Anxiety and Overstimulation in a Place You Don’t Recognize

Caitlin Ellithorpe
Anxiety and Overstimulation in a Place You Don’t Recognize  
2021
Collage
25 x 37
$4,500

About the collection:

The works presented are a series of painting explorations with iridescence. Starting spring of 2021, the artist became interested in the use of iridescent color and form as a means of abstracting reality. She used moments of iridescence to represent the inertia of the universe and the flow of life and time. Each work features the iridescence in interaction with people, prompting an evaluation of the subject and their relationship with the world around them. 

The artist was interested in the way that iridescence attracts attention through its intense use of saturated colors, but at the same time obscures the objects featured by abstracting their natural form. This study has since piqued her interest in color application.

Caitlin Ellithorpe is a third-year student at the University of Chicago double majoring in Neuroscience and Visual Arts. She was born and raised in Houston, Texas, and she has been creating and drawing for as long as she can remember. She acquired a strong interest in painting starting in her sophomore year of high school and has since explored many other mediums such as collage, digital art, sculpture, and film. Given her neuroscience background, she is fascinated with people and their subjective perceptions and sensations of art. She is currently working on exploring the bounds of color and representation in manipulating the viewer’s perception.