In her junior year of high school, Cathy Volk decided she was going to be an artist, so she enrolled in an art class. After the third class, when her drawing looked nothing like the bowl of fruit in front of her, the nun told her she needed to change classes—that she was not an artist. For decades, Volk took that sentiment to heart and went on with her life, one that did not include making art.
Fast forward to 2021, on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic. At the invitation of an artist friend, Volk joined a pencil-drawing class taught by Big Canoe artist Kay Davis and threw that decades-old sentiment out the window.
In that class, Davis taught the grid method, which uses a grid overlay to accurately scale an image by copying it square by square.
“I shocked myself,” Volk said of her first drawing attempts, “And it was because I had instruction.” She has had strong influences in Big Canoe, from fellow artists in the Artists Club as well as from her brother, Ed Nudd, who has been an artist most of his life…