Catherine didn’t graduate from Stanford University with a degree in Engineering or from the Royal College of Art with an MFA in Painting with the thought that her future would entail raising and filming thousands of insects, hundreds of rodents, and dozens of reptiles and amphibians. Had she known, at least she would have taken a class in entomology. A course in filmmaking would have been helpful, too. What drove her to engage with the little creatures critical to the ecosystem, to even go so far as to raise cockroaches, which terrify her, is to confront and challenge our anthropocentric point of view. Her hope is to bring the nonhuman back into the human world and to creatively reengage with the systems that support life on earth.
Catherine’s artistic creations have been exhibited at MoMA, MassMoca, the Kunsthalle in Vienna and the Today Art Museum in Beijing. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, ArtNews, Artforum; on PBS, CNN, NPR and the BBC; and in two books (FOOD CHAIN; and AMERICAN COCKROACH).
Little known fact: Catherine is also an award winning figure skater. She will teach you how to do a double Salchow along with sharing her ant wrangling techniques.
