About the Show
This work showcases sculptural paintings, developed over several years of experimentation from accumulated junk mail and paper waste, agar-agar-based bioplastic, plant and mineral pigment, and commercially produced paint.
With these pieces, Cottle examines the possibilities for regeneration produced by intermingling “natural,” “unnatural,” “recycled,” and “virgin” materials in her quest to (re)claim beauty as our birthright despite the wasteland we inhabit. She invites the viewer to join her in celebrating the fact of our existence and the joy of our aliveness, thereby turning our backs on the wasteland and choosing an emergent path—one dependent on our grappling with empire and its detritus so that we might reconstitute it.
Kerry Cottle is a visual artist and educator based in Sacramento, California.
She received her MFA from the University of New Mexico and a BA and MA from California State University, Sacramento and currently teaches at Sierra College, Folsom Lake College, and California State University, Sacramento. Most recently, she was an artist-in-residence at Social Studies in Northern California and at Burren College of Art on the west coast of Ireland. This is her first solo exhibition at Axis Gallery.