maeve billings
on the easel
First painting from my first week of grad school!
artist statement
I paint bodies as objects and the beauty I see in the undesirable. I am constantly looking: at roadkill, at the carcass in the trash, at scabs and bruises on my legs. I can’t look away. Dead things and flesh stop me in my tracks, and viscerally remind me of the fragility of my own body. Through painting, I find the strange combination of life and death that is contained within flesh as a thing, and not a person.
I work in oils because their material qualities remind me of bodies. The paint can drip and sweat, the fat of it congealing on the canvas. The colors are saturated and juicy with bloody reds, bilious yellows, and subcutaneous blues. The paint is undeniably a thing, a material, and so is the body it depicts.
There is an intimacy in the objectification of flesh, in acknowledging that we are not separate from the raw matter of bodies. I can’t draw a line between my own physical reality and the meat. Each painting becomes a vision of what we all look like without the veneer of exterior individuality.
Current shows
Things That Ache Softly
HEDGE Gallery, 1300 W 78th St #200, Cleveland, OH 44102
This spring, HEDGE is thrilled to present Things That Ache Softly, an exhilarating three person painting exhibition featuring Maeve Billings, Madison Mayle and Katy Richards.
The artists take inspiration from the natural world, using imagery of botanical forms, landscape and animal flesh. Using this combined symbolism, and themes of intimacy, impermanence and vulnerability, their work reflects conditions from lived and corporeal experiences.
about the artist
Maeve Billings is an emerging painter from Cleveland (OH) with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Cleveland Institute of Art. They had their first two-person show at Waterloo Arts in Cleveland, collaborating with Bex Fuller to put on Collective Spaces in January 2019. Maeve has participated in group shows including Rotten Keepsakes, Are We There Yet?, and the Front International CAN Triennial: You Are Here. They have been in various group shows in Illinois, Ohio, and Missouri. Maeve acted as the committee chair for both the 74th and 75th Student Independent Exhibition. They have received awards including the First Agnes Gund Memorial Traveling Award, the Victoria Welling Award, Cleveland Institute of Art Gund Family Scholarship, the Governor’s Show Scholarship, the Ted Frost ‘88 Travel Scholarship, and the Cleveland Women’s Club Scholarship.
