Catherine Courtenaye to Give TEDx Talk

Catherine Courtenaye reports that she has been invited to speak at the TEDx Talk at the University of Montana, in Missoula, on February 20. This TEDx Talk theme is language and will feature 17 speakers from many disciplines. Catherine is the only visual artist included in the program and will address how and why she uses language in her painting.

Catherine uses various digital and printmaking processes to incorporate examples from 19th century American penmanship manuals, arithmetic workbooks and handwritten ephemera into her paintings.

She first became interested in writing “many years ago, while reading through some antiquarian documents, I was struck by how single pen strokes in 19th century manuscripts can conjure an era so keenly.” Catherine’s work allows her to combine her interests in American cultural history, literature with formal issues of stroke and texture.