Santina Amato is a multimedia artist whose work addresses the notion of the intimate body, especially the female body. Her practice incorporates video, sculpture, installation, performance, painting, and photography and is deeply rooted in attempting to translate the complexities of her own female sexuality, desire and erotica within the visceral relationship between the physical, the psychological, and the social of the functioning body. As a material focus, her interest in using bread dough within an interdisciplinary artistic dialogue, is its life cycle. Once activated by warm water and sugar, yeast cells split and divide in a process reminiscent of when an egg is fertilized by sperm. There is a peak moment when dough is voluptuous, full, and ripe just before it begins to 'die'.
Amato was born in Australia to Italian immigrants, and has lived and worked in the USA since 2010. She received an MFA (Photography) from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2017) and a BFA (Painting) from the Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne Australia (2009). Her first solo exhibition in the USA titled Monster, was supported by the Illinois Arts Council Agency (IACA), 2018 Individual Artist Support Project Grant and exhibited at Heaven Gallery in Chicago, IL. Amato just completed new portraits in her ongoing series Portraits of Women With Their Weight in Dough supported by the City of Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs & Special Events (DCASE), 2019 Individual Artists Program (IAP) Grant. In December 2019, she will be Artist-in-Residence at the
Exhibitions and screenings include The Arts Club of Chicago, Chicago, IL, Here Arts Center, NYC, Governors Island Art Fair, NYC, Leroy Neiman Center, Chicago, IL, ExFest Film & Video Festival, Chicago, IL, Detroit International Videonale, Kuntshalle Detroit Museum of Contemporary Art, MI, CURRENTS, Santa Fe International New Media Art Festival, NM, Brooklyn Public TV, NY, and The International Women’s Day Video Screening in Melbourne, Australia.
Amato has held positions as Fellow and Artist-in-Residence at Museum of Contemporary Art, Tuscon, AZ supported a grant from the Illinois Arts Council Agency, MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA supported by the City of Chicago's DCASE, 2018 IAP Grant, Crosstown Arts, Memphis, TN, Process Park, Artslant & Chashama, Pine Plains, NY, Filed/Work Program, Chicago Artist Coalition, Chicago, IL, Artists' Cooperative Residency & Exhibitions (ACRE), Steuben, WI, Artspace Visual Arts Center, Sydney,
Australia, New York Art Residency and Studios Foundation, NYC and BRIC Media Arts House, NYC. Amato is Founder and Director of Moving_Image_00:00, a biannual festival in Chicago of moving image works created by Chicago-based artists.
Her work is part of a collective photographic portfolio at The Joan Flasch Artists’ Book Collection and The Art Institute of Chicago and video collection at the Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne, Australia.
ARTIST STATEMENT
I am interested in material processes and work in a wide range of mediums and formats from 9 x 5 inch paint works on paper to large-scale installations that respond to the architectural features within site-specific contexts. As a material focus, my particular interest in using bread dough within my installations, sculptures, video and photographic works, and in particular, live settings, is its life cycle; once activated by warm water and sugar, the cells of yeast split and divide, similarly to when an egg is fertilized by sperm. There is a peak moment when dough is voluptuous, full, and ripe, just before it begins to ‘die’.
By observing the similarities in the life process of dough and my own body – the way it moves, the way it feels, the way it is observed by others, the way it is perceived by the self, its temporal relationship to the world & to others – I attempt to translate the complexities associated with my own experience of being female, my relationship to my own body and those that I desire, female heterosexuality, desire, erotica, intimacy, and aging, through an interdisciplinary artistic dialogue of video, sculpture, ceramics, performance, installation, painting and photography.
This attraction to the materiality of dough relates back to my childhood growing up within an immigrant Italian household in Australia, where dough was no foreign matter and gender roles were clearly in place. My first memory and experience of femininity and the power of creation (and potentially female desire) was watching my mother knead this soft, white, voluptuous material. Folding it over and onto itself, pushing her whole body towards it – back and forth, back and forth¬– while steering the dough with her hands, she transformed it from flour and water into our existence as a living organism, to be consumed by our bodies, via our mouths.
My work is formal in its presentation, biomorphic in form, addressing the basic notion of the intimate body, especially my female body. I am interested in the visceral relationship between the physical, the psychological, and the social of the functioning body – the mess, the goo, the merging, the mixing, the exchange, the mutual consumption. The work results in abstract reflections on the psychosexual nature of intimacy, as if captured in an ongoing stage of metamorphosis.
Education
School of Art Institute of Chicago
Master of Fine Art (Photography), 2017
2015 – 2017 • Chicago, IL, U.S.A
Victorian College of the Arts
Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours)
2009 – 2009 • Melbourne, Australia
Victorian College of the Arts
Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting)
2005 – 2007 • Melbourne, Australia
Victoria University
Diploma in Visual Arts
2003 – 2004 • Melbourne, Australia
Awards
2020
Artist-in-Residence, Bethany Arts Community [link]
2019
Professional Development Award, Illinois Arts Council Agency (To support AIR Position at MOCA Tucson)
2019
Artist-in-Residence, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tucson, AZ (Forthcoming) [link]
2019
Individual Artists Program (IAP) Grant, City of Chicago DCASE [link]
2018/2019
Hot Pick Artist, Smack Mellon, Brooklyn, NY [link]
2018
Individual Artist Support Project Grant, Illinois Arts Council Agency (IACA)
2018
Individual Artists Program (IAP) Grant, City of Chicago DCASE [link]
2018
Artist-in-Residence Process Park, Artslant & Chashama
2018
Artist-In-Residence, Crosstown Arts Center (Forthcoming) [link]
2018
Artist-In-Residence, MASS MoCA (Forthcoming) [link]
2017
Field/Works Artist-In-Residence, Chicago Artist Coalition [link]
2017
Artist-In-Residence, ACRE, Steuben, WI [link]
2016
Honorable Mention Award, ExFest 2016 Film/Video Festival, Chicago, U.S A [link]
2016
Angela & George Paterakis Scholarship, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2015
LeRoy Neiman Scholarship, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2015
Travel Grant, The Ian Potter Cultural Trust (Melbourne, Australia) [link]
2014
Dame Joan Sutherland Fund, American Australian Association, New York, NY [link]
2014
Media Artist Fellowship, BRIC Media Arts House, Brooklyn, NY [link]
2013
Immigrant Artist Program, New York Foundation for the Arts, New York, NY [link]
2013
Artist-in-Residence, Artspace Visual Arts Centre, Sydney, Australia [link]
2013
Summer Studio Artist-in-Residence, BLINDSIDE Artist Run Initiative, Melbourne, Australia [link]
2012
New Work Early Career, Australia Council for the Arts, Australia [link]
2012
ArtStart Initiative, Australia Council for the Arts, Australia [link]
2012
Artist-in-Residence, New York Artist Residency & Studio Foundation, Brooklyn, NY [link]
2012
Summer Artist-in-Residence, Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia [link]
2010
Artist-in-Residence, Kala Art Institute, Berkley, CA [link]
2010
Cultural Fund Travel Grant, Copyright Agency Limited, Australia [link]
2008
Travel Grant, Ian Potter Cultural Trust Fund, Australia [link]