Instagram story viewer> @katebickmore> Posts

Kate Bickmore ꕤ

@katebickmore

195

posts

5.9K

followers

1245

following

𝓈𝓁𝑜𝓌 𝓁𝑜𝑜𝓀𝒾𝓃𝑔 · 𝒻𝓁𝑜𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝒷𝑒𝒾𝓃𝑔
@andrewreedgallery ❦ US/UK

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

Download All

My interview with @suzettemcavoy is in the current issue of @decormaine — out now!

It was a joy talking with Suzette about flowers and traveling, and to have a couple paintings from my show at @____chart____ captured in the studio before they left.

I’m feeling very grateful for the community and support I’ve received living in midcoast Maine. 🙏🏻

📸 by @davecloughphotography taken in Rockland, Maine by @katebickmore

644

47

a year ago

Thank you @artnet and @cabellerina for the fantastic article about my work and contextualizing it in the history of botanical painting! 🙏🏻

“On the Precipice “ is on view now at @____chart____ through October 19th. Read the full article online! ✨ taken in CHART by @katebickmore

590

26

2 years ago

Here are some install shots from my show ‘On the Precipice’ at @____chart____ ✨

On view through October 19th!
Tues - Sat, 10 - 6 PM

📸 by @ebabernstein taken in CHART by @katebickmore

552

34

2 years ago

Inspired by my trip to the island of Socotra — this painting is currently on view at @andrewreedgallery ☀️

𝘈 𝘉𝘭𝘶𝘴𝘩 𝘰𝘧 𝘈𝘱𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘖𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘴 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘌𝘥𝘨𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘙𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘨𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯. I begin to see myself in the Adenium socotranum—a tree native to the Yemeni island of Socotra. She holds two seemingly contradictory expressions at once: the gravity of her large, curving trunk gripping the rocks below, and the weightlessness of translucent light pink blooms fluttering from her branches.

Each tree feels like an individual being, and so does each flower that forms her crown. I recognize myself somewhere between those states—I’m my own person, but only alive because of the many living parts that exist within me.

I’m moved by the way light travels through her—following it from the distant Hagghier Mountains, across valleys and deserts, along trunks and branches, until it finally arrives at her soft pink petals. There, a tongue of fuzzy stamens draws me into her deep, orange throat. I want to continue through her vascular system, down her strong limbs and roots, and back out again into the surrounding desert.

The journey reminds me of looking at a Hudson River School painting: the eye moving through an immense landscape, only now to be drawn into the hidden interior of a floral body.

Moving through Socotra, I became acutely aware of my own visibility. At six feet tall, with pale skin, I felt as conspicuous as the pink blossoms scattered across the desert, and yet, as a queer white woman, I carried a part of myself that remained unknown to those looking at me.

I was an outsider there, but I felt kinship with the desert rose: a body intensely visible, rooted in a place I could never fully know.

Perhaps it isn’t what I can see that grips me most, but everything I can’t. What lies beyond the mountains? What gathers within the shadows of the swollen trunks? What else does she keep hidden away, and why? Perhaps there are parts of her meant to remain unknown.

A Blush of Apparitions Opens at the Edge of Recognition
96 × 72 inches (244 × 183 cm)
Oil on canvas, 2026 taken in Miami, Florida by @katebickmore

549

102

5 days ago

On July 18th, Andrew Reed Gallery opens the second part of “Holding Time”, featuring two large-scale paintings and a watercolor by Maine-based artist Kate Bickmore. In “Part II”, Bickmore shifts the focus to Socotra, the isolated Yemeni island often referred to as the “Galapagos of the Middle East” to which the artist traveled for two weeks in spring 2025. The two paintings in “Part II” are a study in near and far, with the tactile specificity of “Crystalline Light Settles on Nocturnal Breath” juxtaposed with the spatial grandeur of the Socotra landscape in “A Blush of Apparitions Opens at the Edge of Recognition.”

In “A Blush of Apparitions Opens at the Edge of Recognition”, Kate Bickmore transforms the endemic flora of Socotra into an immersive field of atmosphere, body, and relation. The work expands Bickmore’s ongoing investigation into ‘relational aliveness’: the felt sense that flowers, bodies, atmospheres, and landscapes are not separate entities, but responsive presences within a shared field. Translucent petals, misted mountain passages, and atmospheric washes allow forms to pass into one another. Flowers do not sit on top of the landscape; they emerge from it, hover within it, and seem to alter the light around them. The sublime here is not achieved through distance or domination, but through intimacy: the sensation of being drawn close enough to feel the landscape breathing back.

Meanwhile, in “Crystalline Light Settles on Nocturnal Breath”, succulent bodies emerge from darkness through an atmosphere of dew, shadow, and luminosity. Influenced in part by Dutch still-life painting and Caravaggio’s use of chiaroscuro, the work reimagines the still life not as a fixed arrangement of objects but as a living ecology shaped through relation. Light does not simply illuminate the plants: it appears to move between them, allowing the forms to breathe, touch, and unfold into one another.

The artist working in the studio on “Crystalline Light Settles on Nocturnal Breath” (2026), oil on canvas, 54 x 64 inches (137 x 163 cm) by @katebickmore

3

14

15 days ago

A painting from my show 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 (𝘗𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘐) in honor of the sun’s spring return. ✨

𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘏𝘦𝘳 𝘎𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘦𝘯 𝘕𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘢𝘳, 𝘏𝘪𝘥𝘥𝘦𝘯 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘜𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘵𝘩, we enter a sanctuary of care, attention, and tenderness—where time slows as two luminescent flowers reach toward one another, their tendrils seeking support, held in receptive light.

I am constantly relearning how to soften within myself. I look to flowers—to floral being—as a way of moving through the world: through her sensitivity, responsiveness, quiet intelligence, and unyielding capacity to grow. Through sustained attention to plant life, I begin to align with her rhythms, and recognize that the porous, relational body I inhabit, is continually being shaped over time.

The cup-and-saucer vine is a climber. She impressed Charles Darwin in 1875, who was similarly struck by her responsiveness to light and touch. His observations helped articulate a form of vegetal intelligence that was long overlooked. And yet, she didn’t need to be seen to become who she already was. There’s a complexity here—of discovery and projection, of naming and claiming—where outside recognition can both illuminate and obscure what has always existed.

Her chalice-like blooms provide far more than beauty—she feeds, shelters, adapts, reaches, remembers—still, she has been primarily cultivated, framed, and feminized for her looks: her labor softened into decoration, her vitality shaped for display. She isn’t made to serve, but to evolve and move in relation—responsive, self-directed, and irreducible to what is being asked of her.

As I bring my face closer, I’m met by yellow radiance—a warmth that holds a sense of safety. She calls me into relationship, rather than left in isolation. Through painting, I can grow in intimacy with her—learning where to reach, to soften, and to receive, not as gestures of weakness, but as conditions for our aliveness.

Ft. Cobaea scandens (cup-and-saucer vine) and Silene vulgaris (bladder campion)

‘Reaching for her Golden Nectar, Hidden in the Undergrowth’
60 x 48 inches (152 x 123 cm)
oil on canvas, 2026

📸 by @zacharybalber taken in Miami, Florida by @katebickmore

2k

158

4 months ago

A couple devotional miniatures from my show 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 (𝘗𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘐) at @andrewreedgallery ✨

I first taught myself to paint in watercolor, drawn to its immediacy and responsiveness. These small works come before the oils — a way of working through layering and composition before stepping into the expansive scale of the larger florascapes. They echo the devotional intimacy of botanical illustration and medieval illumination, where close looking becomes an act of reverence.

Beyond the Veil of Weighted Stillness
8 x 6 inches (20 x 15 cm)
watercolor on paper, 2025

Reaching for her Golden Nectar, Hidden in the Undergrowth
8 x 6 inches (20 x 15 cm)
watercolor on paper, 2025

📸 by @zacharybalber by @katebickmore

290

22

5 months ago

My largest living diorama yet, in collaboration with @samueljosephthomas at @andrewreedgallery 🌱

This installation holds time as something shared — a threshold where what is built and what is growing respond to one another, and inviting us to meet the living world with care and reciprocity.

Heartfelt thank you to:
@samueljosephthomas ~ the florist extraordinaire + builder of the living diorama, who manages to always bring my vision to life.

@adwblanco ~ the brilliant BTS fabricator + lighting visionary that helped problem solve how to make the installation feel immersive.

‘Holding Time, Between Us, 2026’
aperture: 35¹/₂ x 62¹/₂ inches (90 x 159 cm)
sculpture: 90 x 85 x 40 inches (229 x 216 x 102 cm)
Plants, styrofoam, spray paint, interior paint, plaster, soil, sand, rocks, PVA, mini LED spot lights, LED color changing strips, LED dimmers, power strip, tulle, screen mesh scrim, pine strapping, black paint, masonite board

📸 by @zacharybalber taken in Miami, Florida by @katebickmore

356

41

5 months ago

My show 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 (𝘗𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘐) is on now at @andrewreedgallery! 🌸

𝘉𝘦𝘺𝘰𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘝𝘦𝘪𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘞𝘦𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘚𝘵𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 reveals an opium poppy held at a threshold—where relief and regulation, sleep and wakefulness, and healing and extraction all quietly overlap.

The petals fold slightly inward, casting shadows upon one another, an intimacy shaped as much by protection as by restraint—she gently reasserts control over her own body.

In the 19th century, opium was widely used to treat women’s pain and “nerves.” By extracting her milk, institutions enforced sleep and compliance—acts of forced regulation under the guise of compassion.

Walking to my weekly yoga class, I notice her resting in the garden, softly washed in pink. Her tenderness and vulnerability seem impossibly distant from the history of extraction and control she has endured, alongside the many women who were historically deemed “hysterical.”

As I settle into the quiet darkness of the studio, my instructor invites us to count our breaths—in for four, hold for seven, out for eight. Control and surrender; a prescribed alleviation as my mind climbs over hills of worry and pushes back against the pressure to extract even more from itself. Even in rest, I realize, I try to optimize.

And yet, I return to the breath, until eventually my body trusts enough to let the counting fall away.

From the shadows, we turn together toward the light as it filters in through the veiled smoke bush—a porous space between dreaming and consciousness, where, safely, we can rest within our own uncertainty.

Ft. Papaver somniferum, (opium poppy) Knautia macedonica (Macedonian scabious), Lathyrus odoratus (Sweet Pea), Cotinus coggygria (Smoke Bush), Amaranthus (Amaranth).

‘Beyond the Veil of Weighted Stillness’
60 x 48 inches (152 x 123 cm)
oil on canvas, 2026

📸 by @zacharybalber taken in Miami, Florida by @katebickmore

791

84

5 months ago

In the studio working on series of new paintings for my solo with @andrewreedgallery !

Thanks so much to @areedy25 + @ceciliamarch for taking the time to visit me + frolic around midcoast Maine.

I’ve spent a lot of time this summer figuring out what I need to make this practice + life more sustainable, and what is most essential to my work as I grow and expand my practice.

As a highly sensitive artist I find it really easy to fall into a pattern of overcommitment —> stress —> hyper-production —> burn out / shut down, which is antithetical to the modes of reflection, care, + intimacy my work thrives on.

Flowers embody this exquisite sensitivity — when they sense harm or imbalance they respond quietly, but powerfully, through chemical reaction, color, scent, + movement. Instead of shutting down, they send signals — within themselves and to nearby plants + insects — saying, ‘something’s wrong here, help me restore the balance.’ 
So, like the flower, I’m slowly learning how to listen to my sensitivities, lean into my cycles, and better connect with my community.

I’m excited for this next chapter and to share what I’ve been discovering + creating with you soon! 🫶🏻 taken in Rockland, Maine by @katebickmore

416

44

9 months ago

A very special (and very delayed) painting for my bestie @mercy.corredor + her partner @rohansud !

Mercy has been by my side for over a decade now, and I am unbelievably grateful to have such an incredible + supportive friend.

Her relationship with Rohan continues to inspire me. I feel so lucky to be able to give them this work and be a witness to the love + family they continue to grow. 🫶🏻

They Held a Thousand Fragile and Unprovable Things, 2025
oil paint on canvas, 30 x 40 inches (76.2 x 101.6 cm)

📸 of art by @and.again.__docu by @katebickmore

570

42

a year ago

A couple lil paintings I made for @palazzomonti !

On a morning walk in Brescia’s winter light, I recalled how the sun cast on and through some delicate dried hydrangea leaves — turning them into precious gold artifacts (like the ones I saw at the San Salvatore-Santa Giulia Monastery) or tiny intricate glass windows (like those in the local Italian churches).

Acting as spiritual guides, flowers are my reminder that we are all expressions of nature, and that is divine. ✨

Prima Luce, 2025
oil paint on linen, 12 x 14 inches (30.5 x 35.5 cm)

📸 of art by @and.again.__docu taken in Palazzo Monti by @katebickmore

332

41

a year ago