For Sport: A solo exhibition by Catie Cook
Catie Cook is a contemporary painter whose work draws from her upbringing in the American South, where traditions of church, debutante culture, and beauty pageantry inform a visual language rooted in performance, control, and presentation. Holding a BFA from the University of Georgia and an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis, Cook has developed a practice that merges painterly realism with staged, cinematic compositions. Her work has been exhibited across the East Coast and Midwest, including Future Fair in New York, the Kemper Art Museum in St. Louis, and Blah Blah Gallery in Philadelphia. Across her paintings, figures and animals occupy constructed environments that feel both familiar and deliberately artificial, reflecting an ongoing interest in how identity is shaped through observation and display.
In her solo presentation, For Sport, Cook examines her experiences of girlhood in the American South through the lens of performance. As the daughter of a scenic designer, her paintings reflect the language of theatre—idealized imagery and carefully constructed scenes that, though imitating reality, often feel eerie and artificial. Through the strangeness of a drape of fabric or the illusion of stage lighting, there is a lingering reminder that her characters are performing for the viewer’s gaze—a feeling emblematic of the female experience. Inspired by her upbringing in Georgia, surrounded by the pageantry of the church, debutante culture, and beauty pageants, Cook’s paintings harness the symbol of the stage as a metaphor for the performativity of gender. The Dalmatian, a recurring character in her work, explores parallel performances of beauty between show dogs and Southern women. Paradoxically obedient and defiant, the Dalmatian becomes a proxy for Cook herself, addressing both agency and submission.
Drawing from the art historical tradition of the hunt and depictions of Diana, Cook leads the viewer through glimpses of a faux hunt, depicting an anonymous female figure reminiscent of a debutante or bride. She deliberately obscures the act of violence, depicting only its aftermath—decorated with ribbons and bows—blurring the line between performance and reality. As her dogs snarl, pose, and leap across staged scenes reminiscent of the theatre, Cook weaves uncanny narratives wrought with themes of control, beauty, and artifice.
