Phoebe-Agnès Sinclair
I utilize the body as a site for investigating transformation, contradiction, and the numinous. Integrating classical oil painting with research on alchemy, spiritual ecstasy, and my background in dance and somatics, I am interested in images that address phenomenological paradoxes. Alongside painting, photographs are manually manipulated as a way of abstracting the image, disrupting the supposedly fixed surface of a print with my fingers and inviting my body into a mechanically produced image. Water and light both function similarly, acting as both subject and metaphoric process through which the figure transforms, fracturing reality and elevating the ordinary into the extraordinary. In this way, the body becomes both medium and metaphor, a shifting surface where matter and spirit, the seen and unseen, continuously inform one another.
I myself am a product of opposites, having been raised by an academic from Berkeley, California and a poet from rural Louisiana. This as well as early experiences of death and bodily fragility led me to a deeply felt understanding of the dialecticals that coexist within life. The world seems to be bound together by webs of contradictions that somehow enforce and enhance each other- loss invites preciousness, light requires shadow, and a color’s complement is its opposite. What interests me is not just the separation of the world into dialectical halves, but the moments when those halves collide. I’m drawn to those moments of paradox because of the feeling they evoke in me- a kind of fizzing instability that leaves me both aching and alive. This feeling, though personal, also feels inevitable and universal.
Shaped by atelier training, time in a French monastery, and an upbringing in rural Tennessee, my work investigates the body’s role in mediating between the material and the spiritual.
Curriculum Vitae
Education
2024- Present Studio Art MFA Candidate at the University of Georgia
2022 University of the South. BA, Art and Philosophy
2021 New York Academy of Art, Summer Undergraduate Residency Program
2018 Girls Preparatory School
Solo Exhibitions
2022 CARLOS GALLERY. The University of the South. In the Light of Loss
2021 STIRLING’S GALLERY. The University of the South. Star and Flower
2020 FRENCH HOUSE GALLERY. The University of the South. Tout ce que J’ai Vue 2018 STIRLING’S GALLERY. The University of the South. Selected Works
Group Exhibitions
2025 CORTONA GALLERY. Mostra
2025 HAMBIDGE HIVE. Melt. Joint Show
2025 LYNDON HOUSE. Juried Show
2024 EXUM GALLERY. Holding Shadows. Joint Show
2022 UNIVERSITY ART GALLERY. Anamnesis
2022 MUDHOUSE RESIDENCY. Final Show
2021 NEW YORK ACADEMY OF ART. Residency Show 2019 AVA GALLERY. Juried Members Show
2018 TOWNSEND ATELIER. Elevate
20US CAPITOL BUILDING. Congressional Art Competition
Recognitions, Awards, and Achievements
2024 Boynes Artist Monthly Award
2023 Curator's Choice Award, Gallery Omata
2022 Phi Beta Kappa Member
2022 Hugh Harris Caldwell Jr. Award For Excellence in Philosophy
2022 John McCrady Memorial Award For Excellence in Art
2021 Omicron Delta Kappa Member
2021 Full Merit scholarship to NYAA Undergraduate program
2019 Best in Show Runner-up. AVA Gallery Juried Members Show
2018 Arts Fellowship. University of the South
2018 Fletcher-Bright Award for the Arts. Girls Preparatory School
2016 Full Merit Scholarship to study under Mia Bergeron. Townsend Atelier
Residencies and Workshops Attended
2022 Florence Academy of Art, Figure Painting Workshop- Florence, Italy
2022 Mudhouse Residency June Session- Crete, Greece
2021 NYAA. Summer Undergraduate Residency Program- New York, NY
2020 Zoey Frank: Multiple Figures Composition Course- Zoom
2019 Mia Bergeron: Figures and Florals- Townsend Atelier, Chattanooga TN
2017 Timur Akhriev: Painting the Still Life Townsend Atelier- Townsend Atelier, Chattanooga TN
2017-2019 Mia Bergeron: Oil painting 1, Oil Painting 2- Townsend Atelier, Chattanooga TN
Workshops Taught
2023 Beginning Acrylic Painting Eight Week Workshop, Studio 550 Manchester NH
2023 Intro to Drawing Eight Week Workshop Studio 550 Manchester NH
Publications
2024 BOYNES ARTIST AWARD. Exclusive Interview
2023 GALLERY OMATA. Exclusive Interview
2022 THE CHRISTMAS TREE LIGHTING. Promotional Video Christmas Tree Lighting At Sewanee
2021 MOUNTAIN GOAT JOURNAL. Cover artist. 2021 SEWANEE SPECTRE. Eight Portraits
2018 SEWANEE PURPLE. Artist of the Week
2018 CHATTANOOGA TIMES FREE PRESS. GPS graduate’s oil painting hangs in the U.S. capitol