Cath Dunn is a painter/printmaker inspired by land use and the rural and urban landscape. She layers colour, line and rhythm to build up semi-abstract images based on a sense of place and mood.

Fascinated by natural forms and a sense of place – rocks, trees and the lie of the land – Cath’s primary interest lies in arrangement, abstraction and stylization. Using the patterns, curves and rhythms of the land she seeks to capture the spirit and her feelings for specific places. Colour, either vivid or subtle, remains central to her work perhaps influenced by her time in Africa. Line is also important though not explicit, often created by the juxtaposition of contrasting colours and tones.

Cath works in a variety of materials with an emphasis on oil and water-based media on paper. These she uses in unusual ways, in blocks of colour to build an image based on the rhythms of dance and music she find in the landscape. Increasingly she is using combinations of materials: collograph, gouache and collage for example, to attain the textures she sees and feels. The series of monotypes shown here are a part of a new series begun at the end of 2018. Cath has exhibited widely including at Cupola Gallery of Contemporary Art, Sheffield, Chatsworth House Derbyshire and Alpha Art, Edinburgh.

Cath is originally from Scotland, now lives in Sheffield and has spent much of her life in Africa and Asia. She come from a family of scientists and poets and hopes that the influences of Scotland, Africa, the Pennines, and of poetry and science are evident in her work. Over the past ten years or so, Cath has been exploring the Dark Peak, an area of heather, peat, rock and rough land around Sheffield. Visually, this provides her with a myriad of surfaces and patterns to explore in paint, printmaking and collage. Certain ecologies, such as the birch woods found throughout the Peak District, represent for Cath, the gracefulness found in other art forms such as contemporary dance. Metaphorically, the Dark Peak provides her with a sense of freedom while at the same time a pagan connection to the elements and a feeling of timelessness.

Cath is a member of Peak District Artisans, Society of Scottish Artists and Sheffield Printmakers. In 2018 she was awarded a Derbyshire County Council award and in 2019 a Making Ways (Arts Council) travel bursary. She has original work hanging in Ashgate Hospice and has undertaken commissions including for Oblong Furniture, Leeds.

Winner of the The Green Man Gallery Award (2019)