My work is created in response to recycled and cast-off materials, gathered from thrift stores, gifted from friends, and collected off the streets around my neighborhood. Transforming and reassembling these objects intuitively, I consider their material histories and narrative potentials, as well as my own haptic responses to physical traces of their past use. Informed by contemporary sculptural and craft practices, the resulting works evoke, rather than illustrate, ideas of continuity, adaptation, and change.
In the works I’ve created over the last decade, I've become more and more aware of the seasonal, generational, and regional dynamics which dictate my access to the diverse collections I work with. I notice the cycles as previous generations' cast-offs become thrift-store merchandise before disappearing from availability. Whether considering a collection of secondhand sea shells and questioning the ethics of their original gathering, or combing through disheveled, plastic Halloween party wigs discarded after one night of use, I am also grappling with the simultaneous natures of such materials to be both aesthetically seductive and ecologically problematic. Through reintegrating notions of time and labor into my handling of these seemingly disposable materials, I hope to reanimate our intimate relationship with the aesthetics, natural and industrial processes, and objecthood of our culture’s cast-offs, and to honor the complexities which go hand-in-hand with our consumption.
SELECT EXPERIENCE
EDUCATION
MFA-Sculpture, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
BFA-Studio Art, University of Wisconsin Eau Claire
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
(upcoming) Material World, NE SCULPTURE | Gallery Factory, Minneapolis MN, 2025
The Abundance, Saint John’s University Art Center, Collegeville MN, 2022
Silver Lining, Silverwood Park Gallery, St Anthony MN, 2022
Shelterbelt, Conkling Gallery, Minnesota State University-Mankato, 2019
Once in a While, Phipps Center for the Arts, Hudson WI, 2016
Everything Must Go, Franconia in the City @ Casket, Minneapolis MN, 2015
Hoop Snake Road, Museum of Questionable Medical Devices, Minneapolis MN, 1993
SELECTED RECENT GROUP EXHIBITIONS
Open Door 19, juried by Syed Hosain, Rosalux Gallery, Minneapolis MN, 2024
31st Annual Juried Show, juried by Aaron Spangler, MacRostie Art Center, Grand Rapids MN, 2023
In Our Minds, Minnesota Museum of American Art, St Paul MN, 2022-2023
I50lation, curated by Cynthia Handel and Coral Lambert, touring exhibition:
Zwitscher Machine Gallery, Berlin DE, 2022;
ProjekTraum FN, Friedrichshafen DE, 2022;
Cohen Gallery, Alfred University NY, 2022;
Zoller Gallery, Penn State PA, 2021;
Livingston Center for Art & Culture, Livingston MT, 2021
CSBSJU Faculty Exhibition, Gorecki Gallery, College of Saint Benedict, St Joseph MN, 2021
50x50, curated by Wayne Potratz, Quarter Gallery, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN, 2019
Ecocentric, curated by Erica Spitzer-Rasmussen, Gordon Parks Gallery, St Paul MN, 2017
Love, SooVAC, Soo Visual Arts Center, Minneapolis, MN, 2016
Three Year Anniversary, The White Page, Minneapolis, MN, 2016
Take Me With You, juried by Andrea Avery, John Michael Kohler Art Center, Sheboygan WI, 2014-15
Strong Women, curated by Armisey Smith, Jewish Museum of New Jersey, Newark NJ, 2013
Art Circles, juried by Eileen Cohen, Silverwood Park, St. Anthony MN, 2011-12
Iron Maidens, curated by Coral Lambert, touring exhibition:
St John’s University Gallery, Collegeville MN, 2012;
Catherine G Murphy Gallery, St Catherine University, St Paul MN, 2011
An Exchange with Sol LeWitt, MASS MoCA, North Adams MA, 2011
SELECTED RECENT GRANTS & AWARDS
Next Step Grant, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, Twin Cities Metro MN, 2024
Juror’s Award, 31st Annual Juried Exhibition, juried by Aaron Spangler, MacRostie Art Center, Grand Rapids MN, 2023
SELECTED RECENT PRESS & PUBLICATIONS
St. Paul Students find their fashion in J-Term Partnership, Meredith Heneghan, Minnesota Museum of American Art Blog, February 2023
I50lation: A Portfolio of 50 drawings x 50 women sculptors, Coral Lambert and Cynthia Handel, ProjeckTraum FN, 2022
Our Wild Spaces, Emily Rose Anderson, Montana Women Magazine, issue 13, Jul/Aug 2021
Art Exhibit stuns students, Lidia Vassar, MSU Reporter, 2019
Explore 5 amazing sculpture parks that aren’t the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, Lauren Beaubaire, Twin Cities Agenda, 2018
Indulge in the Ecocentric, CT Corum, The Metropolitan, 2017
The Saint Paul Art Tour You Weren’t Expecting, Jody Huber, St Paul Almanac, May 2014
Strong Women, Armisey Smith, exhibit catalogue, Jewish Museum of New Jersey, 2013
An Exchange with Sol LeWitt, Regine Basha, exhibit catalogue, Cabinet Books, 2012
ACADEMIC TEACHING
2016-22 Visiting Assistant Professor, Saint John’s University, Collegeville MN
2020-22 — 4 semesters Sculpture I, 1 semester Independent Study
2016-17 — 3 semesters Sculpture I
2011-12 Guest Instructor — Sculpture I, College of St Catherine University, St Paul MN
2005-07 Instructor of Record, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN 4 semesters, Sculpture I
2004-07 Graduate Teaching Assistant, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN 5 semesters Sculpture I, 1 semester Kinetic Sculpture
2004 Teaching Assistant, Women’s Art Institute Summer Studio Intensive, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Minneapolis MN
(for complete CV, see pdf above)