Merrilee Challis

Merrilee Challis

Painting [Birmingham, AL]

www.myspace.com/merilka

The world is ephemeral, often brutally so. I find that I tether myself to the world through the process of making art. My work arises from a miasma of disparate sources: fairy tales, flora, fauna, and medical anomalies. Drawing has always been the mainstay of my practice. I usually begin with an ink pen and, without much planning, follow my intuition. The work evolves organically out of an often obsessive process (mark-making, stitching, etc), in which some sort of “order” is created, and then subverted.

Much of my recent work has been consumed by a sense of “taking stock” of nature, depicting a world out of balance. Drawings and illustrations of forrest creatures, tidal pools, and sub-aquatic creatures reflect the fecundity of life, teeming --albeit, despite a vulnerability -- from birth to death, from the bloom of life, to adaptation and eventual decay. I feel a strong connection to both Voodoo and Victorian sensibilities, and try to marry them in my work. I return again and again to these words by Donald Kuspit: “beauty contains the death within it.”

EDUCATION ________________
Post-Graduate Apprenticeship, Fabric Workshop and Museum, 2000
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, MFA, 2000
University of Alabama at Birmingham, B.A. Studio Arts, cum laude, 1994
Universitat Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany, Internship Program, 1991-2

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
2006 – Present
Owner BottleTree Café / Bar / Venue (www.thebottletree.com)

2003 - 2005 Co-founder, COLLARMOTH, craft /design collective featuring hand-made goods (www.collarmoth.com)

2003 -- 2008 Adjunct Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham

2002 - 2005, also 1996-1998
Art Director, Studio By The Tracks (www.studiobythetracks.com), a non-profit art studio that provides free art instruction to emotionally conflicted children and adults with autism and schizophrenia, Irondale, AL

2000-2002
Member and Fundraising Coordinator, Cooperative Gallery, Vox Populi, Philadelphia, PA

EXHIBITIONS
2008 “Devotion to Thread,” group show, Paperboat Gallery, Milwaukee, WI
“Handmade Nation,” group show, Poketo, Los Angeles, CA
“Southern Gothic Now,” group show, Space 301, Mobile, AL
2007 ARTBASEL, Miami, FL (with Bucheon Gallery)
“Menagerie,” Solo Show, Art Star Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
Square Foot Gallery, Nashville, TN
“The Seven Deadly Sins,“ group show, 1301 Gallery, Omaha, Nebraska
2006 ARTBASEL, Miami, FL (with Bucheon Gallery)
“The Wilderness of Memories,” Solo Show, Paperboat Gallery,
Milwaukee, WI
“Tenth Anniversary Exhibition,” Bare Hands Gallery, Bham, AL
“Solo Show,” Moxie Gallery, Birmigham, AL
“Group Show,” Belcourt Theater, Nashville, TN
2005 “Four Seasons,” Youngblood Gallery, Atlanta, GA
“Organ Garden,” Two Person Show, Bucheon Gallery,
San Francisco, CA
“The Faux Show,” Esther Klein Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“My Friends Are Friends of Friends,” Camp Fig, Austin, TX
“hothouse flowers,” Solo Show, Moxie Gallery, Birmingham, AL
“Birmingham’s Best Young Artists,” Schedler Minchin Fine Art,
Birmingham, AL
Los Angeles Art Fair, with Bucheon Gallery (San Francisco, CA)
Scope Art Fair NY, with Bucheon Gallery

2004 “By Hoof, Stitch and Limb,” Solo Show,
Birmingham-Southern College, Birmingham, AL
“Aqualung,” Solo Show, Teaspace, Atlanta, GA
“Hot for Teacher,” Camp Fig, Austin, TX
“The Vine that Ate the South,” University of Montevallo
“Mekong Jitney,” Java Gallery, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
“Stray Show,” with Vox Populi, Chicago, IL
“Creature Comforts,” Solo Show, High-Corner Co-op, Waverly, AL

2003 “Red Dot,” Spector Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“SUMRUM: samesame/different,” Eyelounge Gallery, Phoenix, AZ
“The Hive and the Pod,” Installation, Work Play, Birmingham, AL
“SUMRUM: samesame/different,” B’ham Public Library, B’ham, AL
“drawing for it,” Spector Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“swimmin’ with the fishes,” Solo Show, Bare Hands Gallery, B’ham, AL
“VOX POPULI ALUMNI SHOW,” Vox Populi, Phila, PA

2002 “f(a)erie,” Installation, Bare Hands Gallery, Birmingham, AL
“BLUE,” Installation, Gulf Alternative Space, Fairhope, AL
‘APOCRYPHILIA,” Solo Show, Vox Populi, Philadelphia, PA
“G.O.R.A. in Modus,“ Eyedrum Gallery, Atlanta, GA
“Gridlock,” Vox Populi, Philadelphia, PA

2001 “Blunt,” The Butchershop, Chicago, IL
“Snapshots,” Arcadia Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“Firsts: the Personal and the Historical,” Bare Hands Gallery, Birmingham, AL
“Her Heart’s Livers and Her Mind’s Knives,” Solo Show, Vox Populi, Philadelphia, PA
“Cross Roads,” Painted Bride Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

2000 “Sugar and Spice,” Harwood Art Center, Albuquerque, NM
“Art for Quilt’s Sake,” MakeReady Press Gallery, Montclair, NJ
“Decorating Seriously, ” Borowsky Gallery, Phila, PA
“Relish: New Member’s Show, ” Vox Populi, Phila, PA
“In Part About the Body,” University City Arts League, Phila, PA
MFA Thesis Show, Penna Acad of the Fine Arts, Phila, PA
“Cleavage,” Luther Bean Museum, Adams State College, Alamosa, CO

1999 “Sold Out: Silent Auction,” Freeman’s Auction House, Phila, PA
“Life is Beautiful,” Solo Show, Bare Hands Gallery, Birmingham AL
“Cleavage: an exhibition on the breast,” Jonson Gallery of the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM

GRANTS AND AWARDS______________________________________
2005 Alabama State Council on the Arts Fellowship
2004 Emerging Artist Award, Magic City Art Connection, B’ham, AL
2000 Best of Show, MakeReady Press Gallery, Montclair, NJ
2000 Window of Opportunity Award, The Leeway Foundation, Phila, PA
1998-2000 Honorary Scholarship, Penna. Acad. of the Fine Arts, Phila, PA

COLLECTIONS_____________________________________________
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Amanda Schedler
Janice and Cam Langley
Jack Drake
Piper Paper Company
Private and Corporate Collections in the United States and Europe

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS: MENTIONS and REVIEWS____________
Pine Magazine, on-line publication, October 2006
Art in America, January 2006
Black & White, May 2005
Portico Magazine, May 2005
The Birmingham Post-Herald, April 2005
The Atlanta Journal & Constitution, October 2005
ArtPapers, October 2005
The Birmingham News, Nov 2004
Black & White, Nov 2004
The Hilltop News, Nov 2004
Cambodia Daily, August 2004
New American Paintings, June 2004
Birmingham Home and Garden Magazine, June 2004
The Birmingham News, 2003
Black & White, 2003
Birmingham Weekly, 2003
The Sunday Journal, Albuquerque,1999
The Birmingham News, 1998
Birmingham