I remember as a teenager viewing an unremarkable fragment of Roman floor mosaic in a museum.
Due to its diminished size, its position as domestic art (made for feet), its basic design- it was not significant. But it remained, and it contained everything meaningful.
Later, working in an auction house, I handled many old, small, and undeniably powerful household things. All of them were made by unnamed, often brutally marginalized people.
As a child, I observed that I was not enough. Making, for me, is an act of resistance. I work quickly. I puncture, stretch, deface, add to, move on from. I describe the ambivalence within my body.
Within the confines of who I have been told I am, I find I am more than that. If I am, so we all are. And that is what I work to communicate in these pieces.
Bio
I was born in 1983 in Chestertown, MD. In 2012 I received a Post-Bacc in Fine Arts from Brandeis University. I graduated from Yale University in 2007 with a BA in Classics. I have exhibited my work in group and solo shows in Maryland, Massachusetts, and New York, and was a resident at the Vermont Studio Center.
In 2022 I founded a non-commercial art space, The Tender, in West Concord, MA, and curate monthly shows work by emerging contemporary artists there. I live in Concord, MA and work in Framingham.
Education
2010-2012 Post Baccalaureate in Studio Art, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
2003-2007 BA (Classics), Yale University, New Haven, CT
Solo Exhibitions
2023
April, The Tender Art Space, Concord, MA
2017
Katherine Spencer: Recent Work, Darwin’s, Cambridge, MA
Group Exhibitions
2024
Upcoming: Attentive Reader, Locust Valley Library, Long Island, NY
Upcoming: Saxonville Mills 200 Anniversary Open Studios, Saxonville, MA
How Did We Get Here?, ECOCA at Upstate Art Weekend, ArtPort Kingston, Kingston, NY
Little Lightning, The Canopy Gallery, Chelsea, New York, NY
2015
CRIT: The Boston Critique Group, Gallery 263, Cambridge, MA
2012
Post-Baccalaureate Exhibition, Dreitzer Gallery, Brandeis University
2011
Open Studios, Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT
2011
Post-Baccalaureate Exhibition, Dreitzer Gallery, Brandeis University
2007
Summer Nudes, Robert Antreasian Gallery, Baltimore, MD
The Next Generation, Carla Massoni Gallery, Chestertown, MD
Residencies
2021 Artist in Residence, Artist Residency in Motherhood, Concord, MA
2018 Artist in Residence, Artist Residency in Motherhood, Cambridge, MA
2011 Artist in Residence, Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT
Awards
2012 Graduate Teaching Assistant Scholarship, Brandeis University
2011 Residency Fellowship, Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT
2011 Graduate Teaching Assistant Fellowship, Brandeis University
Commissions
2009 Set Design, Holy Ghosts (original opera by Larry Bell), Berklee Performance Center, Boston, MA
2006 Straight Street mural, Chestertown, MD
2005 Set Design, Mother Courage (Dramat Mainstage, dir. Satya Babha), Yale University
Arts Organizations
2021-on M/others Who Make
2021-on Collective Labor Critique Group
2010-on Boston Critique Group