Bird Queen II Artwork

A Gifted Painter and Sculptor Cohen's Visual Language Kate Cohen draws from the traditions of Surrealism and folk art to craft riveting personal icons that record her life experiences in resonate symbols. She assembles diverse, often aged materials and arranges them into complex constructions. She seduces the viewer by revealing her creative process and thus taps into the collective unconscious where symbols are transformed from autobiographical details to universal truths. A gifted painter as well as a talented sculptor, Cohen combines both media in objects that demand viewer interaction. Sometimes this interaction is intellectual, where fragmented words in puzzle-like games and other visual clues are scattered across the composition. inviting the viewer to "solve" the mystery of the art and thereby determining meaning. At other times the interaction is physical as in "Fragments" and Cohen's "Birds and Balls a Go Go" which invites the viewer to pick up the forms, experience the evocative forms revealed through the play of shadows. In both cases, the knowing is intuitive. Cohen's work tells without narrative; it implies in visual language rather than explaining with text. Cohen hopes her work makes you happier than a bird with a french fry.