Spotlight Artist

Holly Cahill

Midwest
Artist profile photo

Elemental Interplay

Abstract quilt with colorful geometric shapes and intersecting dark brown and navy bands.

acrylic on canvas and linen, natural dyes on silk and cotton, and velour

Piercing the Storm

Abstract painting with colorful semicircle, black fabric cone placed in front.

acrylic on canvas and velvet

Night Fall: anywhere/everywhere

Abstract artwork with colorful geometric shapes and three vertical dark blue fabric strips.

ink and acrylic on canvas and velour

Featured in New American Paintings1 / 3

Artist Statement

As a child, I often disappeared into the forest for hours and still find the experience of wandering generative. Through an expansive painting practice that combines fibers, sculpture, and collage, my work is aroused by moments of awe and wonder in everyday encounters within our lived ecology. I translate observations within the natural world into hybrid works that focus on the roles biodiversity, sensorial experience, and transformation play in building a more verdant future in order to deepen connection, sensitivity, and care for our environment.

Pairing improvisation with labor-intensive processes, I invite the evolution of my work with slow and intentional efforts tied to marginalized histories of craft. I often create by repurposing remnants from past and present works, merging fragments of paintings and dyed fabrics into stitched, pieced, sculptural configurations that accumulate multiple impressions of the landscape. Contrasting various perspectives and dimensions that distill and extend fleeting moments in nature, my works additionally bulge and pool out from the picture plane, encouraging viewers to consider their place within the imagery.

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