Aly Edmondson
Art
Statement
Fat individuals are being removed from your feeds. Within the coding of social media algorithms, images that contain an “excessive” amount of skin are flagged and promptly removed under the premise of “violating community guidelines.” This removal is not because of a depiction of nudity, violence, defamation, etc. — this is the censoring of fat bodies simply for existing. Many individuals who do not possess the Desire capital* are continually being censored in social media spaces. Systematically, this censorship and erasure is not new to those who occupy bodies that have been “othered,” this is a reality faced in practically every social, physical, medical, virtual, and institutional space we occupy, including this one.
*Defined by Da’Shaun Harrison in Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness, Desire capital is “determined by the structures through which people are marginalized for their Blackness, their gender(lessness), and their bodies. Beauty standards, especially in the United States, are predicated on anti-Blackness, anti-fatness, anti-disfiguredness, cisheterosexism, and ableism.” (Harrison, 2021).
Bio
Aly Edmondson is an interdisciplinary artist from Lafayette, Indiana, currently creating in Seattle, Washington. As a first-generation university student and graduate, Aly is heavily influenced by capitalist societal limitations regarding poverty and accessibility within the institutions of academia and contemporary art. Her artwork reflects her identity socioeconomically, socio-politically, and socio-physiologically. It often analyzes and challenges media representation and stereotypical narratives of poverty, fatness, and gender; both individual and intersectional. Aly works in several mediums including installation, video, performance, sculpture, and photography often using textiles, ready-mades, text, and poetry.
Committee
- Flint Jamison
- Rebecca Cummins
- Ellen Garvens
- Divya Mehra
- Marlena Edmondson, LCSW
Education
- MFA, Photo/Media, University of Washington, 2022
- BFA, Photography & Intermedia, Ball State University, 2013
Publications
- 2019 – Episode #64 “The Fat Art Show”, Plus Size Magic Radio
- 2019 – Part VIII Craft Projects: Carving Cute Critters, 53 Ready-to-Use Kawaii Craft Projects. ALA Editions.
- 2017 – Standards Are Everywhere: An Information Literacy Approach to Standards Education, U.S. Department of Commerce, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Curatorial Projects
- 2019 – Trust Womxn Music and Arts Festival, The Spot, Lafayette, Indiana
- 2018 – The Fat Art Show, Bindery Artist Studios, Lafayette, Indiana
Exhibitions
- 2022 – 2022 MFA + MDes Thesis Exhibition, Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, Washington
- 2021 – The Reordering of Things, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle, Washington
- 2019 – Eat the Rich, Bindery Artist Studios, Lafayette, Indiana
- 2015 – Summer Ceramics, Art Museum of Greater Lafayette, Lafayette, Indiana
- 2015 – Spring Ceramics, Art Museum of Greater Lafayette, Lafayette, Indiana
- 2013 – No Place Like Home, Griner Art Gallery, Muncie, Indiana
- 2013 – Current Condition: Electric & Moving, Ball Gymnasium, Muncie, Indiana
- 2013 – By Any Means: Alternative Photographic Processes, Southwest University of Visual Arts, Tucson, Arizona
- 2013 – 78th Annual Student Show, Griner Art Gallery, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – 8 Channels 1 Station Video Show, Gallery 312, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – 13 Directions, Cornerstone Center for the Arts, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – Guerilla Projection, Muncie Arts Walk, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – Fusion, Griner Art Gallery, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – Political Animal, The Artist Within, Muncie, Indiana
- 2012 – 77th Annual Student Show, Griner Art Gallery, Muncie, Indiana
- 2010 – 75th Annual Student Show, David Owsley Museum of Art, Muncie, Indiana
- 2010 – Welcome Center Showcase, Lucina Hall, Muncie, Indiana
Awards
- 2021 – Boyer and Elizabeth Bole Gonzales Scholarship, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington
- 2016 – Summer Ceramics Scholarship, Art Museum of Greater Lafayette, Lafayette, Indiana
- 2012 – Muncie Arts League Award, Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana
Links
Excerpt from commentary by Aurora San Miguel
Fat suits, although worn under clothing so as to conceal their prosthesis, function for the wearer to assume a faux fat body. A fat suit with no body to wear thus eliminates its functionality. Six suits, each set in light to medium beige tones emphasizing different proportions, levitate off the gallery wall on metal hangers. Aly makes note of the conditions with which these objects may be worn and the identity inhabited by the wearer in type-written tags attached to each form.
