Location: Hong Kong
Repetition, stillness and rhythm are essential elements in Catherine Pickop’s work. She is particularly interested in how art can help to express internal emotions and rationalize inner thoughts. She began using coffee residue as a personal material in her art making exploring feelings consciously and subconciously as a method of self discovery Her works become a visual reflection of her mind, the process of her art-making describes how she sees the world, reconstructed on paper in minimal abstract form.
After exploring different media through her early stage, she is now more focused on drawings with natural mineral pigment and coffee residue. She created her own method and gesture of rubbing natural mineral pigment on paper which is direct and intimate way of painting. Each painting evolves from combination of carefully planned structure and the direct sensation of application and removal of pigment. The carefully calibrated neutral tones create complex spacial compositions which invite the audience to appreciate movement and subtle variations of colour.
The process of my art making is a way to express my personal response to the world around me with a distinct technique and style. It is a profound self-communication and a visual representation of my mind. Art allows me to rebuild a long lost sensitivity and forms a path that leads to peace and stillness as well as an appreciation of the beauty of imperfection.
The sentimental longing for a peaceful mind and a constant desire for something that does not and probably cannot exist informs every step of my art creation process. Coffee residue is a major medium in my art. It began as a metaphor for routine and self control and has developed into a useful tool to awaken and reconnect the senses.
Repetition, stillness, and rhythm are essential elements in my work, each painting is my yearning for harmony of order and beauty. Mechanical scoring on paper invokes a strong feeling of precision in order to achieve a compositional balance. The gesture of rubbing coffee residue and natural mineral pigments on paper using my body temperature, skin and the pressure of my fingers alone to control the tonal movement in colour is for me, an intimacy between my body, mind, paper and the medium. The sound and scent, as well as the feeling, is therapeutic, meditative and liberating.
In making this art, an increasingly large body of work is being created with the same style and methodology while evolving iteratively into a variety of different compositional concepts.
Natural Mineral Pigment and Coffee Residue on Watercolor Paper
H: 76cm x W: 113cm
2018
“When Someone is Seeking”
