Katie Stackhouse

Master of Contemporary Art

I am interested in the intricate and complex connections that occur between bodies, objects and a site’s ecology. Throughout my practice, I consider philosophies of new materialism and the intersections between pedagogies of ecological stewardship, politics of care, feminism(s) and theories of place.
Working with sculpture, painting, video and performance, I seek to translate somatic relationships between the human body and sites, using materials that hold transformative properties and histories of ceremonial function, such as beeswax, bronze, plaster and paint.

The river near my home and the granite coastline where I have lived have at times become embodied in the art-making, subverting human-centric worldviews. The performative processes of painting on site welcome co-authorship with forces of weather, earth pigments and geological terrain.