Alyson Shotz facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Alyson Shotz
Born	1964 Glendale, Arizona, United States
Education	University of Washington, Rhode Island School of Design
Known for	Sculpture, installation art, photography, video
Awards	Stanford University Research Fellow, Pollock-Krasner Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts

Alyson Shotz (born 1964) is an American artist. She lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. She is famous for her large sculptures and art installations. These artworks are often inspired by nature and science.

Shotz's art plays with light, shadows, space, and gravity. She wants to make people think about how they see things. Her sculptures are different from traditional heavy, solid ones. Instead, she uses everyday materials to create art that can be flexible, see-through, or reflective. Her pieces often seem light and react to changes around them.

One art critic, Lilly Wei, said that Shotz keeps making new kinds of sculptures. Each new project explores different ideas and possibilities.

Shotz's art can be grouped into three main types:

• Big, detailed sculptures and installations made by hand.
• Simple, self-contained sculptures. Some of these use machines or involve chance.
• Abstract photos and digital prints based on her photographs.

Her artwork is displayed in many famous museums. These include the Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum, and Guggenheim Museum Bilbao.

Becoming an Artist: Alyson Shotz's Journey

Shotz was born in Glendale, Arizona in 1964. Her father was an Air Force pilot and her mother was a teacher. Because of her father's job, she lived in many different places. These included states in the West and Midwest.

She first studied geology, which is the study of Earth's rocks and soil. But she soon decided to study art instead. Even so, science has always been a big influence on her artwork. She earned her art degree from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1987. Then, she got her master's degree from the University of Washington in 1991. In the early 1990s, she moved to New York City.

Shotz started her career as a painter. She made colorful pictures of natural shapes. She also used photography, collage, and video in her art. One important early work was Reflective Mimicry (1996). This piece included photos and a video. It showed a woman walking in the woods. The woman wore a suit covered in small mirrors. The mirrors reflected the trees and plants. This made the woman seem to disappear into the background. Shotz continued to explore how figures can blend into their surroundings. She did this in large outdoor artworks like Mirror Fence (2003).

Public Artworks and Special Projects

Alyson Shotz has created many large artworks for public spaces. These are called commissions. She has made art for places like Stanford University and NYU Langone Health. She also created art for the MTA Arts & Design in New York. Other places include the High Museum of Art and AT&T Stadium.

In 2022, she installed a permanent sculpture called Entanglement. This twisting steel artwork is above the main area of the Skidmore College Center for Integrated Sciences. She also made a glass mosaic for a courthouse ceiling in Nashville. This artwork, The Robes of Justitia, won an award in 2022.

In 2023, the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum bought her outdoor sculpture, Temporal Shift. This artwork is made of stainless steel and changes with natural light. It represents how the Earth moves around the Sun.

Where to Find Her Art: Collections and Awards

Alyson Shotz's art is part of many public collections. You can see her work in museums across the United States. Some of these include the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Her art is also at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the National Gallery of Art.

She has received many important awards and fellowships. These include honors from the New York Foundation for the Arts and Stanford University. She also received awards from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation.