Biography

Elizabeth Knowles is a visual artist based in Norfolk, CT.  Her artmaking explores both static and dynamic patterns in nature recurring on differing scales of perception. Some are biological patterns on the cellular level of organisms. Others are geological formations reminiscent of Earth’s natural landscapes. Utilizing a variety of media, her work connects landscapes and life forms, physiology and physics, death and detritus, order and chaos, and growth and form. Each shape is whole in and of itself while simultaneously connecting to a greater system of patterns. Revealing life’s rhythms, the work displays the unfolding and undulation of vibrant energy expanding, contracting, and recycling itself through visual relationships. 


Recent projects for 2024 include a collaborative sculpture for the University of Connecticut’s Avery Point campus along with a sculpture for the Village Green in Norfolk, CT. For Morningside Park in Upper Manhattan in June 2023 Knowles created 3 temporary site-specific floating sculptures in addition to 2022 outdoor sculptures for the NYC Parks on Manhattan’s Lower East Side and the University of CT, Avery Point.  Other projects include site-specific installations for Unesco’s Artistes + Science, Monaco, The Pelham Art Center, NY, Ely Center for Contemporary Art, New Haven, CT, Rockrose Lobby for Chashama, NY, NY, Flat Iron Prow Art Space, NY, NY, the New Canaan Sculpture Trail, CT, NYU Langone, NY, NY and Montefiore Hospital, Bronx, NY.  Additionally, Knowles has created projects for Edith Wharton’s House, The Mount in Lenox, MA, Bank of America Plaza, Charlotte, NC, the Housatonic Museum, Bridgeport, CT, Artspace, New Haven, CT, the Painting Center, NY, NY, Five Points Art Center, CT, Studio 80 +Sculpture Grounds, Old Lyme, CT, the Kingston Police Building, Kingston, NY, Chesterwood National Trust for Historic Preservation, Stockbridge, MA and Governor’s Island, NY, NY.  She has collaborated with Saks Fifth Avenue on window installations and VOGUE magazine for the “Last Look” page. 

Natural patterns inspire my work. Some are biological patterns on the cellular level of organisms. Others are geological patterns of the earth’s natural landscapes. Through painting, sculpture, and site-specific installation, I explore how dynamic patterns connect landscapes and life forms, physiology and physics, death and detritus, growth and form.

Starting with the most simple and building to the more complex, my creative process becomes a recreation of the interaction of different levels of life. One basic component connects with another and another and another until a whole is created. This action is similar to a cell grouping together with other cells to form a more intricate organism. Echoing fractal patterns, the work displays the unfolding of life as patterns expand back into each and into themselves. Additionally, the structures reveal a frozen moment in time depicting the transition between order and chaos, or life and death.

Fractal structures define life’s patterns both figuratively and metaphorically. The meandering journey of sperm to egg, a chain of DNA, the lines on the palm of a hand, the more symbolic branches of a family tree or the recursive structures of language and thought interpret our lives as a series of non-linear transformations of organic structures unfolding in space. Ranging from atomistic to larger organizational systems, the study of patterns reveals the complex interface between the various levels of life and the mysterious connection between them. 

Elizabeth Knowles, 2024