BIO
Kathryn is a Kansas City-based interdisciplinary artist who works in oil paint, collage and fabric sculpture to explore the effects of her adoptive upbringing on her identity. In 2022 after a 20+ year career in product design, environmental design & entrepreneurship, Kathryn returned to her roots in fine art. A newly admitted student of Graduate Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she earned her BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute with a competitive scholarship award. Her work has been published in Core.Zine and she most recently exhibited at PLUG, Gallery Athanor, Weinberger Fine Art, The Bunker Center For The Arts & Interurban Art House.
As an adopted individual, Kathryn grapples with the scarcity of knowledge about her biological heritage, which further intensifies her yearning to explore the significant impact of this absence on her own sense of identity.
Through her work, Kathryn invites viewers to question how societal constructs regulate individuality. Her thought-provoking works disorient viewers and engage conversation about the semiotics of the human body, and their influence on personal identity.
ARTIST STATEMENT
“I have no history, only that which the world has decided for me.”
As one of two adopted children in a bi-racial household, I share only my biological mother’s blonde hair and a propulsion towards art as described in my adoption papers. This limited knowledge connecting me to my personal heritage draws me to explore how my unique history significantly impacts my own sense of identity.
Having my connection to my ancestors largely severed, my identity is largely built on my environment. Growing up I found myself drawn to emulate the dolls and photos of pretty blonde girls that provided a reflection of myself missing in my family photos. The grief & anger of this absence and a need to see myself in my environment serves as a catalyst in my work, propelling me to challenge the source of our identities. Does one’s birthright, which for me is either redacted or hijacked, determine one’s identity? Or are we reflections of a largely transactional environment?
Whether through large scale vulgar paintings of banal subject matter or sculptural works that re-frame how we view the body, I encourage introspection into the cultural factors that form our identities.