Galway artist Cat brings The Wild Things to life as she returns to creative calling
It's been more than 20 years since Oughterard artist Cat Coogan graduated from college with a fine arts degree. Since then, life brought her in other directions and for many years, her art remained largely private.
Cat Coogan returns to creative calling with ‘The Wild Things’
However, over the past year Cat decided to fully re-engage with her creative work and the result is a solo exhibition, ‘The Wild Things’, running at Oughterard Courthouse, from this Friday to Sunday, September 4-6.
Cat's detailed art is inspired by Irish wildlife, landscape, folklore and her connection with the natural world. Working primarily in gouache, watercolour, ink and fine pen, her paintings combine animals, including deer, foxes, ravens and Irish wolfhounds, with aspects of Irish mythology, Celtic symbolism and landscape.
While animals are central to the work, Cat says her paintings aren't intended simply as wildlife portraits. They explore ideas of instinct, perception, memory and the unseen world beyond ordinary human experience.
After returning to art in a serious way, Cat began sharing her work publicly and there's been great demand for her original paintings and limited edition prints.
This show marks a return to the part of her life that began in art college and which, despite the intervening years, never entirely disappeared. ‘The Wild Things’ will include original paintings alongside a small number of limited edition, hand-embellished fine art prints.
The official launch is at 7pm this Friday, September 4. The show will run Saturday, 11am-5pm and Sunday from 12-5pm. All welcome.