Artist CV

A professional visual artist since 2019, a professional writer since 2010, I’ve spent the past dozen years devoted to creative practice and artistic expression. Before that, I worked in many arts adjacent fields, supporting artists of all ages and stages: managing a paint-your-own pottery studio, teaching art workshops, and working in the admissions department of an arts university.

Making things—artwork, poetry, fresh grown food, portals to creativity, big ideas, and three-dimensional structures—is what brings me alive. It is what I am meant to do.

I am also quite passionate about holding community space for fellow artists and makers, both online and ‘in the real world.’ I love to open up to conversations about paradigm shifts and what it means to turn toward the making, the wonder, the doubt, the awe. I am always down to hold a workshop, a conversation, or a presentation.

What follows is a selection of creative endeavours. For more information about any of them, or to inquire about a commission, a painting, a workshop, or a conversation, contact me at alana@ofloveandlight.org.

Artwork: Select Exhibitions and Print

SOLO, CURATED SMALL GROUP, AND PRIZE WINNING EXHIBITIONS

  • ArtsWorcester Material Needs Grant Recipient for work on three-dimensional tree roots as part of an expansion of the “Mother Tree Holds the Stories” series, grant awarded February 2024, exhibit date TBD in Fall 2025
  • “20th ArtsWorcester Biennial,” 4th Prize: Juror with “Precedented II,” ArtsWorcester Gallery in Worcester, MA, May-July 2023
  • “Divine Beacons,” Four-Artist Group Show by Invitation, Curated by Agnes Field, AVA Gallery in Astoria, OR, 19 pieces, April-May 2023
  • Solo Show, Insomnia Coffee in Tanasbourne, OR, June 2022
  • “The Stories They Carry,” Hoffman Gallery, Three-Artist Curated Show, 16 pieces (6 sold), Manzanita, OR: March 2022

SELECT GROUP SHOWS

  • Calliope Choral/Orchestral “ArtSong”: presenting artist: custom creatied “Vessel of Memory” (15×30″ painting)  based on the song “Les Chemins de L’Amour” for concert and auction in Boston, MA, March 2024
  • “Page Turner: A Juried Exhibition” at ArtsWorcester in Worcester, MA, November-December 2023
  • “Her Signature” Group Show by the Massachusetts Women’s Caucus for Art, Main Street Studios, Fitchburg, MA, October-December 2023
  • “Hot Art” Joint Group Show by the Massachusetts and Monadnock, NH Pod of Women’s Caucus for Art, DublinArts & Muse Gallery, Dublin, NH, July 2023
  • “Impact: A Member’s Exhibition” by ArtsWorcester and Fitchburg Art Museum, Worcester, MA, March-April 2023
  • “Celebrating the Figure” Juried Show, ArtWorks Gallery in Ware, MA, April 2023
  • “Coming Together” Group Show continued (4 pieces), Sitka Gallery South, Newport, RI, January-February 2023
  • “Coming Together” Group Show of Women’s Caucus for Art (10 pieces), New Dawn Arts Center, Ashburnham, MA: November-December 2022
  • “Water Media” Juried Group Show, Oregon Society of Artists in Portland, OR, March 2022 (“Meet Me Where There Are No Lines” used in marketing materials)
  • “Radical Revolution” Juried Group Show by Siren Nation, Portland City Hall, 2019

SELECT PRINT

  • “The #40DayJournalForJustice: Community Artivism” by Alana Garrigues, Strawberry Moon Magazine, Issue 3 (11 art journal pages included)
  • Select Artwork in Still Point Arts Quarterly, Spring 2022: Mixing Mediums
  • Illustration Commissioned for forthcoming posthumous Jan Spiller book to be completed by Chief Astrologer Stephanie Shea: used in crowdfunding materials in 2021, release date unknown

 

Select Interviews and Media Coverage

  • Bait/Switch Magazine, Summer 2023, Flora/Fauna, Interview by Lu Valena
  • Oregon ArtsWatch, March 2022: excerpt from “Hoffman Center for the Arts reflects Manzanita couple’s love of arts and community” by Jordan Essoe, which covered the Hoffman three-person show centered around Trees (one painter, one sculptor, one cabinet-maker) as part of the history article:

“Intricately detailing the lyrical patterns of a tree trunk’s interior anatomy, Garrigues wants to imagine and map the lifelines of trees that were never allowed to reach maturity. As a kind of palmistry for the missing years of dead landscapes, the artworks immediately summon the images of the countless serialized stumps and woodland graveyards encountered when driving from Portland to Manzanita.

 

For her largest pieces, Garrigues repurposed plywood that used to be part of her sister’s home. She is interested not only in the family provenance of that wood, but also its relationship to the timber industry and the fact that plywood is typically harvested from trees no older than 30 to 35 years.

 

‘Really what I’m interested in is the stories that these trees can carry,’ Garrigues said. ‘You can see not only the age of the trees through the rings, but also the quality of the soil and the water or if there were fires in the area – all of this information that the trees hold onto.'”

  • Instagram Live Interview: The Art Friend Show with Host Annamieka Hopps (2023)
  • Podcast Interview: “Holding Space” on Creativing Unearthing with Host Emma Freeman (2022)
  • YouTube Interview: “On Following What Makes You Come Alive” on Teach Me Something New with Host Clara Benali (2020)

Select Teaching Projects

  • “Art Journal as Portal for Justice Conversations,” workshop during the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts (NHSCA) workshop: “Woven: Gathering at the Intersections,” Sanborn Mills Farm, Loudon, NH, October 2023
  • “Artistry and Poetry of Trees” full-day art and writing workshop: Hoffman Center for the Arts, Manzanita, OR, March 2022
  • Portland Sunday Parkways on behalf of the Children’s Healing Arts Project (CHAP) art lesson via Facebook Live: June 2020 and September 2021
  • “Illustration: What Tells a Story?” for Children’s Healing Arts Project (CHAP PDX): Visual Storytelling workshop for Art Club kids, delivered via Zoom, March 2021
  • Hands on Art: elementary school docent, learning and teaching six projects per year combining art history with a practical and experiential art project, Redondo Beach, CA, 2013-2019
  • “Story Sprouts” full day intensive writing workshops, each focused on a theme: “Voice,” “Setting,” “Conflict,” “Folk Tales, Fairy Tales, and Fables.” Co-Facilitator, Partner focused on lectures, while I focused on writing exercises and revision tips, Torrance, CA, 2014-2017
  • “Story Sprouts: Create a Collective Story” workshops for kids, in collaboration with co-facilitator N.A. Windsor: Girl Scouts of Los Angeles Summer Camp, June 2017; International School of Los Angeles, Los Feliz Campus, March 2016, West Valley Campus, June 2018; Jefferson Elementary School, 2016
  • “Nonfiction Observation for Fiction Writers (or: Why Spying is Good for You)” creative writing workshop: South Bay Creative Writers Group, February 2019; Children’s Book Writers of Los Angeles, June 2021
  • Assorted Editing/Revising and Creative Non-Fiction workshops

Creative Initiatives

  • Sustainable Artist conversations, Brave Creative art experiences, Books Together artist reading group, and Solstice and Equinox Virtual Art Gallery Shows: all initiatives for the {within} artist collective, active 2021-2023
  • Journal for Justice: art journal practice and social media challenge designed to enhance an artist’s relationship with social justice and activism; founded 2020
  • Story Sprouts: co-founder; annual writing workshop for the Children’s Book Writers of Los Angeles members and friends, active 2013-2017
  • Writercize: “exercises to inspire word play, hone the craft of the written word and bulldoze writer’s block for authors, bloggers, poets, freelancers, teachers, students, dreamers and writers of all kind,” active 2011-2014; named an eCollegeFinder Top 75 blog; more than 225k views

Select Writing Projects

  • “Only the Bones” poem by Alana Garrigues, interview of Alana by Lu Valena, Bait/Switch Magazine, Summer 2023, Flora/Fauna
  • “The #40DayJournalForJustice: Community Artivism,” Strawberry Moon Magazine, Issue 3 Art and Activism (Summer 2022): article author, guest editor for the issue
  • The Beach Reporter (600+ articles, with select pieces cross-posted to The Daily Breeze): 2010-2016
  • “Kayla Wayman, Junior Time Traveler: Lost in the Stream” (winner of the Story Monster Royal Dragonfly Grand Prize): co-editor, co-writer, co-producer: 2015
  • “Story Sprouts”: co-editor, co-writer, co-producer: 2013
  • “Story Sprouts: Voice”: co-editor, co-writer, co-producer: 2014

Select Training and Education

A perpetual student, I want to acknowledge a few of the teachers and programs that have made a huge difference.

Other Notable Art and Writing Teachers: Linda Aman, Erna van Dyk, Lala Ragimov, N.A. Windsor, Lyssa Tall Anolik

Community

I believe strongly in the power of community and a collective… to amplify, to celebrate, to commiserate, to enhance, to wonder at, to improve, to grow, to expand, and to make possible that which was once invisible.

Both writing and art-making are primarily unseen, invisible, solitary vocations. They require long hours with one’s self, digging deeply into the joys and fears of being alive. Moments of shared experiences matter so much among those who give shape and form to the imagination.

Participation + Collaboration

I have been honored to submit artwork and participate in the following community-based projects:

  • 6000 Circles project and Massachusetts installation, a collaboration between The Calling, the Women’s Caucus for Art, and assorted organizations and individuals: participating artist, March-November 2024 (traveling exhibit)
  • Hudson Armory Project Community Mural: participating preparatory artist, September 2023
  • “Marks 4 Their Lives” global art initiative in memory of the children lost in the Holocaust, founded by Lori Arbel, ongoing
  • “Art for a Cause” World Collage Day initiative by Jennifer Wilkin Penick, Georgetown Arts and Humanities and MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, May 2023

Community Facilitation

From 2021 through 2023, I served as facilitator of the {within} artist collective. Founded by Daphne Cohn in 2019 as the Creativity Habit Collective, I joined in 2020, and was invited to partner with her in 2021. In 2022, I took the helm.

For two years, we and then I held sacred space for artists and makers approximately 10-12 times each and every month, meeting via Zoom, building deep and meaningful life-long connections and collaborations between artists around the world.

I closed the collective in 2023, as many artists found their schedules shifting as pre-pandemic responsibilities returned.

Stay tuned for community and collective gathering spaces and opportunities to return in new forms.

Membership