Press Release: Natural Bridge

Katherine Taylor & Natalia Wróbel

October 6 - 29, 2017
Opening reception: Friday, October 6, 6-9 pm

Abigail Ogilvy Gallery is proud to present Natural Bridge, an exhibition featuring sculptor Katherine Taylor and painter Natalia Wróbel, whose work transforms organic textures and firm shapes into other worldly objects and places. Rooted in nature, Taylor’s sculptures mimic animals but upon closer examination the texture reveals itself to other be drawn from other agricultural objects, creating sculptures that are animal-botanical hybrids. Similarly, Wróbel indulges in the atmosphere of her surrounding, using city sounds, canals, and flowering vines to create portals into liminal realms beyond our physical world.  Both Wróbel and Taylor use their artwork as a means to inspire beauty, truth, and respect in an otherwise imperfect reality.

Katherine Taylor’s process begins outside of her studio walls as she explores the mountains, forests and rivers to find patterns that provide inspiration for her work’s surface. Her choice of medium creates a sense of durability, yet upon close examination the details are delicate, refined, and exquisite. Taylor creates molds of familiar objects- leaves, melons, and tree bark. By casting and shaping in bronze and stainless steel, the earthly textures create the essence of dried elephant’s skin, sleek whale fins, and the boney backs of lizards. Insistent that nature can be brought from the mountains into her studio, “My current practice revolves around tree bark as an artistic medium. To isolate it, I take an impression of the bark using a silicone paste to pick up the pattern and details of the surface. The silicone is food-grade and does not harm the tree. Rather, it allows the tree to travel with me.” Her process allows nature to become part of an artwork that is responsive to the specific site, space and time. Whether small in scale or nearly life size, the sculptures exude a sense of grandeur and profound presence.

In her third exhibition at Abigail Ogilvy Gallery, Natalia Wróbel’s artwork spans from 2013 to her most current works completed in September 2017, created in New York City, Boston, and a recent piece from her time in Amsterdam. Her pieces reference ancient architecture, elements from nature, and neural networks to elicit imagined, meditative pseudo-landscapes. By weaving in subtle hatch-work of marks in complementary colors, more chartreuse greens and yellows, and a few thicker paint applications of the palest pink, Wróbel’s allows her artwork to evolve from her surroundings. She paints as a means to bring harmony to our world, “It is my duty to create beauty for others to behold and enjoy. There is enough suffering and darkness in the world. I will use my energy to create a peaceful resting place for the eyes, mind and soul.” Each painting carries a spirituality that is meant for each viewer to privately interpret, a place of sanctuary and meditation.

Katherine Taylor is a sculptor living and working in Houston. Taylor holds a Bachelor of Arts from Dartmouth College (1997) and an MFA from the University of Melbourne in Australia (2005). Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including exhibitions at Skoto Gallery in New York, the National Arts Club in New York, and the Hood Museum of Art in Hanover. She is in several public and private collections in the US and abroad.

Natalia Wróbel studied art at Dartmouth College, the New York Studio School, and the Lorenzo de'Medici Institute in Florence. Her paintings are featured in numerous private international collections and have been on view at notable Art Fairs including Art Basel: Miami, Art South Hampton, and Texas Contemporary. She received the New York Studio School Mercedes Matter Fellowship in 2012, and the Murray Art Prize in 2015. In 2016, her painting was selected for inclusion at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston Auction. In 2017, she was awarded a painting residency at the Berlin Art Institute. She currently lives and works in Berlin, Germany.