Lexa Walsh is an artist, cultural worker and experience maker.

With a background in both sculpture and social practice, Walsh makes site specific projects, exhibitions, publications and objects, using an array of materials and employing social engagement, institutional critique, and radical hospitality. She creates platforms for interaction across hierarchies, representing multiple voices and inventing new ways of belonging. Walsh has exhibited and performed internationally for over 25 years at institutions large and small, and in public spaces.

Her upbringing as the youngest child of fifteen informs her work, as does practicing collectivity while coming of age in the Bay Area post punk cultural scene of the 1990’s. Walsh co-founded and conceived of the all women, all toy instrument ensemble Toychestra. She founded and organizes Oakland Stock, the Oakland branch of the Sunday Soup network micro-granting dinner series that supports artists’ projects. Her most recent large-scale works include a multifaceted exhibition about the complexities of war at Marin MOCA, and a collaborative project with progressive nuns at Grand Central Art Center. She recently relocated from Oakland, CA to the Hudson Valley.

Download CV

ARTIST STATEMENT

I make context-responsive, multifaceted projects, exhibitions and objects about power and value. With a background in both sculpture and social practice, I create platforms for interaction across hierarchies, representing multiple voices and inventing new ways of belonging.

Currently I am making award forms such as trophies, plaques and medals made of ceramics, found objects and mixed media. These investigations appropriate traditional awards with their handmade, oversized, often humorous forms. These works are shown in large groupings, with participatory components where the public may offer testimonials and dedications to share in an expanded notion of what and who may be celebrated, and why (I grew up in a house full of trophies, and none of them were mine). Additionally, I make architectural and social spaces for conversation and engagement. These can look like a clubhouse, kiosk, or chapel, along with custom conversational furniture.

My process always involves deep research, listening, experimentation and play. Ultimately I am driven by uncovering the grey areas, the in-betweens, the nuanced space between discomfort and a warm embrace, to create physical and emotional spaces for social engagement and institutional critique.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Long BIO

Walsh makes projects, exhibitions, publications and objects, employing social engagement, institutional critique, and radical hospitality. She creates platforms for interaction across hierarchies, representing multiple voices and inventing new ways of belonging, not only for people, but also for collections and archives.

Walsh is a graduate of Portland State University’s Art & Social Practice MFA program and holds a BFA in Ceramics from California College of Arts and Crafts. She was Social Practice Artist in Residence in Portland Art Museum’s Education department, received Southern Exposure’s Alternative Exposure Award, the CEC Artslink Award, the Gunk Grant, the de Young Artist Fellowship, and Kala’s Print Public Residency Award. Walsh has participated in projects, exhibitions and performances at Apexart, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Cité de la Musique, the de Young Museum, di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Exploratorium, Kala Art Institute, Mills College Art Museum, MIT List Visual Arts Center, Oakland Museum of California, NIAD, Portland Art Museum, SFMOMA, Smack Mellon, Taipei Artist Village, Walker Art Center, Williams College Museum of Art, and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. She has done several international artist residencies, tours and projects.

Her upbringing as the youngest child of fifteen in a house full of trophies (that were not hers) informs her work, as does practicing collectivity while coming of age in the Bay Area post punk cultural scene of the 1990’s. Walsh founded the experimental music and performance venue the Heinz Afterworld Lounge, worked for many years as a curator and administrator at CESTA, an international art center in Czech republic, whose team created radical curatorial projects to foster cross-cultural understanding. Walsh co-founded and conceived of the all women, all toy instrument ensemble Toychestra. She founded and organizes Oakland Stock, the Oakland branch of the Sunday Soup network micro-granting dinner series that supports artists’ projects. She recently launched the Bay Area Contemporary Arts Archive (BACAA), was a virtual Artist in Residence at the Frank Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University for the exhibition Shall Make, Shall Be: The Bill of Rights at Play, and created a large series of ceramic and mixed media award forms, Taking One for the Team. She recently worked with progressive nuns for a residency project at Grand Central Arts in Santa Ana, CA and created a large scale installation at Marin MoCA.

Long Statement

I grew up in a house full of trophies, and none of them were mine. Currently I am making award forms such as trophies, plaques and medals made of ceramics, textiles and found objects. These investigations appropriate traditional awards with their handmade, oversized, often humorous forms. These works are shown in large groupings, with participatory components where the public may offer testimonials and dedications to share in an expanded notion of what and who may be celebrated, and why. Additionally, I make architectural and social spaces for conversation and engagement. These can look like a clubhouse, kiosk, or chapel, along with custom conversational furniture, like the tete-a-tete and double faced kneeler for Sisters InfoShop, a collaboration with the progressive, activist Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange.

“Taking One For The Team” is a large scale installation of exuberant award forms and a participatory sound element. This body of work explores our notions of endurance sparked by events in recent years. Similarly, “Consolidated Mess” is an exhibition responding to WWII museums and their tendency to celebrate war. A primary component of this exhibition a large series of my ceramic and mixed media military ‘decorations’ with dedications made by not only me, but also participating Veterans, and a corresponding exhibition I curated of Veteran artists work.

To create physical and emotional spaces for social engagement and institutional critique, I have utilized many platforms:

The Table is a platform for exchange where almost anything can happen.
The Community Cookbook is a platform for storytelling and recording.
The collective making of Cheer and Song is a platform for expressions of joy and protest.
The Museum (and its pedestal) is a platform to question power and value.
The Thrift Store is a platform that asks what differentiates it from a museum.
The Archive is a platform for uncovering and classifying.
The Public Square is a platform for calling in.

These works can look like a hearth for difficult conversations, an artist run service platform, or a social club for elders. As an artist-curator, I have merged prominent artworks with ephemera and fakes, and assembled community-sourced archives.

LEXAWALSH@GMAIL.COM

Join me for some occasional newsflashes

〰️

Join me for some occasional newsflashes 〰️

Happening:

Isn’t Life a Blast: Celebrating Real Time Residency runs May 16-June 29 at Gallery 16, San Francisco. I am curating selections from the archive I developed when in residence at Real Time & SPace.

Im working on a new installation of ceramic, textile and mixed media award forms, which opens June 22nd at The Guardhouse Program at Fort Mason in San Francisco, presented by FOR-SITE.