Catalina Ouyang
I'm taken with the potential of art, like a mother, being both shelter and warning.
— Catalina Ouyang about her practice on De:formal.
Image by Alexander Perrelli from the artist's website.
It is not a simple thing to take in Catalina’s work, for without instruction viewers are left with the complexities of their own thoughts, moving through the carefully constructed spaces that she creates. Am I sad? Afraid? Empowered? At every turn of Catalina’s work, one feels an oscillation of feeling that stays with you long after stepping away from the room. Through it all however, there is a sense of unapologetic “badassness” (for lack of a better term) - where trauma, love, pain, intimacy are on full display in whatever form it needs to take. Whether it be wooden sculptures that teeter in uncomfortably awkward heights or a child-like doll with hollowed out eyes gaze unceasingly towards traumatic imagery, Catalina’s practice draws you into her world in a myriad of ways asking you to peer into the smallest details.
In font IV, a head lays flat with its mouth opened as if in offering, a ghostly shape (in reality, a vinegared egg) deposited just so - not unlike receiving communion. In such a small space, an entire conversation emerges of power dynamics and the supplication of the body to something unknown.
Digital render of "font V" from Epoch Gallery's "Wonderland".
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