Catalina Vásquez (Kathiuska) is an illustrator, designer, and visual storyteller from the mountains of Medellín, Colombia. Her work weaves together narrative and visual languages to create a universe where personal and collective experiences meet, exploring memory, place, identity, and the richness of human emotions and lived experiences.
With a multidisciplinary approach, she has contributed to projects across independent animation, documentary, editorial design, advertising, educational initiatives, museography, textiles, and fashion. Her work navigates the space between graphic narrative and documentary animation, exploring the plasticity of the image as a vessel for memory.
A graduate of the University of Antioquia, Catalina was a resident at the Maison des Auteurs (Angoulême, France, 2018) and received the India Catalina Award for Best New Creator for her short documentary Reciclando Recuerdos (FICCI, 2011). Her short film Cárcel was part of the Official Selection at DOK Leipzig (2018), the Málaga Film Festival (2019), and Bogoshorts. As an executive producer, she realized the animated short Niebla, selected for the Official Competition at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (2021).
In 2021, her work Geraldine, co-created with Alejandra Pérez Torres, was selected by the Goethe-Institut for a Global South comics anthology. The project documents the life of a trans woman from the Emberá Chamí indigenous community, weaving together narratives of ecological activism and LGBTIQ+ rights.
She is currently pursuing a Master’s in Latin American Cultural Studies at Javeriana University, where she researches the intersections of domestic labor, gender, and class through an affective lens.
Selected clients:
Adobe · Internazionale · Amnesty International · Upwork · Doméstika · Snapchat · Reserve · Airbnb · Penguin Random House · Editorial Planeta · Ministry of Culture of Colombia · Radio Ambulante · Fundación Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano FNPI · Mutante · Comisión de la Verdad de Colombia · Revista Semana · Revista Avianca · El Espectador · Señal Colombia · Fiesta del Libro y la Cultura de Medellín.
Awards & Grants
ADC Silver Cube Award. The One Club for Creativity. New York, USA. 2022
Movements and Moments, Feminist Generation. Goethe Institut Indonesia. 2020
Graphic Novel Artistic Residence at the Maison des Auteurs. Granted by the Ministry of Culture of Colombia and La Cité Internationale de la Bande Dessinée et de L'image. Angouleme, France. 2018
The Film Development Fund Grant (FDC) - Proimágenes Colombia. 2016
Exhibitions
2015. Museo de la Calle. Fiesta del Libro y la Cultura. Medellín, Colombia
2018. Maison des Auteurs. Festival international de la bande dessinée d'Angoulême. France.
2019. Latin America illustration 6. New York, USA
2022. Artists posters. La Guarimba International Film Festival. Amantea, Italy.