Tara Donovan builds large, labor-intensive, and site-specific installations out of everyday materials such as scotch tape, drinking straws, paper plates, roofing paper and Styrofoam cups. Donovan takes these materials and grows them through accumulation. The results are large-scale abstract floor and wall works suggestive of landscapes, clouds, cellular structures and even mold or fungus. In her words, "it is not like I'm trying to simulate nature. It's more of a mimicking of the way of nature, the way things actually grow."

Donovan's printmaking practice reflects her focus on exploring the possibilities of common materials. She has used bubbles, rubber bands and pins to build matrices for complexly patterned prints.

Donovan's work has been the subject of exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Indianapolis Museum of Art and is represented in major public collections. In 2008, she was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship.