Artist Statement
Art is truth telling. Art is storytelling. My process starts by noticing a thread of a story: an idea running over and under and under and over the warp of life. Creating is the response: picking up that thread and making something out of it.
My work is a crossover of tedium and novelty. Trained in fiber arts, but often detouring into different mediums, I pair traditional processes with unconventional materials. Weaving with fishing line. Sewing with plastic. Naturally dyed fiber paired with laser-engraved acrylic. I am interested in my materials, not just for how they appear, but for what they are: for their history, integrity and stories. I use plastic, often reclaimed: cereal bags, packing plastic. I use scavenged dyes: from locations which are more significant than the color produced. I am attracted to transparent materials for their ability to layer, interact with light, cast shadow. Imagery becomes data in translating a concept to visual language.
Warm colors. Soft textures. Familiar imagery. Often paired with plastic: stark, clean, occasionally ethereal. I hold tension between what is hopeful and what is fractured. The materials I use mimic that contrast.
Bio
Lucy Burton is a multidisciplinary artist from Indianapolis, IN. She received her BFA in Fibers from Indiana University in 2019. That year she was also nominated by IU for the Windgate Fellowship. In 2020 she moved to San Antonio where she currently lives and works. Her work has been shown numerous times in each place she’s lived: Indianapolis, Bloomington, San Antonio. She is currently participating in the Brehm Residency.
Curriculum vitae
Solo Shows
2024 - Bright Coffee, A Study in Gravity, San Antonio, TX
2020 - Harrison Center for the Arts, Hearth, Indianapolis, IN
2019 - Grunwald Gallery of Art, Confessions of a Joy Seeker, Bloomington, IN
2019 - Harrison Center for the Arts, Souvenirs: Collection III, Indianapolis, IN
Two person Shows
Upcoming: May 2025 - Bright Coffee, Déjà Vu, San Antonio, TX
Group Shows
2024 - Bright Coffee, Creatures for a Community, San Antonio, TX
2023 - Kelso Art Center, FASA’s TEXtiles, San Antonio, TX - juried by Mary Heathcott
2021 - Harrison Center for the Arts, Hanging by a Thread, Indianapolis, IN
2020 - John Waldron Gallery, National Society of Arts and Letters Show, Bloomington, IN
2019 - Grunwald Gallery, Remembering and Forgetting, Bloomington, IN
2019 - John Waldron Gallery, National Society of Arts and Letters Show, Bloomington, IN
Installations
2019 - Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Poured Out / Filled Up, Indianapolis, IN
Press & Publication
2020 - Lucy Burton: “Hearth” & “Confessions of a Joy Seeker”, Harrison Center Blog
Honors
2020 - Reva Shriner Memorial Award in Visual Arts
2019 - Windgate Fellowship Nominee
Education & Residencies
2019 - BFA in Fibers, Indiana University
2025 - Brehm Residency