Catherine Snow, Fort Worth, TX
Member Since July 2012
Artist Statement As is so often said, art is the window to the soul. Self-expression through art enlivens spirituality and creativity, tapping inner resources, furthering self-discovery and awareness.
I am recently retired from my second career as Family Counselor, play therapist and expressive art therapist. I practiced in Lewisville and Fort Worth for 16 years after graduating from Texas Woman’s University with a master’s degree in Marriage and Family Counseling. I have additional training in play therapy from the University of North Texas and Expressive Art Therapy from Dr. Jane Goldberg’s Expressive Arts Training Institute in Newport Beach, CA.
It was during my training in Expressive Art Therapy that I was encouraged by my fellow trainees—many of whom were professional artists—to enter a weaving in a juried art show in Dallas. I was accepted and the piece sold. That was the beginning of my third career as an artist in 2004.
Now, as a professional artist and creativity facilitator, my mission is to help people understand that art is about the process of self-expression and having fun, not the production of a "masterpiece". It is about releasing the passion of my soul and allowing it to flow outward to resonate with the souls of others.
Art has taken me along several paths. The mandala drawings reflect my personal growth as I walk through difficult times in my life. I begin with one or several basic shapes and the mandala creates itself. I simply improvise, following inner impulses, feelings, frustrations. Making a mandala is an unconscious, strange and beautiful, even mystical process. The result filled with both personal and universal symbolic meaning--like it or not, a window into my soul.
I love sticks, driftwood, seedpods, fibers, yarn, rocks, clay, all of which connect me with my roots—farmers, woodworkers, rock hounds, quilters, crafters, creative homemakers. My ancestors loved the land and lived their lives with a respect for and in communion with nature. My extended family owned 3 farms within a 4 mile radius in Garfield County, Oklahoma. I grew up on those farms and still feel a deep spiritual connection there, and an aching loss as members of the family died and the farms were sold. The Earth as mother, provider, sustainer, are the traditions of my youth that manifest as the goddesses, stick figures and weavings of my fiber art.
The Great Depression and the rationing of materials and goods during World War II caused hardship for my family which necessitated recycling and reuse of everything. I believe this tendency remains in the core of my being and is a prevalent theme in my art projects.
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