Mandy Espezel

About

Mandy Espezel is a Canadian artist originally from Treaty 8 territory, within the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, and the traditional lands of the Cree, Dene, and the unceded territory of the Métis. They received a BFA from the University of Alberta in 2007, and an MFA from the University of Lethbridge in 2012. Espezel has participated in numerous exhibitions and residencies within Canada and internationally, and has received support for their work from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and the Canada Council for the Arts. Espezel is a recurrent sessional instructor, and is based in Lethbridge on Treaty 7 land, in the traditional territories of the Blackfoot Confederacy

Research

Based in an intuitive material studio practice, my work engages an intersectional-feminist phenomenological discourse. I am invested in the power and necessity of vulnerability. I work to confront the limits and conceptual dilemmas present within historically binary modes of representation/mimesis, while striving for corporeal embodiment. My interdisciplinary work is rooted in the realm of painting, with recent projects exploring site specific installations which incorporate individual paintings/drawings/found materials/video/performance/textile sculptural elements. The manifestation of anxieties (realized in both psychological and physiological states), empathy, sensuality, touch, and the “autobiographical” as a source of influence in interpretation and production are current thematic concerns. Subjectivity is source material, and through intensive confrontations of these categories, new possibilities for understanding unfold.