My name is Cathy Tveici, but before I was married I was Cathy Puccio and before I was an adult I was a kid who couldn’t control the urge to draw. I always knew I would be in the art field and it was never a question of “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I just always knew!
It was no surprise that instead of going to my local high school, I got on a train to New York City where I attended the high school of Art and Design. The high school of Art and Design really put me in the right direction. There I dabbled in a little bit of everything from pottery to architecture. It was there where my interest in graphic design started to flourish.
Once I graduated from the high school of Art and Design it was only natural that I continued my education at Parson’s School of Design. I majored in Communications Design and Advertising and received my BFA degree. Painting was a part of my education but it was not the direction I wanted to go.
After graduation I landed a job at a magazine doing mechanical paste ups. The art director got fired and poof, I was an art director. Some how with very little experience I managed to pull it together. Since then all my creativity has been geared towards Magazine Design (published my own for 12 years), Catalog Design, Advertising, Flyers, Brochures, and Logos… I think you get the picture.
One day I saw a photo and said to myself, “I want to paint that” I don’t know where it came from but the urge was uncontrollable, just like when I was a child and I would tear the house up looking for a piece of paper and pencil to draw with. I went and bought everything I needed and started to paint. My husband and daughter kind of chuckled when they saw the beginnings of my first painting, but when it was done they were no longer laughing but instead they were amazed. And honestly, I was amazed myself. I had no idea I was capable of painting, but I guess after 30 years of designing my brain just told my hands what to do. It is now my obsession and my passion! You see, I’ve been designing on a computer for so long I forgot how much fun it was to get my hands dirty!
