Katherine Nash

Katherine Elizabeth Nash (1910–1982) was an American artist and sculptor best known for computer art and direct and arc welding. The Katherine E. Nash Gallery at the University of Minnesota Department of Art's Regis Center for Art bears her name.

Family

A blond who became a welder during World War II,[citation needed] Nash was the daughter of Carl and Elizabeth Flink of Minneapolis, Minnesota. She studied at the Minneapolis School of Art, the university and the Walker Art Center School. She married attorney Robert C. Nash in 1934. Nash taught at the University of Nebraska and the Minnetonka Center for the Arts.[1]

ART 1
printout of artwork that looks like waves in ASCII art
Rain Pattern, No. 3, Katherine Nash, 1969

In 1970, Nash then of the University of Minnesota and Richard H. Williams then of the University of New Mexico and later the University of Minnesota published Computer Program for Artists: ART 1. The authors described three approaches an artist might take to use computers in art:

* The artist can become a programmer or software engineer
* Artists and software engineers can cooperate, or
* The artist can use existing software. At that time, ART 1 existed and she chose this path.[2]

ART 1 output, like Rain Pattern, No. 3 from 1969, was an early example of not writing algorithms to produce art but of instead creating art with software.[3]
Galleries

In 1957 Nash was acting director of the University Gallery in Northrop Auditorium that became the Weisman Art Museum across Washington Avenue. From 1961–1976, Nash was professor of sculpture in the University of Minnesota Studio Arts Department, now the Department of Art, where she was known as Katy.

Nash lobbied the university for student exhibition space and in 1979 a gallery was founded in Willey Hall and administered by the student union. In 1992 the Department of Art became its supervisor and in 2003 moved the gallery to the Regis Center for Art.[1]

Nash died in 1982 in Minneapolis.[1]
Notes

1. ^ a b c University of Minnesota (2005). "Katherine E. Nash Gallery: History". http://www.nash.umn.edu/about/history.php. Retrieved 2007-01-19. and Nash, Katherine (1910–1982). "Katherine Nash papers, University of Minnesota Archives". http://special.lib.umn.edu/findaid/xml/uarc00294.xml. Retrieved 2007-01-19.
2. ^ Nash, Katherine; Richard H. Williams (October 1970). "Computer Program for Artists: ART 1". Leonardo, Pergamon Press (via JSTOR) (Leonardo, Vol. 3, No. 4) 3 (4): 439–442. doi:10.2307/1572264. http://jstor.org/stable/1572264. Retrieved 2007-06-30.
3. ^ Huhtamo, Erkki. "WEB STALKER SEEK AARON: Reflections on Digital Arts, Codes and Coders". Ars Electronica Linz. http://www.aec.at/en/archives/festival_archive/festival_catalogs/festival_artikel.asp?iProjectID=12320. Retrieved 2008-12-01. [dead link]

* Katherine E. Nash Gallery
* Nash, Katherine (1910–1982). "Katherine Nash papers, University of Minnesota Archives". http://special.lib.umn.edu/findaid/xml/uarc00294.xml. Retrieved 2007-01-19.

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