Mawuena Kattah
About the work
Mawuena Kattah's practice draws upon an extensive personal archive of family photographs taken in Ghana and recent studio photographs of family taken in London. She brings people and pattern together in complex, vibrant compositions that entangle an aesthetic and social syntax. Through immersive installations that place textiles, painting and ceramics together to create semi-domestic spaces within the gallery or museum, Kattah invites her audiences to share in her multi-layered experience of collectivity and kinship.
Biography
Kattah’s paintings, prints, ceramics and textiles have been exhibited in major contemporary art galleries and museums in the UK, including acquisition of works by the Arts Council’s National Collection.
Kattah is currently exhibiting works in 'Criminal Ornamentation' a Hayward Touring / Arts Council Collection group exhibition curated by Yinka Shonibare MBE. Artists featured in the show include Timorous Beasties, Boyle Family, Susan Derges, Joe Fletcher Orr, Laura Ford, Edward Lipski, Alexander McQueen, Milena Dragicevic, Lis Rhodes, Bridget Riley, Yinka Shonibare MBE, Caragh Thuring and Bedwyr Williams.
Touring to three venues: Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter - 19 January-17 March 2019, Longside Gallery, Arts Council Collection, Wakefield - 5 April-16 June 2019, Southampton Art Gallery - 28 June-28 September 2019.
Kattah’s work has been shown in significant group exhibitions in the UK including ‘Walls Have Ears: 400 Years of Change’, Aston Hall (2018), Whitechapel Gallery (2009) and Studio Voltaire (2012) and solo exhibition at Tenderbooks (2016), following a placement in the Victoria and Albert Museum ceramics studio to develop a new body of work.
Solo Exhibitions
2016
Ceramics, Textiles & Works on Paper, Tenderbooks
Selected Group exhibitions
2019
Arts Council Collection - Touring Exhibition ‘Criminal Ornamentation’ Curated by Yinka Shonibare MBE
Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter / Longside Gallery (YSP), Wakefield / Southampton City Art Gallery, Southampton.
2018
Arts Council Collection ‘Walls Have Ears - 400 Years of Change’ Aston Hall Birmingham
Art in Focus: Pots and Podiums - St Mary's Hospital, London
Peckham Craft Weekend, Copeland Gallery
2017 - Fashioning Space - Victoria and Albert Museum
2012 - SV12 Members Show, Studio Voltaire
2011 - Verovisation, MAD Musee Belgium
2009 - See the Revolutionary Art Exhibit, Whitechapel Gallery
Solo Publications
2016 - Mawuena Kattah, Ceramics Textiles and Works on Paper. Published by Intoart
Group Publications
2018 - Criminal Ornamentation, Hayward Gallery Publishing
2010 - See the Revolutionary Art Exhibit. Published by Intoart
2007 - The Studio Project: Opening Art Practice. Published by Intoart
Film Screenings
2018 - Ceramics, Textiles & Works on Paper - Real to Reel: The Craft Film Festival Korea (Crafts Council)
2017 - Ceramics, Textiles & Works on Paper - Real to Reel: The Craft Film Festival London (Crafts Council)
2016 - Ceramics, Textiles & Works on Paper - Victoria and Albert Museum
2014 - Intoart Archive, Tate Britain
2010 - A film made according to instructions by Mawuena Kattah with Lenka Clayton, Tate Modern and Whitechapel Gallery
Press
Crafts Magazine May 2018
Guardian 2017
Intoart
Mawuena Kattah became a member of the London based collective Intoart in 2007.