CATHERINE PAUL

ABOUT CATHERINE PAUL

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I work in an array of media, from assemblage to drawing to textiles.

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My artist's book Ill, On Being uses the form of the card catalog drawer to bring together writers' experiences of illness, in hope of bringing solace, haptic joy, and education to those who thumb through it.

 

My multi-media project HORSE derives from a question: Why did I have an emotion reaction--overwhelming and even inappropriate--to a drawing in a museum? My process allows my exploration to span across media, beginning with intimate forms of writing and drawing into commercialized and decorative realms, where the personal wobbles. 

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My fiber art brings traditional methods of quilting and knitting into abstracted encounters with natural, imagined, and literary worlds. As an art form with a long and tangled history, quilting offers special opportunities to explore relationships between art and craft, comfort and discomfort, utility and art for art's sake. Traditionally thought of--and denigrated--as women's work, quilting further allows examination of gendered thinking in the art world, and opportunities to explore the place of women's creativity. 

 

I also make a lot of quilts, because people need comfort, and fabric brings me joy.