Statement
ARTIST STATEMENT
My work has influences as varied as illuminated manuscripts, Indian and Islamic miniatures, textiles and visionary art. I’m especially drawn to the beautiful patterning used in these traditions. Painting is the way I work through issues in my life. Painting with gouache in the manner that I do is a slow, meditative and self-soothing process. I am interested in the uplifting power of color and the creative process during emotional periods in our lives. My work explores the complicated parent-child relationship and the desire to protect a loved one.
As my child grew older and I was less able to protect her as I had when she was younger, I became interested in the long tradition of using art to protect, guard or heal loved ones. Over the past few years, I have created work that serves as talismans, spells, or wishes. Eye-forms are ever vigilant and ward off evil. Complicated and repetitive patterns confuse evil spirits and entrap the bad. I try to work as intuitively as possible and color choices are made one step at a time, rather than working with a pre-determined palette.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
After earning a BFA in Painting from The Cooper Union in New York, Catherine Colangelo returned to Houston to pursue her art practice. She was one of five finalists for the 2017 Artadia Award – Houston, the recipient of 2011 and 2007 Individual Artist Grant Fellowships from the Houston Arts Alliance, and has been a Hunting Prize finalist in 2014 and 2010. Catherine’s work has been featured in many group exhibits and in the recent solo exhibitions Force Field at Front Gallery, Everyday Sorcery and Talismanic at Cindy Lisica Gallery (Houston), Ocular Rhythms at McMurtrey Gallery (Houston), and Sea Change at Conduit Gallery (Dallas).
Catherine’s work has been selected by Rebecca Matalon, Curator, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, Claire C. Carter, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, and Bill Arning, former director of the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, to be included in New American Paintings, West Issue. Her work is also included in corporate collections including: Four Seasons Hotel (Abu Dhabi, UAE), Four Seasons Hotel (Houston), Rosewood Abu Dhabi Hotel, (Abu Dhabi, UAE), Fidelity Investments (Boston), and Sidley Austin LLP (Houston).