Andrea della Cava

About

Andrea della Cava earned her BA from Queens College and her MA from Columbia University's Teachers College. She majored in painting and minored in teaching at both institutions. For the last 20+ years she has dedicated her career to art education at the secondary level. In parallel, she has pursued her own practice in the arts in the following media: painting, drawing, ceramic sculpture and metals/jewelry. She has been granted fellowships in the above areas from Yale, Skidmore and Maine College of Art.

Andrea's process driven work attempts to balance color, form, line and texture. Most recently, her pieces reflect her growing interest and investigation into healing botanicals as well as cell division. Her techniques involve drawing, painting, collage, sewing / beading and wax resist. It's the combining, layering and meshing of these techniques and materials that demonstrates an element of surprise in her work.

Artist Statement

Since recovering from breast cancer in 2017, my artwork has reflected a deeper investigation of nature. I'm looking at the world around me more closely and am finding beauty in budding flowers and half eaten leaves. I notice repetition in tree bark, rippling water, forming cracks. It is a natural tendency for cells to want to organize themselves. Organisms in nature tend to self-pattern. But what happens when something goes wrong? Imperfections occur. These can sometimes be beautiful and make something unique. Other times these anomalies can be the sign of abnormalities and malfunction. Exploring both nature's urge to systematize and the chaos that comes when organization fails intrigues me. My art is a reflection of this exploration.