Clio Art Fair Spotlight: A review by Cathy Jolicoeur

Tsering Dicky
3 days ago
2 min read

Artist Cathy in her studio with her artwork

Artist Cathy Jolicoeur in her studio

Cathy Jolicoeur draws her inspiration from her diverse experiences, which she then integrates into her journey, her creative process, within her projects and encounters. She aims to demonstrate that culture is a powerful vector for change that actively contributes to personal growth, based on the premise that art fosters openness to the world and to oneself. Art is the language of the senses. It is a key vector in the learning of emotions. This passion, this love for the search for unusual mediums, brings her to the heart of the creative process. To get involved in the action. To feel, to perceive the material. To go beyond. The "pure" creative act does not imply any premeditation; it is rather a kind of instinct, a sudden vital obligation that drives her to paint with her tools. Brushes, straws, needles. In short, a multitude of eclectic tools are essential for her to bring forth paintings rich in colors and textures. While painting, artist Cathy Jolicoeur undeniably feels richer, stronger too, because she possesses that extra something that allows her to reject all the miasmas of daily life, to reject them by magnifying them through artistic creation. Absence of premeditation, vital need, intrinsic and visceral energy, conscious or unconscious will to mark her time, to transmit: this is how I feel, how I understand artistic creation. Artist Cathy Jolicoeur explores entomological fauna with finesse, contrasting it through her practice with embossed metal work. This apparent duality between the infinitely small and her preferred material is navigated by the artist as she creates articulated invertebrate animals that echo, to the point of confusion, the naturalized specimens of 18th and 19th-century herbariums. The modernity of the treatment and the use of metal give the artist's works a recontextualized reading of the world of insects. Her neutral colorations give the representatives of the pterygotes the impression that her insects have been cast in liquid metal, when in fact they have not. By emphasizing their size, she highlights often unloved representatives of the animal kingdom and encourages the viewer to tame them in a contemporary artistic context. In her approach, the artist favors hand-embossed aluminum plates, patinated like in the past, which offer strong contrasts. Her amalgams of raw materials and sculpted textures reveal flowing forms in studied blends. She is also a visual arts teacher and mediator.

Cathy Jolicoeur exhibited her work in the past at the 21st edition of Clio Art Fair, held from September 18-21, 2025. Here is a short interview with the artist and a review of her experience at Clio Art Fair.

Cathy, can you please describe your art in four words?

Unique, different, organic, reclaimed.

What inspires your art?

Nature.

How would you describe your experience at Clio Art Fair?

A well-organized fair with talented artists. A great owner with a great clientele!