About
BIOGRAPHY
Liz Wade holds an MFA from the Hoffberger School of Painting at the Maryland Institute College of Art (Baltimore, MD), and a BFA from the California Institute of the Arts (Valencia, CA). Her paintings, prints, drawings and collages have been exhibited widely, most recently at the C. Grimaldis Gallery in Baltimore. She has been the recipient of an Individual Artist Grant from the Creative Baltimore Fund, and was the 2007 Maryland Fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. She resides in Baltimore with her husband, artist Nicholas Cairns, and their two children.
RESUME
Solo Exhibitions
2010 “Bêtes Sauvages,” C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD
2008 “Works On Paper,” CCBC Gallery, Baltimore, MD.
2008 “Elizabeth Wade, New Work”, Hudson D. Walker Gallery, Provincetown, MA
Selected Group Exhibitions
2013 Havertown Invitational, Havertown Music and Arts, Havertown, PA
2011 “IMPACT“, Maryland Art Place, Baltimore, MD
2011 “Back to the Future“, Creative Alliance, Baltimore, MD
2010 “Summer ’10“, C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD
2010 “Moulin Rouge”, Creative Alliance, Baltimore, MD
2010 “Athena’s Daughters 2010” Maryland Art Place, Baltimore, MD
2010 “HIVE”, Area 405, Baltimore, MD
2009 “That’s What She Said”, Benton House, Chicago, IL
2008 “Seven Deadly Sins”, Maryland Art Place, Baltimore, MD
2008 “Preliminaries and Process”, Cade Gallery, Arnold, MD
2008 “Summer 2008”, Tao Water Gallery, Provincetown, MA
2008 “my _________ other”, Creative Alliance, Baltimore, MD
2007 “New Art Examined III”, (juried) Arlington Art Center, Arlington, VA
2007 Artist-in-Residence Open Studios, Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center
2007 “Ethereal Heist”, MFA Thesis III, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD
2006 “What Are They Building in There?” MICA, Hoffberger School of Painting, Baltimore, MD
2006 “Works on Paper III” (juried) Circle Gallery, Annapolis, MD
2005 “New Work: Hoffberger School of Painting”, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD
2005 “Arizona Artists”, Orme School, Mayer, AZ
2001 “Art Angels”, (juried) SomArts Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA
Professional Activities/ Awards
2008 Creative Baltimore Fund Individual Artist Grant
2007- 2010 Part-time Faculty:
- Maryland Institute College of Art
- Anne Arundel Community College
- Community College of Baltimore County
2007 Provincetown Award: Maryland Institute Fellowship, Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center
2007 Featured Artist on “Artworks”, Maryland Public Television, Airdate 4/11/07
2006-2007 Assistant to Grace Hartigan, Director, Hoffberger School of Painting
Education
2007 MFA, Maryland Institute College of Art, Hoffberger School of Painting
1997 BFA, California Institute of the Arts, Performing Arts Design, Technology, and Management
STATEMENT
Liz Wade’s large, figurative works on canvas use bold yet delicate color schemes, a blunt drawing style, and flat, patterned shapes and planes to depict simplified animal forms and human figures frozen in narrative tableaux. Her subjects are often fools or deities, with exaggerated facial and bodily features, who engage in semi-heroic activities with carnal ferocity. Mad laughter emanates from these paintings, but it is tempered by seriousness and searching— a desire, as Wade’s mentor Grace Hartigan put it, “to discover the unknown in the self.”