ARTIST STATEMENT
I am interested in how humans codify, document, and distribute knowledge. My projects investigate the dynamics of knowledge preservation—what kinds of knowledge are deemed valuable.
My art projects allude to traditional modes of codified knowledge with print and book-like formats, repetition, and purposefully arranged elements but they describe alternate modes of knowledge keeping that are frequently subordinated; —place based, intuition, empirical, tacit, unknowing, biological ecosystems, food ways, wayfinding, etc.
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In the late 1800s a printing press arrived in Aiyansh, British Columbia in the the Nass River Valley. The man who ordered it from England had never used a printing press. Piece by piece, over many months he put the press together, taught himself to use it, and began publishing a newsletter letter-press printed onto paper. He wrote his newsletter to share news of Aiyansh with people back in his hometown and to teach the people around him his language and ideas. He wanted to change people with information and stories.
It was some of these same interests that first attracted me to print media—the legacy and power of the printed object, tactile techniques, the challenge of melding idea and image together; ideas as objects and the places they could travel. Over time my creative research of print media and book arts has expanded to include questions about the supremacy and perceived value of printed word and image. I'm attracted to projects that highlight the power, both creative and destructive, of knowledge systems that depend on objects for transmission.
My ancestor Wilhelmina Derrick, was born in Nass River Valley, BC, Canada, near that printing press. She was nine years old when the press arrived in the land that my family called home. The man with the printing press changed many things in Nass Valley, forever. He was there to spread his religion and he and other men like him systematically damaged my Indigenous family’s culture and knowledge archives.
I am interested in how humans codify, document, and distribute knowledge because of my family’s loss. I am fixated on the knowledge that my family lost due to diaspora and cultural genocide and am working to imagine a world where that knowledge has been restored.
BIOGRAPHY
Amanda Lee is a multi-disciplinary artist with a background in printmaking, book arts, and photography. Her images and installations evoke a sense of poetic minimalism inspired by sacred texts, transcendentalist paintings, and manuscripts. She makes art that investigates the intersection of Indigenous knowledge systems with print media and book art theory.
Lee earned an MFA at Indiana University, Bloomington and was the recipient of the inaugural Virginia A. Myers, Visiting Artist / Visiting Assistant Professorship in Printmaking at University of Iowa. She has presented work internationally in Scotland, Hong Kong, and has had several solo exhibitions at SG Gallery in Venice, Italy. Lee was an artist in residence for McColl Center for Art + Innovation and University of North Carolina, Charlotte, as well as Willapa Bay AIR, and a University of Washington, Whiteley Center Scholar.
She is an avid teacher and will be beginning an appointment as Assistant Professor of Printmaking and Drawing, Digital Emphasis at University of Minnesota, fall semester of 2023. She has previously held faculty positions at Utah State University, University of Georgia, and University of Arkansas. She has been a visiting artist and taught workshops at Kent State University, Loyola Marymount University, University of Alberta, and Penland School of Crafts.
She has won several awards including an Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation grant and public art ‘boot-camp’ fellowship and commission from the City of Seattle.
Her ancestors left their traditional home in the Nass River Valley, BC in the mid-1900’s and settled in Seattle, WA as Urban Indians. She maintains a studio in Seattle, WA.
NEWS
Whiteley Center Visiting Scholar
Whiteley Center at Friday Harbor Laboratories, University of Washington, Friday Harbor, WA
Summer, 2024
Event Scores for the End of the World
Seattle Art Book Fair
May 11, 2024
Unverified and Unreasonable
SGCI Conference 2024, Providence, RI
April 6, 2024
Huntington Library Short-term Fellowship Recipient
The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, Los Angeles, California
Fall, 2023
Essential Workers: A Visual Narrative
Self Help Graphics and Art, Los Angeles, California
February 25 to March 30, 2023
Blurring the Lines: Exploring the Frontiers of Photography and Printmaking
Remarque Print Workshop & Gallery, Albuquerque, New Mexico
July 8 to August 28, 2022
Smart Objects / Flattened Images
Well Well Projects, Portland, Oregon
September 3 to 25, 2022
The Feminist Biennial
Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
September 24 to November 5, 2022
Los Angeles Printmaking Society National Exhibition
Mixografia, Los Angeles, California
October 15 to November 12, 2022
Erratics Portfolio
Saltgrass Printmakers, Salt Lake City, Utah
Traveling 2022 to 2024 - https://artsandmuseums.utah.gov/erratics/