September 25—October 16, 2025
Testimonial
Jeanne Ciravolo
Sheetz Gallery, Misciagna Family Center for Peforming Arts
Artist Statement
My work honors the difficult histories of my close female relatives. Through physical and psychological acts of construction and repair - collage, print, and transfer – their personal stories materialize experiences of perseverance and resilience. I paper over, scrape away, stain, draw, and paint.
The images I create are characterized by a sense of becoming and unbecoming, often with the folds and wrinkles of my rough canvas substrate suggesting order or energetic disarray altering the surface. I begin each work with drawing and incorporate chance through engagement with a collection of found or created materials which I use to construct the work. I create painted paper, as a separate investigation of color and visual texture and collect household or natural materials that attract me for their colors, texture, origins, and purposes. This collection becomes a lexicon of mark and hue to use for collage.
Through patching and decoupage, gestures associated with women’s labor and craft, I pursue artmaking as an act of re-envisioning and rebuilding.
I create smaller works using domestic textiles, kitchen towels, and decorative textiles as substrates. Each textile comes with a history - stains, tears, burns, bleach marks - which informs my alterations. I stitch or collage fragments of narrative into the fabrics that allude to illness, failure, aspiration, and fantasy. My interventions combine with the textiles’ existing traits to locate and magnify the stories of my women protagonists.”
Artist Bio
Jeanne Ciravolo is an assistant professor in residence and director of the Alexey von Schlippe Gallery at the University of Connecticut. She has exhibited her work at Hudson Valley MOCA, Yellowstone Art Museum, Coral Springs Museum, The New Britain Museum of American Art, and The Butler Museum of American Art, among others. Her work also has appeared in publications such as Art Spiel, Create Magazine and Rejoinder, a publication of the Institute for Research on Women at Rutgers University in partnership with the Feminist Art Project.
Artist Checklist
- The Birth of Venus, 2025
Acrylic and collage on drop cloth
52.5” x 33.5” - What We Talk About, 2024
Mixed media collage with stitching and mesh produce bag on drop cloth
60” x 35” - Two Figures, 2025
Mixed media collage with stitching and mesh produce bag on drop cloth
51” x 33” - Missive, 2024
Mixed media collage with block print of sheela na gig on drop cloth
48” x 34” - Found Lost Demand, 2024
Mixed media collage on drop cloth
53” x 35” - Crouching Venus, 2024
Mixed media collage with bark, stitching, and heirloom doily on drop cloth
47” x 36” - Foundations of Our Former Houses, 2024
Mixed media collage with stitching, wash rag fabric scraps, and reproduced tracing from David’s “Oath of the Horatii” on drop cloth
75” x 51” - Flora, 2023
Mixed media collage with stitching and doilies on drop cloth
52” x 33” - Harmony of the Spheres, 2023
Mixed media collage with mesh and net produce bags on drop cloth
68” x 52” - Garden IV (Eve), 2024
Bark, painted paper, acrylic, orchid leaves, and block print of Eve from Masacchio’s “Expulsion From the Garden of Eden” on doily
7.5” Diameter - Garden III (Venus), 2023
Stitching, acrylic, net produce bag, and thread on doily
7.5 Diameter
Misciagna Family Center
for Performing Arts
Penn State Altoona
3000 Ivyside Park
Altoona, PA 16601
814-949-5452
[email protected]
Penn State encourages qualified persons with disabilities to participate in its programs and activities. If you anticipate needing any type of accommodation or have questions about the physical access provided, please contact the box office at the Misciagna Family Center for Performing Arts by calling 814-949-5452 in advance of your participation or visit.
This publication is available in alternative media on request.
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