KATIE COUGHLIN | Watch the Curve

Coughlin investigates the notions of home, vessel, body, and clothing through the manipulation of space and material. Although clay is most often the place where Coughlin begins her work, she uses other mediums, specifically cloth and wood, to expand her sculptures. These material-collaborative apparatuses allow her to incorporate the human body, placing her work between object, sculpture, and performance.

“As a teenager, there were constantly clothes to take off the line. We had, at one point, three clotheslines reaching out from the windows to the telephone pole tucked away in the left corner of our backyard. The reaching of arms out the window as our legs anchored us inside was a brutal test of our ability to balance and stretch. Our body became a part of this apparatus —as it often does when we complete physical tasks; our joints propel us forward while shoulders and hips and heads bear weight and get worked. When our bodies become mechanisms, where does the boundary lie? Is the edge of our body – the tip of our finger – or is it the ends of the bristles of the broom as we sweep the floor?”

There will be two performances on Saturday, August 6^th, and Saturday, September 10^th, at 5 pm on the DVAA’s balcony and sidewalk, with a viewing area across the street.

Katie Coughlin received her MFA from The Ohio State University (2018) and her BFA from Alfred University (2010). Katie has been an Artist in Resident at Red Lodge Clay Center and Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts. She has received multiple awards, including the Outstanding Student Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Award from the International Sculpture Center, The Warren Mackenzie Advancement Award from Northern Clay Center, and most recently, a 2020 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship. A native New Yorker, Katie returned to the city in 2018 and lives and works in Brooklyn.