Catherine McCaw-Aldworth

After the success of  DOMESTIC DISHARMONY I wanted to keep pushing myself in the same direction but even bigger, and with another important show coming up in London in May I wanted a true statement piece. My mind instantly went to the planning of the big house appliances, at first I wanted to make a bath out of wax, but baths have been used by others on my course and in art history and I wanted to create something different from the rest. For some reason the thought of a wax washing machine stood out to me, but different to my previous pieces I wanted to incorporate some aspect of the body, an imprint in the wax.  The piece is not yet finished but hopefully will be done in the next couple of weeks once the uni workshops are open again, it will then be shown in my next upcoming show 'No Fit State'  The photos below show the progress I have made so far and the process to making all the individual pieces that once assembled will create the washing machine...

I was able to take part in a ceramics workshop today which was very helpful in letting me explore new avenues of work. ceramics is very important in the home as It is what most of our eating appliances such as plates, bowls and cups are made from. There are various forms of ceramics that one can work with but today I was working with terracotta clay and used it in some unconventional ways. I created two simple houses, four walls, a triangular roof and knife drawn doors and windows, much like a three-dimensional children’s drawing. I then threw these houses against a wall to smash and deform them, this became the finished piece. It reminds me of Dorothy’s house from the Wizard of Oz when it lands atop the wicked witch. This kind of displacement of a house is somewhat nauseating, it could be seen as a demolished pile of clay from a child or an abstract piece of an artist. .

The time has come and DOMESTIC DISHARMONY is here! I am so proud and beyond thrilled with how this show has turned out. If you’re near Farnham come by and say hi and see some amazing work! DOMESTIC DISHARMONY is a collective work of five female artists centring around the theme of the domestic and all that surrounds it. The works of Catherine McCaw-Aldworth, Lauren Rea, Eleanor McLean, Julia Da Costa and Maria Kaminska.  The work varies from three dimensional sculpture and to dimensional painting and poetry on bed sheets. Whether the work is poetic in the form of words or in the form of dripping wax from lace, the work finds a way to connect with its audience. 

I am currently putting together a show called DOMESTIC DISHARMONY and I am working on some new pieces to have in the show. I am going to show the print ‘Traces’ from the crit show as I had some really good feedback from that piece and I really want to show it again to a wider audience and outside of the dirty studio environment where our crit shows take place. I had an idea for a piece that I call ‘The Seven Dwarves’ this will consist of seven wax cans in the stages of crumpling on a box shelf. The cans represent empty alcoholic drinks that can be left around the home by parents. The stages of crumpling in the cans also refers to the deterioration of the home. How a situational place can decay. One thing that I find quite interesting is how parents or guardians tell their children fairy tales and stories to mask what’s really going on in the home. By influencing the child’s imagination, it distracts them from what’s really going on around them. these sto...

  I wanted to take my cast domestic objects into an environment that was equally as haunting as the objects. Something that was abandoned and fragile, almost dead-like and untouched. After researching possible places online, I came across the Whitchurch Hospital in Cardiff, near my home, which used to be a mental asylum. It was quite easy to get too as there are always people passing through and it turned out to be the perfect place to visit and do a photoshoot in. I took an ironing board and some laced fabric with me to photograph the iron, but with the milk bottle and light switch I just left them to their own stance. I was able to attach the switch to one of the more decaying walls where all of the paint was peeling off, quite a beautiful scene of decay actually. The milk bottles were placed on one of the parlour mantel pieces in low lighting. I had so many photos from the day which I edited using photoshop just to take...

Myself and the rest of the fine art year went on a trip to London recently and it really was very inspiring and circulated lots of new ideas into my mind. We visited a few sited throughout the day, the most important being the Bloomberg New Contemporaries at the South London Gallery, Hyper Mesh at the Assembly Point Gallery and the APT studios/gallery. In the Bloomberg New Contemporaries, I enjoyed many of the pieces but I had a few close favourites. One of the first pieces I came across was by Jack Burton ‘Hotel, Night Shop, The Smell of Fig Trees’ a multimedia pieces that depicts a domestic scene of a bathroom layered with doodles of other random objects and gesture which have some personal connection to the space and artist. The mute colours of the piece also make it stand out, which is quite compelling actually. Jack Burton ‘Displacement’ by Mohammed Sami was also one of my favourites from the day. An acrylic painting on linen that shows a two-prong plug lying ...

I recently put in a submission to show work in a show called ‘Pint Sized’ and I’m happy to say that my digital collage ‘Psycho’ was chosen to be displayed at the show. Although the collage was primarily made as an experimentation and form of play, I have been getting lots of really good feedback on the piece and so decided to submit it! the show will take place from the 15 th -17 th February and the private view is on the 14 th February. If you’re near Folkestone please go and have a look! This is the statement I put alongside the submission. “Art is a platform that has no language, it only requires understanding from the viewer to be able to create a certain connection to the individuals own experience. This is what I look to create in my work, something that can create a bond with the viewer to make them think about their worldly perspective and perhaps alter their understanding of the world. While my practise is constantly developing through many mediums and themes...

Casting household items can be extremely difficult, especially if you don’t have the financial ability to use easier and more flexible casting materials such as silicone. To create the milk bottles, light switch and iron I wanted to make for ‘Horrors of the home’ I had to use a plaster mould and an alginate mould. Seeing as my uni gives us plaster for free I tried to make a 2-part mould of the milk bottle and iron using that, it worked for the milk bottles but because of the shape and size of the iron I has to rethink and change to making an alginate 2-part mould, which also didn’t work. I ended up using half the alginate mould and plugging up any holes and cracks with clay whilst I filled it with wax. While extremely unconventional, it did work in the end and I’m really happy with the final look of the iron. I didn’t smooth it down or fix the errors left from the cast. Instead I let it look ‘rough’ much like how Sarah Lucas and Rachael Whitread do with their work. The only way t...

Cornelia Parker 'Psycho Barn' I have set myself a small project to get myself back into making and being productive again. my studio has been far too bare lately. I have decided to move on from the sci-fi, fantasy and horror movie fascination, I realise now it was more of a phase and pass time. I’m now looking into the sets of these movies and how they translate into reality. I think this could be the start of something really good and exciting in my practice. I feel more in control of the work now and where its going. I have been doing a lot of research lately and have found a great fascination with the works pf Rachel Whiteread, Cornelia Parker and Sarah Lucas! I have liked their works for a long time but I find that it is more relevant to my work now, as I think I may be heading into the realms of the domestic within my work. I was looking into the bates motel house from the movie psycho and came across the piece by Cornelia Parker ‘Psycho Barn’ which is a replica of t...

Studio Imagery Wall As I have mentioned before we are lucky enough to have our own project/exhibition space at UCA Farnham. Every Thursday we are encouraged to band together in groups of four and put on pop-up shows, I have already taken part in one which was called ‘fragmented’ and now I have taken part in another called ‘to be confirmed’. There was meant to be four of us working together on this but unfortunately the other three artists dropped out last minute and so I had the space to myself. Although this is frustrating as it was meant to be a group show, it was also beneficial to me as I had the space to use as a testing ground. I’ve been playing around with the idea of utopia and dystopia, thinking about different interactions with materials and context. I’m not sure exactly where I am going with my work lately, I am currently interested in sci-fi, horror and fantasy cinema, more so in their settings and environments. I created a bit of an inspiration wall in my studio with...