Cat Mailloux | Exhibition Statement

Re-ligament is a meditation on the root word of religion, re-ligio, meaning to re-ligament or reconnect. A ligament is a fibrous tissue that connects cartilage and bone, allowing a body to move. Re-ligament is a series of large and small quilts utilizing techniques of traditional and improvisational patchwork, applique, and embroidery. Layered like drawings, they combine and explore the logic of stained-glass windows with quiet vignettes of domestic life—the shapes of windows, shadows cast onto walls, and light filtering through trees on neighborhood walks. Together, they form a liturgy of the ordinary, finding the connectivity of the every day and imparting divine grace. 

The quilts form an attempt to visually re-ligament, formally employing the motif of black, in outlines, shapes, and overlays meant to mimic the linework of the lead between pieces of stained glass. Toggling between organic shapes and repetitive geometry, they stretch the limits of traditional patchwork. The quilts reflect the exuberance of light, contemplations of the night, and the tenderness of stitches.

Artist Bio

Cat Mailloux’s textile practice is focused on quilt making, pursuing connections between the visual language of churches, cathedrals, and domestic spaces that slowly bleed their way into imagined and limitless landscapes, exploring questions of the infinite through material. Mailloux is currently based in Columbus, OH, and serves as an Assistant Professor of Studio Art at Cedarville University. She holds an MFA in Sculpture from Ohio State University and a BFA in Sculpture and Art Education from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. Her visual work has been exhibited in galleries across the country including Women Made Gallery in Chicago, Illinois, Skylab Gallery in Columbus, Ohio, and Coram Deo Gallery in Omaha, Nebraska. She has participated in residencies at Vermont Studio Centers, The Columbus Printed Arts Center, and Mary Sky. 

Mailloux makes quilts, what she thinks of as layered and labored drawings in found color and material. They are made from old and thrifted clothing, mostly worn denim, that carry the faint memory of the bodies that wore them. The making of a quilt is grounded in logic, bound and subject to invisible, omniscient rules of how things must fit together. The image is embedded within the material; the quilt is both composition and architecture. As color shifts across its surface, both advancing and receding in space, geometry gives way to atmosphere.

Her practice as a visual artist extends into community work as a teaching artist in Columbus, where she runs the program Sewing Lab, which offers free sewing classes and workshops for children and adults in the Columbus community.