa Cruz or UCSC, is a public, collegiate university; one of ten campuses in the University of California...
, and co-taught the Sustainable Design
Sustainable design
Sustainable design is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of economic, social, and ecological sustainability.-Intentions:The intention of sustainable design is to "eliminate negative environmental...
studio.
In 1995, Kaechele began curating large-scale, site-specific installation art with musician Perry Farrell
Perry Farrell
Perry Farrell is the frontman for the alternative rock band Jane's Addiction. Farrell created the touring festival Lollapalooza as a farewell tour for Jane's Addiction in 1991; it has since evolved into an annual destination festival. Farrell continues to produce Lollapalooza with partners William...
in Los Angeles, including work on the first Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival
Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival is a three-day annual music and arts festival, organized by Goldenvoice and held at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California, in the Inland Empire's Coachella Valley...
. In 2000, she moved to New Orleans and began collaborating with artist/musicians Quintron and Miss Pussycat on performance art projects.
In 2007 she founded Life is Art Foundation | KKProjects, an art space composed of six abandoned houses in the St Roch Neighborhood of New Orleans. The foundation invites local and international artists to create site-specific installations utilizing the houses and surrounding ecological and social environment as medium. Exhibitions have included artists from emerging to Tony Oursler
Tony Oursler
Tony Oursler is a multimedia and installation artist.- Tapes, Installations: 1977-1989:Tony Oursler is known for his fractured-narrative handmade video tapes including The Loner, 1980 and EVOL 1984. These works involve elaborate sound tracks, painted sets, stop-action animation and optical special...
, Mel Chin
Mel Chin
Mel Chin is a conceptual visual artist. Motivated largely by political, cultural, and social circumstances, Chin works in a variety of art media to calculate meaning in modern life. Chin places art in landscapes, in public spaces, and in gallery and museum exhibitions, but his work is not limited...
, Keith Sonnier
Keith Sonnier
Keith Sonnier is a Postminimalist, performance, video and light artist. Sonnier was one of the first artists to use light in sculpture in the 1960s, and has been one of the most successful with this technique...
and Robert Rauschenberg
Robert Rauschenberg
Robert Rauschenberg was an American artist who came to prominence in the 1950s transition from Abstract Expressionism to Pop Art. Rauschenberg is well-known for his "Combines" of the 1950s, in which non-traditional materials and objects were employed in innovative combinations...
.
Kaechele also purchased several houses in post Katrina New Orleans for purposes as an art project. The Life is Art Foundation is founded on an appreciation for ecological systems and natural order. The application of systems-based thinking to life and art is the core mission, as expressed through projects that marry art with architecture, ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
, agriculture and human social order. The foundation serves as a test site for cutting edge ideas in these fields.
As of April 2011, Kaechele's houses in New Orleans have been abandoned.
Kaechele's current curatorial work includes a land art exhibition of an acre and a half living sugar cane sculpture in Theriot, rural Louisiana, by Norwegian artist Anne Senstad, as well as twenty, large-scale site-specific installations in New Orleans’ City Park and Botanical Gardens in partnership with Voodoo Experience
Voodoo Experience
Voodoo Experience, also commonly referred to as Voodoo or Voodoo Fest, is a multi-day music and arts festival held in City Park, New Orleans, Louisiana. It was first held on Halloween weekend in 1999. It has since moved between the weekend before Halloween and Halloween weekend throughout the years...
.
Kaechele’s work has been exhibited at the A+D Museum: Los Angeles
A+D Museum: Los Angeles
A+D Museum, also known as Architecture and Design Museum, Los Angeles, is a museum for architecture and design in Los Angeles, California. It is located on Wilshire Boulevard in Museum Row in the Miracle Mile district, next to the Peterson Automotive Museum.- History :A+D Museum was co-founded by...
, and covered in international publications including the New York Times’ T Magazine, Interview, Newsweek, Art in America, Art Papers, GQ and the RISD interior architecture Journal.