• A piece of graph paper with a pattern of diamond shapes stitched in red and blue thread.

Kate Russo

Portland, ME | London, UK

Kate Russo (b. 1982) is an artist and published author living in Portland, Maine. Russo published her debut novel, Super Host, in 2021 and her second novel, Until Alison, in 2025, both with Putnam. She holds a B.A. in Fine Art and Art History from Colby College and an M.F.A. in Painting from The Slade School of Fine Art, London. With a strong connection to London, Russo also spends a few months a year in the city.

Russo’s work as a writer and painter intersect through her deep interest in narrative and storytelling. As a graduate student at the Slade, Russo often wrote short stories to accompany her heavily patterned drawings and textile pieces. For this work, she won the school’s Henry Tonks Prize for Drawing.

In 2008-2009, Russo was a member of theatre group “Love Bites” in which she wrote one act-plays performed in Calder Theatre Bookshop. Theatre and stage design has long remained an influence on her drawing.

In 2016, her series Painting by Men was selected for Center for Maine Contemporary Art Biennial by writer/critic John Yau and gallerist Christine Berry.

Previously, she exhibited in England and United States, including solo shows at Foley Gallery in New York City (2014) and Aucocisco Galleries in Portland, ME (2014). In 2015 Russo was selected by curator Anthony Elms for Currents: Do You Hear What I Hear? at the A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn, NY, as well being selected for London’s Creekside Open by artists Richard Deacon and Lisa Milroy.

Selected Works     Exhibits     Statement     CV     Press     Inquire

Selected Works

Homestead 6 7 x 5.5 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 6
7 x 5.5 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 7 7 x 5.5 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 7
7 x 5.5 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 8 7 x 5.5 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 8
7 x 5.5 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 9 7 x 5.5 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Homestead 9
7 x 5.5 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 20 6 x 4.25 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 20
6 x 4.25 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 24 6 x 4.25 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 24
6 x 4.25 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 27 6 x 4.25 inches Thread and graphite on graph paper 2024 [stitchworks]

Novella no. 27
6 x 4.25 inches
Thread and graphite on graph paper
2024 [stitchworks]

Men Behold Women Reclining 20 x 24 inches Oil on panel 2023 [paintings]

Men Behold Women Reclining
20 x 24 inches
Oil on panel
2023 [paintings]

Men Contemplate Women Reading 24 x 20 inches Oil on panel 2023 [paintings]

Men Contemplate Women Reading
24 x 20 inches
Oil on panel
2023 [paintings]

Men Observe Women Sewing 24 x 20 inches Oil on panel 2023 [paintings]

Men Observe Women Sewing
24 x 20 inches
Oil on panel
2023 [paintings]

Men Watching Women Work 24 x 20 inches Oil on panel 2022 [paintings] [sold]

Men Watching Women Work
24 x 20 inches
Oil on panel
2022 [paintings] [sold]

Men Staring at Women From Behind 24 x 20 inches Oil on panel 2021 [paintings]

Men Staring at Women From Behind
24 x 20 inches
Oil on panel
2021 [paintings]

exhibits

  • Art gallery with colorful textile artwork on the left and smaller framed photographs on the white wall, with a wooden floor and corner view of the room.

    Every Infinitesimal Thought

    Group Exhibition
    September 27 – November 30, 2025 [link:/every-infinitesimal-thought]

  • Art gallery display with three framed art pieces on a white wall, featuring colorful geometric patterns, natural light from a nearby window, light wooden flooring.

    Storyteller

    Kate Russo
    July 1 – August 6, 2023 [link:/storyteller]

Artist Statement

Time is the storyteller’s medium. It can be manipulated, drawn out, exploited — all depending on the artist’s narrative. As both an artist and a writer, time and its parameters are the framework, inherent in everything I make. My abstract narrative-based artworks are appropriated from existing art historical themes, as well as patterns and architecture, then re-channeled through a feminist lens. The works in Storyteller bring together three aspects of my work: painting, stitching and drawing.

The Male Gaze series uses palettes from pre-existing, well-known paintings that share a familiar motif in art history. Read from left to right, row by row, each painting of twenty ovals is a colorist’s journey through five hundred years (16th century to the 21st) of art history on a specific theme. 

In my reimagining of these historic paintings and tropes, I retain only the colors. By matching the palette of the original painting, each individual oval corresponds to a painting by a deceased male artist. I consider the oval to be each male artist’s portrait. Using the grid, I break down the palette into 6-16 colors, where possible retaining proportionality with the source painting. Each oval is not a pixelated version of its source but rather a complete breakdown, reducing the original paintings to nothing but color. What remains is a series of intricately patterned, shimmering ovals.   

After all, within the original context, what was the female form but ornament, to begin with? And what is color, but a feminine concern? As Charles Blanc, 19th-century critic and art theorist, wrote: “…design must maintain its preponderance over color. Otherwise, painting speeds to its ruin: it will fall through color just as mankind fell through Eve.” I don't just fall through color. I dive.

When I’m stitching, I am influenced by Rozsika Parker’s book, The Subversive Stitch, which examines how needlework was used to tell stories and pass time through the centuries. More than any other art form, needlework is defined by the amount of time it takes to complete the work.

Though often intricate and meticulous, stitching is also repetitive, laborious and even painful. In The Subversive Stitch, Parker asserts the act of stitching is subversive, giving women the time to think, plan and even plot. Time spent with a needle and thread in my hand is no different. Once I’ve worked out a pattern and the needle is passing in and out of the paper, I’m suddenly plotting and planning, scheming and subverting. The works themselves allude to this.

Inherent in all of the stitch work is a sense of anticipation: a book before it is cracked, a still room, an audience waiting for what’s to come. The Novellas, inspired by traditional book cover design, nod to the plotting and planning of their maker. In the Homestead, Rooms, and Corners series, I’m building sets, floorboard by floorboard, brick by brick, conveying a sense of solid structure, while also imparting the softness of needlework. Equally, I’m interested in the tension of known gender roles present in the work. Brick walls and parquet floors which are traditionally laid by men are, here, stitched by a woman. Agnes’ Room, Eva’s Room and Louise’s Room, inspired by the works of Agnes Martin, Eva Hesse and Louise Bourgeois, are the start of a new series of work, dedicated to female artists who had a subversive relationship with pattern, repetition, domesticity and obsession.

CV

Born: Altoona, PA | 1982
Resides: Portland, ME & London, UK

  • 2005–2007
    M.F.A. Slade School of Fine Art, UCL, London, UK

    2000–2004
    B.A. Colby College, Waterville, ME, USA

  • 2023
    Storyteller, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME

    2017
    Stitched Works, Postalco Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan

    2014
    Settings, FOLEY Gallery, New York, NY
    Abstract Personalities, Aucocisco Galleries, Portland, ME

    2013
    Nervous Energy, Kate Russo and Tom Butler, Engine, Biddeford, ME

    2011
    Palimpsest: Kate Russo Paintings, Susan Maasch Fine Art, Portland, ME

    2010
    The Employees, Gallery 333, Exeter Phoenix, Exeter UK

    2007
    On the Revelation of Bricks, Sassoon Gallery, London, UK

  • 2025
    Every Infinitesimal Thought, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME

    2022
    You Take the Cake, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME
    A Gathering of Aces, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME

    2019–2020
    Temporality: The Process of Time, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, ME

    2019
    Perfection, Able Baker, Portland, ME

    2018
    2019 Flatfile Artists, Tiger Strikes Asteroid, NY
    Reverence to the Thread, Portland Public Library, Portland, ME

    2017
    People Watching: Then and Now, Fitchburg Art Museum, Fitchburg, MA
    Install 12, Corey Daniels Gallery, Wells, ME
    Referent: John Franklin, Matthew King, Andrew Mowbray and Kate Russo, Room83Spring, Watertown, MA

    2016
    Maine Biennial, Curated by John Yau and Christine Berry, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, ME
    Currents: “Do You Hear What I Hear?” Curated by Anthony Elms, A.I.R. Gallery, New York, NY

    2015
    Delicate Creatures, FOLEY Gallery, New York, NY
    Creekside Open 2015, selected by Richard Deacon, APT Gallery, London, UK
    Creekside Open 2015, selected by Lisa Milroy, APT Gallery, London, UK

    2013–2014
    NN Open Biennial, NN Contemporary, Northampton, UK

    2013
    Emerging Artists, Ogunquit Museum of American Art, Ogunquit, ME
    Sublime Monotony, Aarhus Gallery, Belfast, ME

    2012
    Zeitgeist (ZAP) Open, London, UK
    Maine Biennial, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport ME
    DÉCOR, University of Maine, Farmington, Art Gallery, ME

    2011
    Art to Collect Now, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport, ME

    2010
    Gallery Artists: Small Works, Susan Maasch Fine Art, Portland, ME
    Ludlow Summer Show, Ludlow, UK
    Things Have Changed, Birdwood House Gallery, Totnes, UK
    Kate Russo and Tom Butler, The Flavel Art Centre, Dartmouth, UK

    2009
    10 Artists, The Old Schoolhouse, Ludlow, UK
    Open Drawing Competition, The Plough, Great Torrington, UK
    Jerwood Drawing Prize, London and touring exhibition through 2010 Drawn In, Sidcot Arts Centre, Winscombe, Somerset, UK

    2008
    Wrapped and Encased at Liverpool 08, The Artist’s Book Fair, Liverpool, UK
    I Know the Crayon I Hold in My Hand is Blue, Tricycle Gallery, London, UK

    2007
    M.F.A. Final Exhibition, Slade School of Fine Art

    2006
    Scene One: In the Offing, Sassoon Gallery, London, UK
    Nationwide Mercury Prize Student Art Exhibition, Hospital Gallery, London, UK

    2005
    Open Studios, Slade Painters, Great Western Studios, London, UK

    2004
    Senior Show (B.A. Exhibition), Colby College Museum of Art, ME

  • 2009
    Shortlist, Jerwood Drawing Prize, UK

    2007
    Henry Tonks Prize for drawing, Slade School of Fine Art, UK
    Shortlist, Celeste Art Prize, UK

    2006
    Shortlist, Celeste Art Prize, UK
    Finalist (Highly Commended), Nationwide Mercury Prize Student Art Competition, UK

    2004
    Senior Art Show Purchase Prize, Colby College, ME

  • 2021
    ”Side by Side: The Art and Writing of Kate Russo,” Nancy Gordon, Creative Maine, September (online)

    2019
    “Skillfully Curated: Able Baker Exhibition Explores Perfection”, Daniel Kany, The Portland Press Herald, February 17

    2018
    Featured Visual Artist, The Maine Review, Fall

    2016
    “The Biennial at Center for Maine Contemporary Art deliciously flawed and fresh”, Daniel Kany, The Portland Press Herald, November 13

    2014
    “Seasonally Affective: Two young painters exhibit devotion to form”, Nicholas Schroeder, The Portland Phoenix, March 28

    2012
    “Biennial Backs Up Good Look with Visceral Subtext”, Daniel Kany, The Portland Press Herald, October 21
    “CMCA Biennial Exhibition 2012”, Suzanne Volmer, Artscope, 46-47, Fall
    “Sorting Through the CMCA’s Biennial”, Nicholas Schroeder, The Portland Phoenix, October 10
    “Divergent Vision, Complimentary Skills for Rockland Artist Couple”, Emily Burnham, Bangor Daily News, October 13
    Interventions, accompanying artwork with stories by Richard Russo
    “Mixed Use,” The Canvas, Maine Home and Design, May

    2011
    Current Work, The Art Issue, Maine Home and Design, April

    2005
    Nationwide Mercury Prize 2006 Album of the Year, Album Sleeve

  • 2018
    Young Space, Artist Interview

    2014                
    Dirty Laundry, “Horror Vacui” by Kate Russo

    2013                
    Buy Some Damn Art, “Sitting Still” Online Exhibition

    2012–present    
    Artist Registry, The Drawing Center Viewing Program.

    2012                
    Big, Red and Shiny
    Two Serious Ladies
    Jealous Curator
    Juxtapoz
    Booooooom
    Hound

    2009                
    Amelia’s Magazine

  • 2020
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Drawing II

    2019
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Senior Visual Arts Majors Critiques

    2018
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Senior Visual Arts Majors Critiques

    2017
    Artist Talk, Maine College of Art – Class on Abstract Portraiture
    Artist Talk, Fitchburg Museum of Art
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Painting II Course
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Senior Visual Arts Majors Critiques

    2016
    Guest Critic, Bowdoin College – Abstract Art Course

    2012
    Biennial Artist Talk “Who Do You Love?” CMCA, Rockport, ME

    2010–11
    Workshop on Pattern, The Community School, Camden, ME

    2003
    John Marin and the Steiglitz Circle, Colby College Museum of Art, ME

Press

Featured
Every Infinitesimal Thought | Portland Press Herald
Every Infinitesimal Thought | Portland Press Herald

An Exhibit in Woolwich Takes On the Gendered Nature of ‘Women’s Craft’ | Jorge Arango

Kate Russo | Art New England
Kate Russo | Art New England

Kate Russo: Storyteller | Carl Little

Inquire

To inquire about available works or learn more about Kate Russo, please get in touch.