About the Artist
Bio
A long time resident of Tucson, Arizona, Catherine Nash is an artist who freely mixes media in her work to express her ideas. Specializing in Japanese and Western hand papermaking, encaustic painting and mixed media drawing, Nash is a teaching artist who balances her studio work with artist-in-resident teaching, lectures and workshops across the United States, as well as in professional studios and universities in eight European countries, Australia and Japan. She has published 4 educational DVDs on the art of papermaking and has just self published a book that surveys international artists entitled “Authentic Visual Voices” that includes her interviews with 28 international artists about their creative ideas. Her work has been included by invitation into numerous national and international exhibitions, most recently in Brazil, Chile, Tasmania, England, and France. Her love of travel and different cultures has inspired her to live, exhibit, research and teach on four continents.
After receiving a B.F.A. in Printmaking and Drawing from the University of New Hampshire in 1980, Nash spent a year and a half creating prints and drawings in Paris. In 1987, she graduated from the University of Arizona with a Masters of Fine Arts in Mixed Media. Two independently designed research trips to Japan enabled Nash to study the techniques of Japanese woodblock printing and papermaking in depth. From 1996-2002, her extensive research in Italy and Scandinavia increased her knowledge of historical and contemporary Western papermaking and paper arts. Nash has combined encaustic waxes and filtered earth pigments with her handmade paper works since 1994.
The landscape, aesthetics and cultures of Japan, the rich gradations and spaciousness of Scandinavian summer night skies, experiences with Native American friends and her explorations into the wilderness of the southwestern deserts have deeply influenced and informed her work.
Shows & Upcoming Events
2019 “National Book Exhibition”, Herron School of Art and Design, University of Indiana, IN. Invitational
2019 “Spectrum”, Gestalt Project Space, Santa Monica, CA.
2018 “An Inner Astronomy”/ Adobe Barn Gallery, Triangle L Ranch, Oracle, AZ. Solo exhibition.
2018 “Stranger Than Fiction” bG Gallery, Santa Monica, CA.
2017 “Surface Tension”, Ferst Center for Arts, Georgia Tech Campus, Atlanta, GA.
2017 “Luminous Within”, University of Tasmania, Burnie, Tasmania.
2016 “Paper Works”, Palace of the Governors, Santa Fe, NM.
2016 “Green & Grey”, Tempe Center for the Arts, Tempe, AZ.
2016 “Into the Night: Modern and Contemporary Art & the Nocturne Tradition”, Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ.
2016 “da Natureza para a Natureza”, Espaço Cultural, Universidad da Brasilia, Brazil. Invitational.
2016 “Luminous Within”, N. & S. America tour, IAPMA 30th Anniversary, Brazil, Chile, etc. 2016-2017
Recent Reviews
Art New England “The Elephant in the Room”, Laconia Gallery, Boston, MA. June-July, 2013 by David Raymond
“…encaustic art, made with pigmented wax and often other materials, does have a look, a soft, somewhat veiled translucent skin varying by degree from on e example to the next. At the most veiled end are works by Catherine Nash – her blue encaustic monoprint entitled Book of Fog – [has] the weather of Rothko, a soft blow of dissolving vision.”
artscope – New England’s Culture Magazine – “Distinctly Encaustic at Bowersock Gallery” by Lacy Daley:
“…Most of what Nash brings to her works comes from her worldly experiences. With specialties in Japanese and Western hand papermaking, Nash possesses a quality of authenticity that reiterates itself in her wax paintings.” About Distinctly Encaustic, June 2012 exhibition at Bowersock Gallery, Provincetown, MA.
Awards & Honors
Hand Papermaking Magazine, Summer 2019.
Nash was invited to collaborate with artist Radha Pandey to create an editioned work for the “Intergenerational Portfolio” by Hand Papermaking Magazine (2016-2017). Their resultant artwork, entitled Eclipse, has been selected for the cover of the Summer of 2019 issue.
Lumies Artist Award, 2015!!
“The Lumies Arts & Business Awards celebrate those individuals, organizations and businesses that make Southern Arizona a wellspring of creative vitality: arts ‘luminaries’ who have made a profound impact on the lives and communities of Southern Arizonans….Catherine Nash – Artist Award: Awarded to an individual artist that has demonstrated excellence, originality and ingenuity in the local arts and culture sector.”
Morris Graves Foundation: 2015 solo artist residency in the studio and home of the late painter Morris Graves, Eureka, CA.
Self published Book
AUTHENTIC VISUAL VOICES: Contemporary Paper and Encaustic is a book that Catherine Nash has been curating and writing for two years. Traveling across the United States, she has conducted videotaped interviews in the studios of 28 international artists.
This publication is a survey of international artists whose work explores the diversity of paper combined with the unique properties of encaustic wax in collage, photography, printmaking, sculptural paper and artists books. Emphasizing the voice of the artist, Authentic Visual Voices: Contemporary Paper and Encaustic is a brand new e-book available as a download, streaming or as a computer interactive DVD that artists and art lovers in particular will find captivating as they gain a deeper understanding into the motivation of these engaging and powerful artists.
Buy it now at authenticvisualvoices.com
Contact Catherine Nash
cnash at start mail dot com