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Cathleen Cramer
My work draws inspiration from remnants of daily domestic life to confront what is recorded and valued in the realm of the maternal. The collage elements I employ relate specifically to the dominant aspects of my current life: my family and my home. I use personal photography, my children’s doodles, and found wood, fabric shards, wallpaper samples, and leftover latex paint from home projects. Recently, I’ve been particularly interested in ways that different spiritual traditions allow for the sacred in the home. Having lost a connection to the religious practices of my upbringing, I’m looking for the divine in everyday life, and inventing my own spiritual practices. “Kitchen altars,” small devotional spaces in the household, can be found in various religious traditions including Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Borrowing from this concept, I use my son’s whittling, found wood, and found paint to frame and embellish humble photographic images that have memorialized sacred moments in my life. The resulting objects act as gateways that allow the caregiver, the food-maker, the house-cleaner, to enter the world of magic and mystery that sits alongside the mundane.
May I Be a Lamp in the Darkness, 10 x 14 x 2, mixed media (personal photographs, found wood and paint, my son's whittling), 2024
Cathleen Cramer is an interdisciplinary artist, teacher, and mother based in Chicago, Illinois. She holds a BA in Fine Art from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and a Masters in Teaching from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her artistic practice is rooted in collage mentality, prioritizing spontaneity, flexibility, and process. She recently completed the Bridge Program at Chicago’s Hyde Park Art Center and her work has been featured in Kinhouse Catalogue and Chicago Collage Magazine. Exhibition highlights include Terrain Biennial, ARC Gallery, Evanston Art Center, and Lillstreet Art Center.
Cathleen Cramer
My work draws inspiration from remnants of daily domestic life to confront what is recorded and valued in the realm of the maternal. The collage elements I employ relate specifically to the dominant aspects of my current life: my family and my home. I use personal photography, my children’s doodles, and found wood, fabric shards, wallpaper samples, and leftover latex paint from home projects. Recently, I’ve been particularly interested in ways that different spiritual traditions allow for the sacred in the home. Having lost a connection to the religious practices of my upbringing, I’m looking for the divine in everyday life, and inventing my own spiritual practices. “Kitchen altars,” small devotional spaces in the household, can be found in various religious traditions including Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Borrowing from this concept, I use my son’s whittling, found wood, and found paint to frame and embellish humble photographic images that have memorialized sacred moments in my life. The resulting objects act as gateways that allow the caregiver, the food-maker, the house-cleaner, to enter the world of magic and mystery that sits alongside the mundane.
May I Be a Lamp in the Darkness, 10 x 14 x 2, mixed media (personal photographs, found wood and paint, my son's whittling), 2024
Cathleen Cramer is an interdisciplinary artist, teacher, and mother based in Chicago, Illinois. She holds a BA in Fine Art from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and a Masters in Teaching from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her artistic practice is rooted in collage mentality, prioritizing spontaneity, flexibility, and process. She recently completed the Bridge Program at Chicago’s Hyde Park Art Center and her work has been featured in Kinhouse Catalogue and Chicago Collage Magazine. Exhibition highlights include Terrain Biennial, ARC Gallery, Evanston Art Center, and Lillstreet Art Center.