Kaleena Stasiak is an Assistant Professor of Art in the Department of Art & Art History at the University of Mississippi. She is the Area Head for the Printmaking studio and the faculty advisor for Pixel Press: UM Print + Photo Club.
Research Interests
Kaleena Stasiak is an interdisciplinary artist who uses an assortment of haptic media to explore collective mythmaking, and its relevance to the present day. Digging through a lexicon of symbols and imagery evoking American colonial times, folk art, and quilts, she reframes the dominant ideologies surrounding early history and domestic labor. Her graphic cyphers denote the power and breadth of traditional women’s work, functional handicraft, and the impulse to create. Decoration and ornamentation become expressions of desire, signifiers of identity, and autobiographical documentation of lives omitted from text-based historical narratives and artistic discourse.
Recent shows include Prevailing Winds at Arrowmont School of Arts & Crafts in Gatlinburg, TN, Tournament of Lies at Wassaic Project in Wassaic, NY, Ancient Art Objects at Whitespace in Atlanta, GA, and Identity Measures at the Contemporary Art Center in New Orleans, LA. She has taught printmaking workshops at St. Michael’s Printshop in St. John’s, NF, where I was the May 2023 Visiting Artist, and at Arrowmont School of Arts & Crafts. She has also completed residencies at Stoveworks in Chattanooga, TN and the Klondike Institute of Art and Culture in Dawson City, Yukon Territory.
Biography
Originally from Ontario, Canada, Kaleena Stasiak holds a BFA in Printmaking from the Ontario College of Art and Design and an MFA in Printmaking & Book Arts from the University of Georgia.
In 2017 she founded the South East Women Wrestlers, a performance troupe based in Athens, GA, that uses the spectacle of wrestling to reframe stereotypes and representations of femininity.
Courses Taught
- ART 3710 Intro to Printmaking
- ART 3720 Intermediate Printmaking
- ART 3730 Book Arts
- ART 3660 Letterpress
- ART 4710 Advanced Printmaking
- ART 5660 Letterpress Printing
- ART 5700 Printmaking
- ART 5720 Book Arts
- ART 6710 Printmaking
Education
MFA Fine Arts, University of Georgia (2018)