Cat Crotchett

Cat Crotchett has been a professional artist for over 30 years. Her encaustic paintings are characterized by layers of information interweaving Eastern and Western patterns painted in vibrant colors and textured surfaces. Cat's current work combines elements of pattern in fragments that together embody something different than their individual parts. They represent an intersection of information as well as ideas of cultural appropriation, assimilation, fragmentation and alteration. She focuses on visual possibilities using the interrelationships between patterns and the new identities that are formed when patterns are layered or juxtaposed. Her patterns are continually active, whether they are engaged individually or together. The end result is dynamic interaction from nuanced changes in form as patterns are established, juxtaposed & layered. Each piece has self-imposed parameters - color restrictions relating to Western color theory; pattern structures that mimic Eastern and Western cultural pattern forms; and color and materials layered in particular orders to imitate influence over time representing cultural sediment. Cat has been a regular presenter and instructor at the International Encaustic Conference in Provincetown, Massachusetts, and has taught painting workshops in the United States and in Indonesia. She earned BFAs in Painting and Art History from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, and an MFA in Art from Bowling Green State Univeristy, Bowling Green, Ohio. She has an extensive exhibition record that includes solo exhibitions at Vanderbilt University, the University of Illinois Chicago, the Maryland Institute of Art and Barbaran Segaragunung Gallery in Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia. She was the 2015 College of Fine Arts Roehrick Distinguished Professor at Western Michigan University and teaches painting in the Frostic School of Art. Cat lives and works in Kalamazoo, Michigan.