July 2015
La Petite Mort Gallery presents
Alexis Boyle / New Works.
July 24 – 30, 2015
Vernissage Friday July 24 / 7 – 10pm.
We are Starguts
Darkness is the birthplace of all things—the damp earth, the seemingly empty space between stars, and the ripe pocket of the womb. In this exhibition, multi-disciplinary artist Alexis Boyle brings together heavenly stars and earthly bodies, through her meditation on plasma, the slippery fourth state of matter (alongside solids, liquids, and gases) that makes up over 99% of the universe. Present in our blood and in outer-space, plasma acts as a mighty conduit between all things, and is the housing of all future hatchlings.
What grows inside? virgin skin and prickly hair—a spiders legs? a Mother’s eggs.
Here Boyle presents work about the body that evokes a cosmic garden: star-seeds bursting through exuberant phases of becoming. Inspired by her recent experience of pregnancy and birth-giving, her watery ink drawings on paper evoke fertile ecologies of life first contained and then inevitably bursting-forth.
Stalks and breasts chute and spill. What grows here? A beanstalk, a child, a star?
People and stars grow, hatch and ravenously consume to produce light in a ridiculously giddy dance of hope. The title of the exhibition makes playful reference to Joni Mitchel’s 1970s hit ‘Woodstock’ wherein a phrase repeats ‘We are startdust’ urging us all to get back to the garden. In Boyle’s view, we are starguts and the garden is full of blood vessels, roots, and comets.
Alexis Boyle’s vibrant multidisciplinary practice includes painting, drawing, sculpture, performance, and new media. Her work playfully explores sexualities and bodies in emotional anatomical landscapes. She earned a BFA from Concordia University, 2011 and an interdisciplinary MFA from OCAD University Toronto, 2013. During her graduate studies she held the Joseph Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship as well as the Fonds de recherche société et culture Scholarship. In 2012 Boyle was artist in residence at the Banff Centre and in 2013 at South Side Studios in Glasgow. She has also exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions. Since moving from Ottawa in 2006, Boyle has lived and worked in Montreal and Toronto. She now resides in Gatineau.
Alexis Boyle represented by La Petite Mort Gallery, Ottawa ON Education
2011-2013 Masters of Fine Arts, Ontario College of Art and Design University, Toronto, Canada
2013 Artist in Residence at Southside Studios Glasgow, UK; Supervised by Lucy Stein, affiliated with the Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh, Scotland
2006-2011 Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fibres with Distinction, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada
Awards
SSHRC Michael Smith Foreign Study Supplement 2013
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship, 2012-13
Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et culture, Québec Graduate Scholarship, 2013
Ontario Graduate Scholarship, 2012 (declined)
Banff Centre Residency Scholarship, 2012
Ontario College of Art and Design University Travel Grant, 2012
Ontario College of Art and Design University Scholarship, 2011-13
FASA Special Projects Grant, 2011
G & S Dye Award, 2010
S.H. McNeilly Bursary, 2010
George Hanna & Normand Herbert Jr. Scholarship, 2007-2010
University Women’s Club of Montreal Scholarship, 2007-2009
Canada Millennium Scholarship, 2007
Solo Exhibitions
Tunnel Vision, MFA thesis exhibition, OCAD University Graduate Gallery, (Toronto) Aug. 22-Sept. 6, 2013
Sex Magic, Solo exhibition in the white cube at Southside Studios, (Glasgow, UK) June 14-15, 2013
Fingertip Memory, OCAD University Graduate Gallery, (Toronto) Dec. 9, 2012
Emotional Monsters, La Petite Mort Gallery, (Ottawa) May 4-27, 2012
Alexis Boyle: A Retrospective (The Concordia Years), Atelier BRIC, Belgo Building (Montreal) June 10-17, 2011
Residencies
Southside Studios, (Glasgow, UK) April 2-June 30, 2013
Banff Arts Centre A Paper, A Drawing, A Mountain Summer, (Banff, AB) June 18-July 28, 2012
Selected Group Exhibitions
2015
Howl! Activist art fair, Casa del Popolo (Montréal) April 26
Edgy Redux Soirée des oracles, La Sala Rosa (Montréal) March 6
2014
SUPERPOWER, curated by Missy Marston-Shmelzer, La Petite Mort, November (Ottawa)
The Infidels, curated by Ernesto Alva, César Catsuu López & Guy Berube, La Trampa Gráfica Contemporánea (Mexico city) February
Posts and Pillars, curated by Jennifer Simaitas and Stefan Hancherow, XPACE (Toronto) January
2013
STRUTT, Niagara Artists Centre, (St. Catharines) November 15-16
StoriedTelling, curated by Amber Landgraff, XPACE, (Toronto) August 9-31
A Paper A Mountain A Drawing curated by Silke Otto Knapp as part of the exhibition Pleinairism, curated by Kitty Scott, Walter Phillips Gallery (Banff) July 12-30
Wratchet Glitter Girl Gang, curated by Madeleine Pippa Bartlett, Glass Door Gallery (Montreal) May 24
SPRING, curated by Emily Weiner at The Willows NYC, Brooklyn Heights (Brooklyn, NY) April 20
2012
Lucky 13: Interdisciplinary Masters in Art Media and Design Group Show, The Gladstone Hotel (Toronto) September 20-26
Under the Radar, Curated by Heather Nicol at the Ontario College of Art and Design University Graduate Gallery (Toronto) March 1
2011
Jaune, Diagonale Centre des arts et des fibres du Quebec (Montreal, QC) December 2-3
Hive, Ontario College of Art and Design University Graduate Gallery (Toronto, ON) October 13-21
Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Diagonale Centre des arts et des fibres du Quebec (Montreal) Apr 12-26
Nuit Blanche, Performance in The New Gas Building (Montreal) Feb 26
Sketchbook Project Tour, The Brooklyn Art Library (Brooklyn) travelling exhibition
2010
Gris, Diagonale Centre des arts et des fibres du Québec (Montreal) November-December
20 x 20 Show, Centre for Contemporary Textiles of Montreal (Montreal) November-December
The F Word: The Future is Fabulous, Ctrl Lab, (Montreal) April 14-17
Loophole / Echappatoire Diagonale Centre des arts et des fibres du Québec, (Montreal) March 13-17
Actions & Interactions Montreal Art Matters Festival, curated by Shauna Thatcher Éspace Artefacto March 1-19
Publications
Making Love, February 2014 special edition of KAPSULA Magazine, Edited by Caoimhe Morgan-Feir, Toronto The Child Alberta 2013, Edited by David Giordano, Silke Otto-Knapp, Mitch Speed. Essay Contribution by
Jan Verwoert. Setup, Vancouver, BC
The Concordia Years 2011, exhibition catalogue self-published by Alexis Boyle
The F Word 2010, exhibition catalogue self-published by Lael Williams and Alexis Boyle. Essay Contribution by Lisa Vinebaum
Press
Posts and Pillars Exhibition Essay January 30, 2014 written by Jennifer Simaitis and Stefan Hancherow
http://xpace.info/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Main-Space_Post-and-Pillars.pdf Storied Telling Exhibition Essay August 10, 2013 written by Amber Landgraff
http://xpace.info/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Storied-Telling.pdf
One stitch at a time, Concordia University Journal. April 29, 2010. Vol.5 No.15 written by Anna Sarkissian