Originally from Detroit, Michigan (USA) - Alison Grimm (b. 1983) works in a variety of media including sculpture, installation, ceramic, and paper collage. The artwork conceptually centers on the transformative experience of the viewer evoked through sight, reference, and imagination. Over the course of the last decade Grimm has developed a deep interest in shrines, altars, orifices, and architectural focal points - exploring the capacity of these particular objects, shapes, and design methods to elicit emotional and symbolic meaning. Personal and collective histories, political and philosophical topics, and the challenges of communication and perception provide important foundations for her work. For example, Grimm's haunting Territorial Exclusivity (2013) sought to bring focus to the history of racism which continues to impact and plague American cities such as Detroit; constituting one work in a series of sculptures and installations that served as reflections on American Dream mythologies. Her work has examined the interior world, our relationship to self and other, creating existential meanderings for the viewer to engage with. Queer desire, identity - the pain and ecstasy of otherness - have long been embedded in the work, to varying degrees of abstraction and focus.

 

Overall, her multi-layered approach invites layered interpretations and questions for the viewer's consideration. Through her use of perceptual devices and altar-like spaces, Grimm seeks the viewer’s attention and imagination to further these narratives while reflecting on their own personal and collective role, and potentials for the future. Creating an exchange with her audience through a process of interaction is very important to Grimm—the viewer’s presence and direct experience is the method through which the work can be fully activated and made whole. Sculpture’s ability to function as a platform through which these physical, psychological, and emotive experiences can take shape has been a driving force behind the majority of her work thus far.

 

 

 

Grimm holds a BA in Sculpture from the University of Puget Sound (2012), and MFA in Sculpture from Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan (2018). She also completed an MA degree in American History, Culture and Society from Ludwig-Maximilians Universität in Munich (2020). She currently resides in Seattle, WA.