Kate Just facts for kids

Kate Just (born in 1974) is an American-Australian artist who is famous for her unique and political use of knitting. She creates amazing sculptures and pictures out of yarn. Besides working on her own, Just often teams up with communities to create large public art projects. These projects help bring attention to important social issues, like the safety and respect of women.

Early Life and Education

Kate Just was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1974. In 1996, she moved to Melbourne, Australia. Just is a multi-talented artist who works with knitting, sculpture, ceramics, and photography. She has studied art and filmmaking at several universities, including Monash University and the Victorian College of the Arts.

Just has been a lecturer in art at the Victorian College of the Arts since 2005. She started knitting in 2000 after her brother passed away. Her mother taught her to knit as a way to cope with her sadness. Just sees knitting as a powerful way to tell personal and important stories. She says her knitted art often reflects her own life experiences.

Amazing Knitted Art

Just is known for creating large, detailed sculptures and pictures using knitting. She also works with other materials like clay and photography. Much of her art explores the female body from a feminist point of view. A feminist is someone who believes in equal rights and opportunities for women. By using knitting, Just shows that crafts can be a serious and powerful form of art.

Famous Artworks and Projects

In her early work, Just used knitting to retell ancient Greek myths and famous historical paintings. She did this to share her own personal feelings and experiences.

Just has also led many art projects that involve the public. These projects often focus on making communities safer for women.

• Community Banners: In projects like KNIT HOPE (2013) and KNIT SAFE (2014), Just worked with groups of women in Australia and the United Kingdom. Together, they knitted large banners with messages that challenged the problem of violence in homes and communities.
• Feminist Fan Series (2015-2017): For this project, Just hand-knitted over forty portraits of famous feminist and queer artists she admires. Some of these artists include Yoko Ono, Tracey Moffatt, Sarah Lucas, and the Guerrilla Girls. Each knitted picture took about 80 hours to make and contained over 10,000 stitches. Just calls this series an "act of devotion" to the artists who inspired her.
• Anonymous Was A Woman (2021): This was Just's first major museum show at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. The artwork was made of over 140 knitted panels, each with the words "Anonymous was a woman." This phrase comes from a famous book by Virginia Woolf. The project highlights how female artists have often been left out of art history. It also points to issues women still face today.
• PROTEST SIGNS (2022): This exhibition featured knitted versions of signs seen at protests.
• SELF CARE ACTION SERIES (2023): This work included 40 knitted panels with self-care ideas. It explored how the artist dealt with sadness after her father's death and why self-care is important for artists and activists.

Exhibitions and Collections

Just's art has been shown in more than one hundred exhibitions in Australia and around the world. Her work has been displayed in galleries in New York, Finland, China, Tokyo, and New Delhi.

Some of her artworks are part of permanent museum collections.

• The banners Safe and Hope are in the Wangaratta Art Gallery collection.
• Paradise, a life-sized knitted sculpture of a woman, is in the Ararat Gallery TAMA collection. It is based on the Greek myth of Persephone.
• Her work is also in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia and the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Awards and Achievements

Kate Just has received many awards and honors for her art.

• Siemens-RMIT Fine Art Scholarship (2006)
• Mollie Hollman Doctoral Medal for her PhD project at Monash University (2013)
• Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award (2015)
• Asialink Residency in New Delhi, India (2016)
• Australian Fellowship Residency in New York (2019)
• Australia Council for The Arts Visual Art Fellowship (2022)

Personal Life

Just has been with her Australian wife since about 1994. She met her partner in Australia when she was 20 and moved there permanently two years later. They have two children.