Carol Bouyoucos
Carol Bouyoucos utilises a variety of digital tools to reinterpret the natural world. Her work explores the seemingly opposed territories of nature and technology, evoking a creative synergy between them and illustrating their potential for harmony.
Carol Bouyoucos.
For more on Bouyoucos, visit her website or her Instagram.
Bouyoucos began a career as a graphic designer in 1981 after graduating from The University of Michigan’s School of Art and Design. Then, in 2015, a major life change motivated her to dedicate herself to practising art. This background in graphic design is evident in her art, as she adeptly manipulates digital technology in each piece.
Bouyoucos is based in Mount Kisco, New York, where she lives and works on a nature preserve. The untamed landscape surrounding her supplies endless narratives for her work, and daily walks with her iPhone allow her to capture and reimagine these scenes. This raw, natural material is a starting point that Bouyoucos then transplants into the field of the digital.
Land of Milk and Honey, 2023. Digital print. 76 x 61 cm. Courtesy of the artist.
The resulting landscapes are richly detailed and complexly rendered, visualising the world as a magnificent sensory overload. Working with new media allows Bouyoucos to cultivate the untamed feeling of the landscapes she works with. It also allows her to relay an environmentally cautionary message through a sense of discord and movement – Bouyoucos is deeply concerned with climate change and its effects on both the planet and humans.
One of the new media techniques Bouyoucos employs is a collaboration with generative AI. This allows her to create entirely new environments that draw attention to the ephemerality of the natural world. For example, A Strange Marsh (2023) foreshadows a future where humans are extinct. It therefore stresses the urgency of acting on climate change and making sustainable changes to prevent such a future.
A Strange Marsh, 2023. Digital print, 71 x 76 cm. Courtesy of the artist.
As she sees it, technology is entangled with Bouyoucos’ practice: “I embrace the aesthetic tension that digital materiality imposes on the work to redefine it and offer new questions about it.” This tension is articulated through the instinctive visual resistance between the digital and natural, as the two seem fundamentally antithetical. Case in point – serially online people are colloquially told to “touch grass” when their e-activities become too addictive, highlighting the discrete boundary between the natural world and the internet.
In relating her practice to these seemingly dichotomous themes, Bouyoucos bridges this boundary by making natural landscapes eternal through her digital practice. She reminds us that as we venture continuously into technological advancement, we must remember the world we live in and must take care of.
All at Sea, 2023. Digital print, 76 x 61 cm. Courtesy of the artist.
Another element instilled in Bouyoucos’ landscapes is the inspiration from early American and European landscape paintings and botanical prints, such as the works of Thomas Cole, Maria Sibylla Merian, and Robert John Thornton. She infuses this imagery into her work, entwining it with a nostalgic feeling accompanying the environmental story she tells. All of these factors combine to create a network of contemporary and historical narratives in her work.
Notably, the biggest influence on Bouyoucos’ practice continues to be her connections with other artists. She mentions her membership in the collaborative forum The Crit Lab as changing her work, as it has become a valued place to share ideas and questions regarding her and other artists’ processes. Bouyoucos cites this experience as a complete revision of the way she works, as the artistic forum gives context to her ideas. As she moves forward in her artistic career, she wants to explore the theme of altered reality and the techniques of AI, examining the concepts and conflicts it precipitates.
Bouyoucos first encountered the SeeMe Community, an artists network and the facilitator for this MADE IN BED feature, through an Instagram open call. She was struck by their work and their ability to assist ambitious artists, and she has been working with them since then, participating in almost all of their shows. In 2022, Bouyoucos had her first solo exhibition with SeeMe.
Majesty, 2023. Digital print, 76 x 61 cm. Courtesy of the artist.
Selected Exhibitions and Awards
Solo Exhibitions
2022
Paradise Found, Gallery Arte Azulejo and See.Me Community, New York, New York
Eden, Lagstein Gallery, Nyack, New York
2021
Common Ground, CB Gallery, Katonah, New York
2020
Caretaking, Cottage at Marsh Sanctuary, Mount Kisco, New York
2019
Wild by Nature, CB Gallery, Katonah, New York
Love in the Garden, The Bedford Playhouse, Bedford, New York
2018
Life Botanical, The Lane Contemporary Art Gallery, Katonah, New York
Group Exhibitions
2023
Sense, Arthouse.NYC, New York, New York
Art Fair, Yellow Studio NY, Cross River, New York
ONE Show, Katonah Connect, Bedford Hills, New York
A Complexity of Joys, MAPSPACE, Port Chester, New York
True North, See.Me, New York, New York
Art X Nature, Madelyn Jordon Fine Art, Scarsdale, New York
Ink, Press, Repeat, University Galleries at William Paterson University, Wayne, New Jersey
2022
Scope Miami with See.Me Community, Miami Beach, Florida
Carol Bouyoucos & Antoinette Wysocki, Spot Gallery at the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York
Plethora, The Holy Art, virtual and London, United Kingdom
Supper, Museo Camuno, Breno, Italy
Emerge, Blue Gallery, New York, New York
2021
Scope Miami with See.Me Community, Miami Beach, Florida
Flat File Show, Peep Space, Tarrytown, New York
Journeys, See.Me and The Invisible Dog Arts Center, New York, New York
IMotif, Sohn Fine Art Gallery, Lenox, Massachusetts
Creativity in Lockdown, The Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum, Norwalk, Connecticut
Selected Awards
2022
Finalist and Honorable Mention, Larry Salley Photography Award, Arts Westchester
First Place, 17th National Photography Exhibit, Fotofoto, Huntington, New York
First Place, Photography, 49th Annual Art Show Bedford, Bedford, New York
Many thanks to Carol Bouyoucos and SeeMe Gallery on behalf of MADE IN BED.
For more information on SeeMe and how to get involved, please visit their website or Instagram.
Gabriella Hetu
Emerging Artist Co-Editor, MADE IN BED