Elizabeth Castaldo
Peekskill, New York
Peekskill, New York
Bio: Elizabeth Castaldo is an artist, printmaker, and bookbinder living and working in Peekskill NY. She is currently a Scholar of Advanced Studies in Book Arts at the Center for Book Arts in New York City. In 2007, the artist earned a BFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York City, and in 2013 she received an MFA from Savannah College of Art and Design Atlanta, where she was a Dean’s Fellow in Printmaking. Castaldo’s work has been exhibited internationally. In addition to many private collections, Cardenas’s work is held in the collections of several institutions, including the Savannah College of Art and Design, Carnegie Mellon University, and Yale University.
Statement: I work in mixed media, combining collage, drawing, and printmaking to create works on paper and artists’ books that explore the connection of feminine sensuality to nature and its manifestations in modern culture. I work with themes such as generation, growth, sexuality, entropy, and decay. I am inspired by the structural patterns inherent in plant and animal life that reveal an undeniable connection between humans and the natural universe. My compositions become multilayered worlds filled with motifs inspired by human anatomy, plant structures, and geometry. A key theme throughout the work is the resilience of living things and the ability to adapt, despite a natural tendency toward disorder.
My work is process-driven, and each stage of the process is a reaction that is informed by the work that preceded it. I play with pattern and layering, building up layers of hand-drawn patterns, watercolor washes, original prints, collage, and appropriated imagery. I am passionate about creating unique handmade art with a foundation in the practice and theory of printmaking. The layering involved in collage, printmaking, and bookmaking provides the opportunity for concealment, excavation, and revelation. Bringing many media together allows me to create something unique as I expand and transform each process; over the course of several years, I have developed and refined a personal visual language.
Statement: I work in mixed media, combining collage, drawing, and printmaking to create works on paper and artists’ books that explore the connection of feminine sensuality to nature and its manifestations in modern culture. I work with themes such as generation, growth, sexuality, entropy, and decay. I am inspired by the structural patterns inherent in plant and animal life that reveal an undeniable connection between humans and the natural universe. My compositions become multilayered worlds filled with motifs inspired by human anatomy, plant structures, and geometry. A key theme throughout the work is the resilience of living things and the ability to adapt, despite a natural tendency toward disorder.
My work is process-driven, and each stage of the process is a reaction that is informed by the work that preceded it. I play with pattern and layering, building up layers of hand-drawn patterns, watercolor washes, original prints, collage, and appropriated imagery. I am passionate about creating unique handmade art with a foundation in the practice and theory of printmaking. The layering involved in collage, printmaking, and bookmaking provides the opportunity for concealment, excavation, and revelation. Bringing many media together allows me to create something unique as I expand and transform each process; over the course of several years, I have developed and refined a personal visual language.