MARY CATE FRUEHAN

Incompleteness asks us to fill in the blanks. I grew up surrounded by the kinds of decay common to rural Pennsylvania–a dilapidated house with a caved in roof, a car left to rust away in someone’s yard over the decades. These ruins felt monumental and mystical to me. I didn’t know who they belonged to, and I had no way of discovering their stories. They made me feel wonder. In a time where information is at our fingertips––to a point where we often feel entitled to it––wanting for more can be poignant.  

 

​

My work deals with fragments of function and dysfunction. In my studio, I amass and arrange. I begin building by incrementally laying down material––wrapping fibers, coiling clay, and layering lines. Allowing the forms to evolve slowly gives them time to suggest narratives of how they might work. As I negotiate with my materials and navigate these forms, their emerging logic suggests where an orifice should be, how something might navigate the interior of this space, or how this object could function.

 

Once I have built up these forms, I bring in other materials and objects I have accumulated. I move these many different parts around––pairing them, building them supports and homes. While these pieces may imply a function or narrative, their use is unknown and incomplete. They ask you to be empathetic, to imagine their story and want to know more about them.