Statement:

Through architectural wall installations, paintings, collage and textiles, my art employs geometric forms to address specific aspects of contemporary visual culture such as modernist typography fonts, projection maps, and barcodes. Keenly engaged in “encoded abstraction,” my line-based works probe visual value systems such as the modernist ideals of the Helvetica typeface. My 2010 solo show at La Cova de les Cultures, Laboratori d’Art (Barcelona) features the use of barcodes on textiles, and combines functional objects, such as wrap skirts and prayer flags, with installation art. In 2009 I traveled to Ghana, West Africa on a travel grant where the textiles and visual-verbal nexus in African arts influenced my studio practice. Proceeds from my Barcelona show will benefit the Women’s Microfinance Inititative, helping women in East Africa.

Bio:
Carol Padberg’s work has been exhibited in galleries, alternative spaces and museums in the US and abroad. In 2011 her work will be the focus of a solo exhibition at the New Britain Museum of American Art. Recent venues include the Minneapolis Institute of Arts; the Living Art Museum, Reykjavik, Iceland; Kunstlerhaus, Hamburg, Germany; and Gallery Woong in Seoul, South Korea. Padberg has been awarded a Skowhegan Fellowship and an Individual Artist Fellowship from the Greater Hartford Arts Council, as well as numerous residencies. Carol Padberg has been a visiting lecturer at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, and the University of Connecticut, Storrs. An Associate Professor at the Hartford Art School, University of Hartford, Padberg’s work is the focus of a 2010 solo show at La Cova de les Cultures, Laborati d’Art in Barcelona, Spain.