PORTFOLIO
Identity, I get to choose
2024, acrylic on canvas, diptych
As I dive into my art practice and the art world, I am confronted with questions about my outward appearing identity and what practices I associate with that define those identities. These pieces serve as a self reflection to those questions along with symbols that have resonated with me significantly throughout my life. I am now exploring the meanings to those symbols and family stories by researching their cultural significance while strengthening ties to living relatives. Up until recently I had not correlated these symbols and stories with personal ancestral importance and am now considering their relevance to me as a person who is far removed and disassociated from my own cultural heritage. These symbols are an exploration of mark-making that express my identity and connection to myself as a human and my connection to my family, both dynamic and imperfect. The unfinished or under-painted look is deliberate to express my identity as in progress, personifying my identity as an ever developing experience. These pieces represent a place of affectionate introspection, to explore others perceptions of “who I am”, and my experience of navigating life as a multi-racial female with a severed connection from my ancestral roots and family stories.
-Morgan DeVillier
Face of Many and None
acrylic on wood board, 12x12, 2022
My identity, my culture, my roots. Who am I if I am not only one culture? Who am I if my way of life is centered around survival in capitalism? Who am I if I do not know where my brown skin originates? Who am I if my grandmother spoke Spanish, but I do not? Who am I if I am white passing? Who am I if I do not identify with a culture? Who am I if I am not enough of one thing? Am I still included? Am I a part of your group? Who am I?
Piñata Pieces
acrylic and plaster on canvas with digital collage, 36x96, 2025
As an exploration of having a multi-racial identity, I explore symbols that resonate with me. Some I have yet to identify with historically categorized ancestral symbols. The unknown of all of my ancestry is something I reflect on in my work. This piece is a reflection and response to how colonization, globalization, and westernization affects identity, the experience of being of many backgrounds while also not knowing or practicing a culture. I have a disconnection between the few things I know were practiced and a lack of practicing myself. To me, the pieces are ingredients to my identity, a practice of nostalgic exploration.
Present Breath 2022, digital photography
Present Breath is a reflection and response to the history of photography used in
anthropology. The photos and attitudes of anthropologists from the past dehumanize
people of color by scrutinizing their physical traits. The act of profiling is still very much a
social practice today. This work reconsiders the archive of human difference and minimizes
it to a subtle commonality, our breath. Through backlit studio lighting and digital photo
overlaying, this new series of photographs captures the subtle suspended movement in the
cycle of a breath. The work informs and restructures the perception of constructed social
and institutional norms and practices of the past. It considers that humanness isn’t merely
an appearance, but an experience. It begs the question, what more do we have in common?
TAKE SOME, LEAVE THE REST
an exploration of the turbulent times under militarism, patriarchy, and capitalism that increase vulnerability for caregivers in an increasingly disaster prone world
2023 readymade, acrylic on canvas, and audio installation
Through still life painting, audio recording, and ready-made installation, I explore intersections of private and public life for people who assert the role as caregivers.
Despite the importance of caregiving in both ordinary and disaster situations, patriarchy and binary gender norms devalue the tasks of caregiving and overvalue militant approaches to resolution.
Take Some, Leave the Rest is not only a reminder to prepare in case of emergency, but also a reminder of the looming threat of institutional and societal structures like capitalism that brew climate inaction and militarization. These structures enable and continue patterns of marginalization and increase precarity for people around the world.
Artifacts in a Carrier Bag
2022, digital photography
Artifacts in a Carrier Bag is a still life photography series that displays the nostalgic or essential items people carry with them. The Carrier Bag Theory of Human Evolution, coined by the anthropologist Elizabeth Fisher, argues that the first cultural device used by humans was probably a carrier bag. This contradicts the commonly assumed and glorified stereotype of humans as primarily hunters. This series emphasizes the behavior of collecting objects as a quintessentially human experience, connecting our modern everyday lives to our gathering ancestors of the distant past.
Concrete Below
2022, digital photography
Concrete Below explores views from above through digital photography and digital manipulation. Taken of concrete floor, these studies mimic Google Earth imaging and contemplate a world of concrete. These views from above pose questions about our relationship to the natural world as humans continue to manipulate it.
