Audrey Barcio is an American visual artist known for her paintings and installations. Her work has been featured in New American Paintings, and in 2019, she was awarded a Pollock Krasner Foundation grant. Barcio maintains a rigorous, interdisciplinary studio practice in which notions of action, labor, and the human condition intersect with the history of Modernism to form the basis of aesthetic explorations. We had the pleasure to speak with regarding her work and career.
Hi Audrey, a pleasure to speak to you about your work. Congratulations on your career as an artist. How did become involved in the arts?
I was lucky to grow up living near to my grandmother, a self-taught painter. From as early as I can remember she was having me draw, paint, and eventually assist in her painting studio. As she grew older, she lost her eyesight though that just changed her work from figuration to abstraction. This impacted me on so many fronts- her courage, adaption, persistence, grace, raw emotion and for me, watching at a young age the transition from figuration to abstraction was transformative. Though with no formal education or training my grandmother learned everything she could about art history and shared that passion with me.
I often look back and laugh because my visual literacy was so impacted at a young age by my grandmother. I excelled visually and as an artist but totally fell flat in reading, writing, and math when I entered elementary school. This was brutally obvious when in first grade I thought that the shapes of numbers correspond with math problems. Such problem as 2 + 2 I would say equals 3 and my explanation was that the number 2 has a curve and when you stack the curves they make 3 because it has two curves… Everything fell into place when I realized that I had approached my learning through the principles and elements of art and, that was VERY different than how my classmates were learning.
You studied art at Herron School of Art and Design, Indianapolis, and later received your M.F.A. in Painting and Sculpture at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). To what extent do you feel your time at the institutions shaped your approach to your work
I’m the first in my family to attend college and, to be honest, it was not an easy path. I went to college blindly without much guidance, financial assistance, or support. My grandmother had passed before I started high school and my family couldn’t imagine that they actually teach art in college, and what I would do with a degree after was a common argument.
I was born in the Midwest, and the idea of going to an out of state school or private school was just not something that was considered. After an extended absence to travel the world (working as a flight attendant) I returned to Herron School of Art and Design in Indianapolis, Indiana, and got serious about what I wanted from my education. Around this time, I met my now-husband and we worked to pay my way through college.
Herron is an amazing school and I was so lucky that it happened to be in Indiana. Herron’s history as an art school is remarkable, the school was started in 1902 after a businessman named John Herron decided to leave all his money to the arts, stating that he wanted it to go to a good purpose and to benefit Indianapolis. For the first time since my grandmother, I found a pure love for art from my professors -they shaped my path forward in every way.
After Herron School of Art and Design, I received my MFA at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. UNLV gave me time, space and the fresh desert air to breathe deeply and dive into my practice. Going to graduate school in the middle of the desert allowed me to focus in a way that I really needed. The expanded landscape, light, and of course glitz of the neon lights worked its way into my work in unexpected ways.
Are there any artists who have particularly influenced your work and if so why?
Aside from grandmother, who has been the biggest influence, I would say there is a long line of historical artist influences from Kazimir Malevich and Hilma Af Klint to Mark Rothko and Agnes Martin. Each of these artists was seeking out truth in a way that my grandmother did through abstraction, and I feel it with all my soul when standing in front of their works.
Over the summer I finished Ninth Street Women: Lee Krasner, Elaine de Kooning, Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, and Helen Frankenthaler: Five Painters and the Movement That Changed Modern Art by Mary Gabriel. I had always been a fan of these artists but never knew just how hard they pushed the conversation forward for female artists- this should be required reading for every young painter!
Your paintings explore how the heritage of abstraction intersects with the tools of the virtual industrial age, rooted in the constructed languages of the past. Please share how these themes became an integral part of your work?
My obsession with abstraction started really young when I poured through my grandmother’s Tudor Publishing Miniature Art Books. Looking at the masters it was clear to me that art has a lineage. My work comes from that quest to continue the lineage of abstraction and reflect upon how our interaction with the digital has impacted our relationship to painting today.
You’re a New American Paintings Winner of 2015 and recipient of a Pollock Krasner Foundation grant. Aside from these accolades, what are your proudest achievements as a contemporary artist?
I’m honored to have recently been hired as a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor of Painting at Ball State University. Teaching the next generation of artists is a responsibility that I cherish dearly. Teaching during the pandemic has presented new challenges but has also reinforced how important the arts are during difficult times. My students are resilient and brave in ways that give me hope for the future.
What is your biggest challenge as a visual artist?
My biggest challenge was/is having the confidence to allow myself to be an artist.
What advice would you give to young artists embarking on their careers?
Believe in your own path and follow it full force ahead. An artist’s path is long – it’s important to see far into the future and not focus too much on the immediate. If we’re lucky, we will be making art till the day we can’t and that should be a long time.
What project/s are you currently working on?
Right now, I’m working on a new series of smaller more intimate paintings in my studio. For my birthday my husband gave me the Anni Albers Notebook from 1970-1980 where she explores over and over different ways to create beautiful geometric patterns. I can’t help but think that this new series is attempting to explore that same obsession Anni Albers had with geometry.
Where can our readers find out more about you?
Website- Audreybarcio.com
Instagram – @audreybarcio
Images: images 2,3 & 1
Untitled, 2020, acrylic, flashe and mica on canvas, 24″ 18″
Courtesy of Audrey Barcio
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