STATEMENT
In my artwork, I use destruction as a creative tool. Tangling rope, tearing paper, and burning wood, I create large scale drawings, sculptures, and performances. I source objects from California coastal ecosystems which have sustained pre-existing damage like driftwood, charcoal, and plastic.
Charcoal is an integral part of my practice due to its ability to function sculpturally as a remnant of destruction, and constructively, as a drawing tool. It is a symbol of the inevitable loss and newness that follows devastation. I burn wood to create charcoal, including a body-sized charcoal log, which I use to create drawings and performances about loss and regeneration.
Like charcoal, plastic trash is a remnant, but with a stubborn permanence. Unable to biodegrade, plastics exist like ghosts trapped between realms, outliving their human users and manufacturers. I animate found synthetics by photographing them like scientific studies of marine organisms or posing the discarded objects in positions that allude to their continual existence, challenging the finality of trash and its categorization as separate from nature or civilization.
As I am researching marine pollution and wildfire damage on the California Coast, I am also witnessing ecological recovery and resilience. In response to redwood trees’ ability to heal from fire damage, I create sand and charcoal drawings and performances based on patterns formed in the rings of redwood trees recovering from wildfires. The drawings are a meditation on resilience, both personal and environmental. I work with these poetic cycles of degradation and regrowth, which are dually present in all of my artworks.
Bio
Courtney Griffith is an artist and educator based in Oakland, CA.
Born in San Diego, she moved to the Bay Area to study art at Santa Clara University. She began her teaching and studio practice at Root Division, a visual art non-profit in San Francisco. She recently completed an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts at Mills College, where she had the opportunity to work as a teaching assistant, shop assistant, and a preparator in the Mills College Art Museum.
Griffith’s artwork has been displayed in museums and galleries including the Palo Alto Art Center, San Luis Obispo Museum of Art, and Florina Museum of Contemporary Art. She has performed her work, The Weight of Absence, at Root Division and at the Mills College Art Museum.
(Resume/ CV included below)
Resume / CV
Personal Information
Courtney Griffith | courtgriff@gmail.com | http://www.courtgriff.com | 858.829.5775 | Oakland, CA
Education
Mills College, MFA Interdisciplinary Art, 2023
Santa Clara University, BS in Mathematics & Studio Art, 2016
Syracuse University Florence, Studio Art Program, 2015
Exhibitions
2024 Metamorphosis Juried Exhibition, Mercury 20 Gallery, Oakland, CA
2023 Earth Juried Exhibition, Palo Alto Art Center, Palo Alto, CA
On Loss and Resilience MFA Thesis Exhibition, Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, CA
Mills MFA at Slidespace 123 Gallery, Oakland, CA
2022 Mills MFA at Standard Parts Group Exhibition, Standard Parts Gallery, Oakland, CA
20-Year Anniversary Performance Event Group Exhibition, Root Division at Kapwa Gardens, San Francisco, CA
2021 Entropy Solo Exhibition, Frank Ratchye Project Space, San Francisco, CA
Taste Juried Exhibition, Root Division, San Francisco, CA
Pandemic Journal Group Exhibition, The Virtual Gallery Online, San Francisco, CA
2020 A Moment of Pause Solo Exhibition, Southern Pacific Brewing, San Francisco, CA
Women Rising Group Exhibition, The Drawing Room Annex, San Francisco, CA
2019 Brushstrokes Juried Exhibition, San Luis Obispo Museum of Art, San Luis Obispo, CA
Pop Up Art Show Solo Exhibition, Magnolia Hall, San Francisco, CA
The Power of Small Things Juried Exhibition, Port Angeles Fine Arts Center, Port Angeles, WA
Season of Abundance Juried Exhibition, San Francisco Women Artists Gallery, San Francisco, CA
RD Makes Group Exhibition, Root Division, San Francisco, CA
Brushstrokes Comes to Cambria Juried Exhibition, Cambria Center for the Arts, Cambria, CA
2016 ArtClash (Finalists) Juried Exhibition, Florina Museum of Contemporary Art Florina, Greece
ArtClash Exhibition Group Exhibition, Sala d’Arme in Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, Italy
Regression/ Progression Partner Exhibition, Santa Clara University Art Gallery, Santa Clara, CA
SCU Juried Art Show, Santa Clara University Art Gallery Santa Clara, CA
2015 Holy! Holy! Holy! Group Exhibition, Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, Italy
2014 John Natsoulas Student Show Juried Exhibition, John Natsoulas Center for the Arts Davis, CA
SCU Juried Art Show, Santa Clara University Art Gallery Santa Clara, CA
relevant Work Experience
Teaching Assitant, Mills College, 2021-2023
Preparator, Mills College Art Museum, 2022
Studio Artist and Educator, Root Division, 2019- 2021
Publications
Root Division Annual Art Auction Catalog, 2020, 2021
ArtClash Catalog, 2016
Santa Clara Review, 2013, 2014
Artist talks
3D Concepts, Mills College, Oakland, CA, 2022
Taste: Sip + Sense, with Chef Tu David Phu, San Francisco, CA, 2021
RD Makes, Root Division, San Francisco, CA, 2020
Collections
Florina Museum of Contemporary Art, Florina, Greece
Work held in private collections in the United States
Awards
Headlands Center for the Arts Graduate Fellowship Finalist, 2023
Santa Clara Juried Art Show; Best 2D Artist, 2016
ArtClash Finalist, 2016
Graduated cum laude from Santa Clara University, 2016