MFA 2023 Artists

Alexandra Danielle Landry

UMass Dartmouth 2023 MFA Thesis Exhibition

Update: Alexandra passed away shortly after this article was published. Her most recent paintings will remain exhibited in the Star Store’s University Gallery through May 13, as they stand a strong testament to her life and art. Our thoughts and prayers are with Alex’s family, friends, and classmates.

About Alexandra Danielle Landry

Alexandra Danielle Landry is an observational oil painter. She was born and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana where she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from McNeese State University in 2015, concentrating in painting and drawing. Landry will earn her MFA from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth in May 2023.

Statement

Spaces of Absence and Excess

In my recent paintings, I aim to convey narratives of absence and excess, exploring two-dimensional representations of time through paintings of domestic spaces. I seek to paint spaces where the figure is absent from direct observation and instead focus on the changes and chaos of a space to carve out representations of human activity and states.

In my thesis work, I seek to combine the formal investigation of inside/outside, light, form and space with the conceptual investigation of order/chaos, presence/absence, outer/inner, and control/excess through the changes, messes, and evidence of human presence/absence and activity in a space in order to ultimately investigate mental states and identity. The subject is intended to act both as the observed form and space, and as a visual metaphor for the above states: discarded objects, dirty plates, empty bottles, bits of trash, disheveled blinds, haphazardly strewn about books and papers. The paintings become narratives of anxiety, fragility, euphoria, neglect, mania, celebration, self-destruction, or loneliness. Emotions and containment are in a constant battle within us; excess and control are, too. Things can be contained/suppressed only so long before they surface and flood out. I seek to explore the act of painting these objects as a form of redemption.