Featured Artist Cathy Garnett

I am a visual artist, primarily working as a painter and printmaker. Nature and landscape have been a constant inspiration in my work. I’m inspired by the abstract aspects of the landscape with its interrelationships of form, line, color, light, and sense of place.

I spent most of my adult life as a landscape architect, which involved the visual and natural world. For almost 20 years, I walked the edge of the Neponset River in Boston while developing a multi-use trail and parks system.

This gift of time spent on the river taught me much about its habitats: estuary, salt marsh, meadow, and forest. Gazing through the grasses, rocks, and vegetation along the water’s edge, I imagined what lies beyond, under the water’s surface. In the woods, the forest’s floor, vegetation, and rocks all inspire. I tease out the complex colors of the view.

I begin the design process through drawing and observation of the view before me. I never quite feel in control of this expression. My initial color choices are intuitive and take cues from nature — a subconscious response to what I see. I paint with watercolor and acrylic. As a printmaker I use etching, woodcut, serigraphy with stencils, and chine-collé to express what I see.

My work is evocative, expressing a memory of place with its structure, order, and subtle complexity. My work is personal and has a strong sense of color and use of technical skills.

Art has been a part of my life, either as a landscape architect or as a visual artist, for as long as I can remember. After retiring in 2017, I received a diploma in studio art from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts. I then was selected to be an artist-in-residence at Acadia National Park, Schoodic Point, Maine. I have been a resident artist at the Mosesian Center for the Arts in Watertown for 10 years, and before that, a studio artist at the Arlington Center for the Arts. I also am a member of Shepard Maudsley Print Studio in West Newton. I have lived in Arlington for 40 years.

I participate in group and solo exhibitions in the Boston area. My work is held in many private and public collections. In 2006, I was awarded an Artist Award for an exhibit about the Arlington Reservoir from the Arlington Arts Council, funded through the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Recently, my painting, “Tidal Creek” was selected as best in show at the Three Stones Gallery in West Concord. My print “On the Edge” was given an award at the Concord Art Association’s Member’s Jury II. I have shown work at Gallery Twist in Lexington.

I have shared my art skills as a teacher of watercolor at Mosesian Center for the Arts in Watertown for over 10 years, and given workshops on the Abstract Aspects of Watercolor and Collage at the Concord Art Association.