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Date: 4/16/2019
CHICOPEE – “It’s really meditative,” Trish Cataldo, 29, of Chicopee said as she repeatedly pushed a multi-needle felting tool into a tuft of coarse, orange wool. Cataldo, the owner of Crybaby Fine Art, Magic, and Miniatures, turned and formed the wool in her hand as she worked and before long it had become a firm ball. From there, her only limit is her imagination.
Cataldo’s style is hard to pin down.
“I used to call it ‘pop realism,’ but now I’m not sure,” Cataldo said. “It’s always changing.” Some of her art is realistic and detailed, though she also works in the abstract. Cataldo said she tries to incorporate “classical renaissance” styles in her work and layers visual styles.
Cataldo also works in several different mediums. She paints, creates miniatures, and makes felted art, which often includes beading.
“It depends on the idea. I have access to a lot of different materials,” Cataldo said. Many of the materials she uses are recycled and upcycled, including most of the surfaces she paints on.
Cataldo was the art director at New England Felting Supplies, until its closure in April 2018. It was there she learned how to felt by experimenting and learning from other artists. She eventually began to teach classes in felting.
“I sold my first piece at a high school art show,” Cataldo said. That’s when she realized she could make money on her art. Cataldo now sells her work on her Etsy store, www.etsy.com/shop/crybabytrish, at a few local vendors, and at art shows. The smaller pieces of art sell for as little as $5, while the larger, more detailed art goes for around $100.
“I try to keep it affordable,” Cataldo said.
While she is currently a full-time artist, not everything she makes is created for a customer’s eye.
“It’s hard to keep making art with just a customer in mind,” Cataldo said. “I try to do things I’m passionate about.” For example, her love of opossums is reflected in much of her felting art.
Cataldo’s miniatures are another expression of her art. She mainly makes small clothing and dollhouse-sized furniture. She sets scenes that are hyper-detailed and realistic.
“I think it’s fun to create small environments,” Cataldo said. She first became enamored with miniatures when her grandfather gave her a three-floor dollhouse, which she still has and uses to display many of her miniatures.
Cataldo tries to keep scale in mind when she works on a piece for a customer but finds it is less important when she is creating miniatures for the art of it.
“I unintentionally follow the theme of my generation’s experiences,” Cataldo said about any message behind her art. She explained that millennials came of age alongside the proliferation of the internet and social media. “Things move so fast,” she said.
Cataldo is also a co-founder of the Paper Project. The Paper Project is an environmentally-friendly artist collective that encourages the people of all skill sets to create art through community events. It supplies local artists with supplies and recycled materials.
“We do this as an effort to support local home based artists through cottage industry style production,” states the Paper Project’s Etsy store. Cataldo said some supplies and paper have been donated to schools in Springfield and East Longmeadow.
One of the largest of the Paper Project’s community events is a hand-drawn, mobile art installation that Cataldo described as a “300-ft long, accordion-style coloring book.” In fact, the Paper Project bills it as the world’s largest coloring book.
“As it travels, we remove the finished pages to be refined by a group of fine artists to be sold at events and future shows,” states the Paper Project’s Patron page. The pages are cut and sold as individual pieces of art, the sale of which helps fund the Paper Project’s future events.
The Paper Project has been awarded grants from the cultural councils of Chicopee, Easthampton, Greenfield, Holyoke, and Springfield, and the Northampton Arts Council.
“It’s really cool to see the support from the community,” said Cataldo.