Catherine Owens is an Irish artist living and working in New York
City. Her work is largely installation based, originating from ideas that
evolve through drawings, painting, sculpture, photography, sound,
film and video.
Using the technical and production knowledge gained while
collaborating on large scale global projects over the last 20 years,
Owens has incorporated this information into her current work,
creating a series of LED based Light Works that seamlessly bring
technology and mark making together.
A large-scale set of these pieces (5ft X5ft ea) were commissioned by
and installed in the renovated Capitol Theatre in Port Chester New
York.
As well as her own solo art practice Owens is known for her
collaborative work with the band U2. As creative director of screen
imagery for animation, film and video, she has made their key visual
content for five world tours from 1992 – 2010
Owens directed and was a producer on the first digital 3D film (U23D)
made for theatrical release in 2008. Shot in South America, its
creation spearheaded a series of major technological breakthroughs
in 3D filmmaking.
The New York Times hailed it as “The first IMAX movie that deserves
to be called a work of art.”
She has created and directed visual content and animation for the
San Francisco based group Kronos Quartet and for the Chinese Pipa
player Wu Man, whose Carnegie Hall debut featured an intricate 20-
minute animation directed by Owens. Owens has attended four
Lincoln Center Director's Labs in New York as a guest artist and was
a keynote speaker at SIGGRAPH in 2008, where she spoke about
working in 3D under the title; Giving Technology Emotion: From the
Artist's Mind to "U23D"
While collaborating with U2 Owens commissioned and directed
significant video works by such artists as Roy Lichtenstein, David
Wojnarowicz, Sugimoto, and Shirin Neshat. Also she created audio-
visual segments for U2’s live shows in collaboration with the Warhol
Estate, Keith Haring Estate, Desmond Tutu, Aung San Suu Kyi,
Vanessa Redgrave and Maya Angelou.
In April 2010 she traveled to India to make a 3D documentary about
Kumbh Mela, the largest spiritual gathering in the world that takes
place once every 12 years.
And in 2012 she shot her third 3D film project, a documentary on the
Irish Dancer Colin Dunne - It was broadcast on the BSkyB 3D and the
Sky Arts network. The Theatrical version was launched at the
Jameson Dublin Film Festival in February 2013.
Her recent body of work expands upon the use of LED Lighting
technology, merging it with paper-making and print. In 2014 she
launched "Field Prints" a set of prints representing impressions of the
vistas found close to her studio in the Blackwater Valley, Co.
Waterford, Ireland.
Owens is currently working on an exhibition of her new LED works
with Anna Kustera Projects in New York for November 2017 while
developing a series of audio visual projects for the Virtual Reality
space.