Michelle Blade (born 1981 Los Angeles, CA) lives and works in Los Angeles. Blade holds an MFA from the California College of the Arts, San Francisco (2008) and a BA from Loyola Marymount, Los Angeles (2003). Solo exhibitions include Night Gallery (Los Angeles, Forthcoming), Asia Art Center (Beijing and Taipei), Micki Meng (San Francisco), Asia Art Center (Taipei), Loyal (Stockholm) and Wilding Cran Gallery (Los Angeles). Group exhibitions include Spazio Amanita (Los Angeles), Blum & Poe (Los Angeles), Nassima Landau Foundation (Tel Aviv), Simon Lee Gallery (London), Marin Museum of Contemporary Art with Etel Adnan and Kristy Luck (Novato, California), La Loma (Los Angeles), “I Do My Own Stunts”, curated by Jack Siebert and Caio Twombly (Los Angeles), WOAW Gallery (Hong Kong), Make Room (Los Angeles), The Center for Contemporary Arts (Santa Fe), The Bonnefanten Museum (Netherlands), Jack Hanley Gallery (New York), Southern Exposure (San Francisco), Roberts & Tilton (Los Angeles), The Torrance Art Museum.

Blade’s paintings of intimate everyday, yet dreamy scenes, burst with an airy, transcendent aura. Blade’s work probes at the meeting of the natural and supernatural, as she documents time, seasons, stillness and the persistence of the natural world in Los Angeles. Being from a multi-generational Los Angeleno family, while also living and working in LA, she contemplates the significance of navigating the physical and mental terrain as those who came before her. Blade has honed a fiercely radiant technique of figuration in which she works with wet on wet paint in thin washes. As the wet media blooms fluidly on the porous surface of the canvas, in a dance and race with time, Blade works with the element of chance, skillfully shifting and maneuvering the paint with her profound brushwork.

Solo exhibitions

2024
Grace Electric, Asia Art Center, Beijing

2023
Between the Bones and Now, Micki Meng, San Francisco, CA

2022
The Blue Horse, Loyal, Stockholm, Sweden
Maker of Meaning, Asia Art Center, Taipei, Taiwan

2020
Into the forest, Wilding Cran Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
Viewing Room / Odd Ark, Los Angeles, CA

Group exhibitions

2024
The Journey Before Me: Etel Adnan, Michelle Blade, Kristy Luck, Marin Museum of Contemporary Art,
Marin, San Francisco, CA

2023
Walk against the wind, presented by Micki Meng and Parker Gallery, New York, NY
Loyal @ El Royale, El Royale, Los Angeles, CA
RIPE, Harper’s, Los Angeles, CA

2022
Juggernaut, The Pit, Los Angeles, CA
I Do My Own Stunts, curated by Jack Siebert and Caio Twombly, Spazio Amanita, Los Angeles, CA
If you forget my name, You will go astray, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
When the Sun Loses It’s Light, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, CA
High Voltage 3, Nassima Landau Foundation, Tel Aviv
Summertime Rolls, La Loma Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
Machines of Desire, Simon Lee Gallery, London

2021
Urban Whisper, WOAW Gallery, Hong Kong
Urban Whisper, Make Room, Los Angeles, CA
My Secret Garden, Asia Art Center, Taipei, Taiwan
Ridiculous Sublime, SFA Advisory, NY
From LA to Milan, F2T Gallery, Milan, Italy

Awards & Residencies
2015 FB AIR Program, Menlo Park, CA
2012 Aurobora Press Residency, San Francisco, CA
2011 Children’s Creativity Museum Artist in Resident
ProArts 2x2 Artist Grant
2010 Alternative Exposure, Southern Exposure Grant
2007 Murphy-Cadogan Fellowship