Kathryn Frund was born in Hartford, CT in 1955. She received her BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1979.
She has exhibited in the US and abroad including shows at Chase Young Gallery, Boston, Pentimenti Gallery, Philadelphia, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office, NYC, and Art Forum Ute Barth, Zurich, Switzerland. Her paintings have been included in group exhibitions at the Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, OH, the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY, the Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY, the Fuller Museum, Brockton, MA, the Federal Reserve Bank, NYC and the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA. Frund’s paintings are in many private and corporate collections including Delta Airlines, Pfizer Inc, Smilow Cancer Hospital, Ritz Residence, and Meditech. Her work has been reviewed in ARTnew, Art New England, The Boston Globe and featured in New American Paintings Magazine.
In 2001, Frund was a fellow at the MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH, followed by residencies in 2008 and 2013 at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Amherst, VA.
Her assemblages, installations, and collages focus on the relationship between the natural world and humanity. The art explores our tenuous physical and emotional connections to the environment and to the artificial and natural matter which we come in contact with on a daily basis. Because of a commitment to reducing her environmental footprint, the work relies heavily on the chance encounter to find post-consumer waste, especially plastic or synthetic material. These objects function as both muse and raw matter for the production of art making. Objects and refuse are culled from construction and consumer waste streams, as well as collected off beaches. Materials as various as lead flashing, playground equipment, helium balloons, plastic zip ties, plexiglass commercial signage, synthetic polymer paint, drapery and vinyl siding are incorporated and reconfigured within the context of the art. The work examines the themes of stewardship, fluidity, and integration. Her assemblages are material and spiritual explorations, addressing the notions of transcendence and restitution.
