Alison J Carr
My work explores the complexities of the glamour of feminine display, through both embodiment and critical engagement with archival and found imagery.
Two key impulses guide my practice: one is to isolate the empty contexts of performance—such as theatre auditoria and lap dance booths—spaces where bodies are usually looked at. The second is to explore the bodies that are put on display: showgirls, strippers, chorus girls.
I make drawings, collages, texts, performances, photographs, and video. I propose theatres as sites of self-actualisation; classic Hollywood film sets as a location of avant-garde art; chorus girl troupes as networks of support and community; and strip clubs as spaces of transformation. I depict the visible contradictions of bodily display—between hyper-visibility and invisibility, the loud and voiceless, power and powerlessness—and I investigate the boundaries between pleasure in performance and quiet reflection, between exhibitionism and our own interior worlds.
I approach this through embodied performance, recording oral histories with retired chorus girls, appropriating vintage Hollywood film to create video essays, and making traced drawings and paintings from found and self-staged imagery. My drawing practice involves isolating dancers in archival material or photographing myself, then tracing, painting, and ornamenting these images with gold pen to confer reverence upon them, producing sensuous images.
Too often, images of bodies are used to sell, and they provoke anxiety or shame, as if bodies themselves can be oppressive or problematic. At the same time, representation can cheapen or belittle bodies, stripping them of value and dignity. Through my work, I offer an alternative: to affirm the value of bodies and create space to consider that any body—regardless of particularities or realities—is worthy of respect and recognition. This desire to cultivate respect is a driving force behind my practice.
I’ve spent two decades developing this line of enquiry—ever since I encountered a collection of cigarette card pin-ups in 2005. That moment sparked a long-term investigation into the cultural and emotional weight of the body on display.
Lived Experience
I have had an art practice since I graduated from my BA (Hons) in 2001. However, I really consider I found my artistic voice much more recently. Following my PhD the process began in which I integrated what I had learned into my work in a lighter touch, intuitive, imaginative way, thus finding ways of working that are self-sustaining and autonomous. My practice has now become a source of solace and inspiration for me and I believe, has become more engaging to encounter.
I was a lecturer 2009-23, now having left academia, I'm recommitting to my creative autonomy and I work with other artists as a mentor enabling them to find theirs.
Outside of academia, I have found more freedom to incorporate research and scholarly enquiry into my work--it's still there, but playfully so.
Alison J Carr
Born 1978 Sheffield, lives in Sheffield
Education
2013 PhD Fine Art, Sheffield Hallam University
2009 MFA Photography & Media, California Institute of the Arts (CalArts)
2001 BA (Hons) Fine Art: Combined & Media Art, Sheffield Hallam University
Solo Exhibitions, Performances & Screenings
2023 They Danced As One, live scored screening with Rob Bentall, Cultures of Sound, Huddersfield, UK
2022 Night World, Exchange Place, Yorkshire ArtSpace Society, Sheffield, UK
2021 Bubikopf, performance, The Cellar Theatre, Sheffield; NewBridge Project, Newcastle, UK
2020 Ascending A Staircase, Darlington Hippodrome Theatre, Darlington, UK
2019 Into the Spotlight, Platform / Site Gallery, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, UK
The Gaps in the Cannon, McCullough Center, Middlebury College, USA
2018 Felicity Means Happiness, Abingdon Studios, Blackpool, UK
Selected Group Exhibitions, Performances & Screenings
2025 Mad Dooley Circus Art Show, The Untouchables Bar, Newburgh, NY, USA
2024 Hold the Space, Brown Street Projects, Sheffield, UK
2023 Babble, Ilkon, Ilkeston, UK
Contrafibularities, Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield UK
2022 Think of Me With Kindness, Gage Gallery, Sheffield, UK
2021-22 Single Figures, Prosaic Mosaic, Sheffield, UK
2021 Undertow, Group Show, Freelands Foundation, London, UK
2019 Prosaic Mosaic: A Survey of New Paintings, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, UK
Inter-Section, Temporary Contemporary, Huddersfield, UK
Showgirls: Screening and Book Launch, Glasgow Women’s Library, Glasgow, UK
2018 Construction House, performance, S1 Artspace, DINA, Sheffield, UK
Showgirl Manifesto, Temporary Contemporary, Huddersfield, UK
On Show, Curator’s Show by Joanna Craddock and Dawn Woolley, Leeds Arts University, Leeds, UK
2017 Lay of the Land Performance, HOME, Manchester, UK
2014 WROUGHT One-to-One Performance Festival, The Hive, Sheffield, UK
Three Act Structure, S1 Artspace, Sheffield, UK
London Life, L A Noble, London, UK
Library Interventions / Sharon Kivland, Leeds College of Art, Leeds, UK
You Me You Me You Me, S1 Artspace, Sheffield, UK
Hollywood Forever, SIA Gallery, Sheffield, UK
2013 Past/Present, Kinsey Institute Gallery, Indiana, USA
2012 Showtime, with artist Kerstin Honeit, SIA Gallery, Sheffield, UK
2011 Showtime, with artist Kerstin Honeit, LoBe Gallery, Berlin, Germany
2009 Greater LA MFA (GLAMFA), California State University Long Beach, USA
MFA Conversations Part II, I-5 Gallery, Brewery Arts Complex, LA, USA
Why Theory: MFA Graduation Exhibition, Spring Arts Tower, LA, USA
Why Video: MFA Video Screening, REDCAT, LA, USA
Woman As Image, thesis exhibition, D301, CalArts, California, USA
2007 Déjà Vu, three-person show, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, UK
2006 Just for Fun, performance, Webster Gotts & Robin Close, Sheffield, UK
Curatorial Projects
2018 Showgirl Manifesto, Temporary Contemporary, Huddersfield, UK
2014 You Me You Me You Me, S1 Artspace, Sheffield, UK
Hollywood Forever, SIA Gallery, Sheffield, UK
Residencies
2011 LoBe London Berlin Art Kunst, Berlin, Germany
2010 Terra Summer Residency, Giverny, France
Collections
2020- Numerous private collections
2009 Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender & Reproduction, Indiana, USA
Awards
2022 1:1 Fund, Jerwood Arts
2018-20 Platform / Freelands Artist Programme, Site Gallery, Sheffield
2008 American Association of University Women, International Fellowship
Funding
2021-22 Developing Your Creative Practice, ACE
2018-19 A-N Mentoring
2017-8 Grants for the Arts, ACE
Selected Press
2019 ‘Platform Shoes: Emerging Artists In Sheffield’, Allan Gardner, The Quietus,
‘Platform 2019 review’, Hannah Clugston, Guardian
Helping Artists Keep Going
Axis is an artist-led charity supporting contemporary visual artists with resources, connection, and visibility.