While her questions have a dream-like quality of wonder and enchantment, this is contrasted with research-based investigation that draws on scientific methods. By engaging in international collaborations with established institutions and researchers in the fields of astronomy, geology, biochemistry or architecture among others, Paterson pursues an interdisciplinary approach based on mutual trust and exchange of knowledge. It is not least this aspect that reflect her work’s distinctive tone of underlying optimism, which also encompasses a confidence in collaboration with future generations, built into her long-term project Future Library (2014–2114).

Paterson’s work has a characteristic way of rendering elusive phenomena at the very limits of the tangible with a surprising immediacy. Her multimedia, conceptually oriented work is characterised by an aesthetic that is both minimal and sensual, with the power to engage viewers’ imaginations and make complex ideas accessible in a poetic form.

Katie Paterson studied visual art at Edinburgh College of Art from 2000–2004 and at the Slade School of Fine Art in London from 2005–2007. She is the recipient of several awards including an Honorary Fellowship of Edinburgh University in 2013 and the South Bank Sky Arts Award in 2015. She was artist in residence at the Physics & Astronomy Department at UCL in London as well as at Edinburgh College of Art, at the Sanger Institute near Cambridge and at Centro Cultural Andratx in Mallorca. Besides participating in many group exhibitions, her work has been shown in solo exhibitions all over the world, most recently at the Living Art Museum in Reykjavik. Paterson’s works are represented in the collections of various international institutions such as the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sidney, the Art Institute of Chicago, FRAC Franche-Compté in Besançon, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Utah Museum of Fine Arts in Salt Lake City.