I create contemporary abstracts made with found paper, found fabric, and handmade paper. Each work is a study of sentimentality and materiality. Sentimentally, I’m drawn to the nostalgia in the found objects. Materially, I consider both paper and fabric to be fibers, and these found fiber objects seem linked in the way that they carry our stories, record our lives, how they are impermanent, and in their physical properties.
As I work, I layer and combine the found fibers into a new collage form. The resulting piece is a physical stretching and remaking of the found material, which gives new energy to the discarded records of a life lived. Water, time, value, domestic labor, craft, and community are additional themes that run through the work.
“Material World” is a site specific art installation created for the Window Box Gallery. The oversized collage artwork completely fills the wall of the gallery, like a hanging quilt, wallpaper, or indoor mural. The resulting piece is highly tactile and visually complex. “Material World” is funded in part by the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance.
Dana Caldera
Dana Caldera is a mixed-media visual artist, living and working in Houston, Texas. Her pieces combine found collage material, handmade paper, textiles, painting, and drawing into intricately layered compositions.
Caldera’s artwork has been selected for numerous juried shows in Texas and nationally. Her work has been included in group shows at The Holocaust Museum Houston and The Alexandria Museum of Art. In 2022, Caldera presented an installation of new fiber collage artwork at TANKSpace in Houston, TX, and was an artist-in-residence with The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston’s CAMHLAB. She was recently named a grant award winner from The Wendy Wagner Foundation and the City of Houston.
‘Material World’ is funded in part by the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance”