Tricia Avant is an interdisciplinary artist, arts administrator, curator, and educator who embraces the synergy of expansive practices. She uses various mediums to create assemblages, collages, dioramas, installations, performances, and videos, often from an embodied perspective. Engaging in small to large collaborative projects and solo works provides her with a practice that encompasses a range of possibilities. She grew up along the coast in San Diego, has lived in the Bay Area and Los Angeles, and now lives between Redlands and Forest Falls, California.
CV
EDUCATION
Arts Management Certificate, University of California, Irvine, CA, 2022
Business Administration Coursework, Pasadena City College, Pasadena, CA, 2013-14
MFA, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2008
Single Subject Teaching Credential in Art, California State University, Los Angeles, CA 2004
Photography Coursework, Grossmont College, El Cajon, CA, 1998-03
BA, History of Art, University of California, Berkeley, CA, 1997
EXPERIENCE
Academic Coordinator and Gallery Manager of Art, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2014-Present
Associate Director, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2011-14
Lecturer, Black and White Photography, California State University, Long Beach, CA, 2011
Teacher, AP Studio Art, Photography, Video, and Digital Imaging, University High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2008-11
Gallery Assistant and Tino Sehgal Interpreter, The Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art, San Francisco, CA, 2007-08
Graduate Teaching Assistant for Digital Photography, Intro to the Arts, and Senior Projects: Painting, California College of the Arts, San Francisco and Oakland, CA, 2007-08
Visual Studies Coach, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2006-08
Teacher, AP Studio Art, AP Art History, Photography, and Digital Imaging, University High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2001-06
Production and Camera Assistant for Jordan Crandall’s film Heat-Seeking, InSITE2000, San Diego, CA and Tijuana, Mexico, 2000
Photography Teaching Assistant and Photography Lab Tech, Grossmont College, El Cajon, CA, 1999-00
Artist Workshop Assistant, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, CA and Grossmont College, El Cajon, CA, 1998
Curatorial Intern, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, CA, 1997-98
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
Cabinet, Hive Vault, The Claremont Colleges, Claremont, CA, 2019
Further Studies in Natural Appearances, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2014
The Sea Folded Its Layers Around Her, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
From the series Cut Out, PØST, Los Angeles, CA, 2010
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
The Formless is What Keeps Bleeding, video screening curated by Cindy Rehm, Heavy Manners Library, Los Angeles, CA, 2024
dEE-lie-LA, Poderosa, The Healers: An Exploration of Wellness, curated by Martin Durazo and part of the 7th SUR:biennial, Harris Gallery, La Verne, CA, 2023
Tow Truck Towing a Truck, As-Is Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2017
Dirt, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2015
24/7 (still life), curated by Claudia James Bartlett, Cohen Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2014
Panopticum, curated by Kevin Moore, Robert Miller Gallery, New York, NY, 2014
Eve Plays Duchamp, curated by Kevin Moore, Brancolini Grimaldi, London, UK, 2013
The Very Eye of Night, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
Position, PØST, curated by Ali Kheradyar, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
Narratives of the Perverse III, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
31 Women in Art Photography, curated by Jon Feinstein and Natalia Sacasa, Hasted Krautler, New York, NY, 2012
Fits and Starts, Agency, West Hollywood, CA, 2012
Eros and Civilization, curated by Benjamin Lord, Human Resources, Los Angeles, CA, 2011
Perform Chinatown, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2011
Utah Ties, juried by Michelle Pobar, Central Utah Art Center, Ephraim, UT, 2011
Insightsprojects, curated by Anders Petersen & JH Engstrom, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain, 2011
The Collector’s Guide to New Art Photography Vol. 2 Exhibition, curated by Vanessa Kramer, Chelsea Art Museum, New York, NY, 2011
Unveiled, curated by Cindy Rehm and Launa Bacon, Craftswoman House, Pasadena, CA, 2011
Art in and Instant, curated by Julia Pressman, SPLOT, Nowy Sacz, Poland, 2011
There’s a Way in Which…, curated by Amanda Hunt and Liz Glass, Playspace Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 2010
Art in and Instant, curated by Julia Pressman, Thomas Jefferson Visual Arts Gallery, St. Louis, MO, 2010
Art of Photography Show, curated by Natasha Egan, Lyceum Theater Gallery, San Diego, CA, 2010
Building Bridges 2010, curated by Marjan Vayghan, Khaneh Honar Gallery, Tehran, Iran, 2010
Roll Call, curated by Tanner Borskey, SF Camerawork, San Francisco, CA, 2010
Art in and Instant, curated by Julia Pressman, Thompson Gallery, Weston, MA, 2010
Favorite This!, curated by Carolyn Castaño, Meridian Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 2009
Emergence Enchanted, curated by Stef Allespach and Krista Chael, Phantom Galleries LA, Long Beach, CA, 2009
Building Bridges from Tehran to Los Angeles, curated by Marjan Vayghan, Khaneh Honar Gallery, Tehran, Iran, 2009
Visions, curated by Tracey Landworth of Creative Photography Workshops, Edward Cella Art & Architecture, Los Angeles, CA, 2009
Art on Ice, The ArtPost Shanty, Minneapolis, MN, 2009
Charming Decay, Hibbleton Gallery, Fullerton, CA, 2009
Running Time 24:00:00, curated by Micol Hebron, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA, 2008
LAAGAFBLA08, Phantom Galleries LA, Los Angeles, CA, 2008
MFA Thesis Exhibition, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2008
Works on Paper, juried by Alma Ruiz, Long Beach Arts, Long Beach, CA, 2007
Human Figure, Long Beach Arts, Long Beach, CA, 2007
PB1, performance, Pop’s Bar, San Francisco, CA ,2006
Abstract Photography, Por Que Base, Taipei, Taiwan, 2006
Post Postcard Show, curated by Julie Deamer, Outpost for Contemporary Art and Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA, 2005
Postcard Show, curated by Julie Deamer, Outpost for Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, 2004
Under the Skin of Grace, Boehm Gallery, San Marcos, CA, 2003
COLLABORATIVE PROJECTS
HYENA, a collaborative book honoring the legacy of women in surrealism, edited by Cindy Rehm and Adrienne Walser, HEXENTEXTE, Los Angeles, CA, 2024
DRAW JAM 2024 @ The Benton Museum of Art, organized by Solomon Salim Moore, Claremont, CA, 2024
Gathering: an artist book in a box, with collaborators Amanda Maciel Antunes and Cindy Rehm, HEXENTEXTE, Los Angeles, CA, 2023
Yard Work: A Gathering, installation of works with collaborators Amanda Maciel Antunes and Cindy Rehm on the autumn equinox, Los Angeles, CA, 2022
Dream House, a zine in honor of Womanhouse, HEXENTEXTE, Los Angeles, CA, 2022
Touch and Melodrama, 23E Studios Art Collaborative, Koh-i-noor Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2010
1 Image 1 Minute artist column with Micol Hebron for X-TRA Contemporary Art Quarterly, 2009
Disembody, 23E Studios Art Collaborative, Fringe Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA, 2008
Overflow: A Reinvention of Allan Kaprow’s “Fluids,” LA Art Girls Performance, Getty Center, Los Angeles, CA, 2008
Fine, Collaboration with Leigh McCarthy, Thee Parkside, San Francisco, CA, 2008
Boys for Girls, LA Art Girls Performance, Out Auction, West Hollywood, CA, 2007
PB2, performance with Edgar Anaya, Elbo Room, San Francisco, CA, 2007
CURATORIAL PROJECTS
Art + Book, lead curator with co-curator Bella Pettengill, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2023
Make It Backwards!, lead curator with co-curators SeoJin Ahn and Maddie Rubin-Charlesworth, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2023
Painting: New Approaches, lead curator with co-curators SeoJin Ahn, Alex Dean, Alicia Garza, Austin Kim, Maddie Rubin-Charlesworth, Aja Trice, and Scarlett Wang, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2022
Este Sanchez, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2020
Gary Murphy, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2019
Ian Byers-Gamber, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2019
Campus Mail Art, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2019
Loren Holland, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2018
Reformulation: Claremont Idyll, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2018
POSTSCRIPT: Cataloging Exhibitions, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2018
Suzanne Wright, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2018
Women’s Art Work, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2017
Arrangements in Undertone, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2017
Conglomerate Objects, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2016
Anthony Lepore | Samira Yamin, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2016
Books: LeRoy Stevens, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2016
The Objectless State, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2015
Candice Lin | Martine Syms, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2015
East of Encino, North of MOCA, co-curator with Tom Jancar, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2014
Katia Santibanez, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2013
Mira Schnedler, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2013 (LA Times review, June 26, 2013)
Ilene Segalove: Dialogues in Time, co-curator with Tom Jancar, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2013 (LA Times review, May 17, 2013)
Sofie Bird Moller: Beat Around the Bush, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2013
I AM CURIOUS … A Glimpse of Erotic Cinema, co-curator with Tom Jancar, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
Annie Sprinkle/Elizabeth Stephens: The Collaboration, co-curator with Tom Jancar, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2012
eros/thanatos, co-curator with Stef Allespach, Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, CA, 2010
eros/thanatos, co-curator with Stef Allespach, Project Space Kreuzberg, Berlin, Germany, 2009
eros/thanatos, PØST, Los Angeles, CA, 2009
Question Bridge: Black Males, A Work in Progress with Chris Johnson and Hank Willis Thomas, Phantom Galleries LA, Los Angeles and Long Beach, CA, 2009
LAAGAFBLA08, co-coordinator with Stef Allespach, LA Art Girls, Phantom Galleries LA, Los Angeles, CA, 2008
AWARDS AND GRANTS
Academic Staff Development Grant, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2022
Creative Artists Agency Foundation Grants, Arts Funding for Public Education, Los Angeles, CA, 2008-11
Bryon Meyer Scholarship, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2006-08
Teams AmeriCorps Fellowship, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 2002-04
Classroom Excellence Award, Los Angeles Educational Partnership, Los Angeles, CA, 2003
Cesar Chavez Education Grant, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 2001-02
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Tessa Maffucci, “In Conversation with Kevin Moore,” Whitehot Magazine, May 1, 2014
Jasmine Moorhead, “The End of the Endgame,” SFAQ, Issue 15, 2014
Gemma Padley, “Eve Plays Duchamp at London’s Brancolini Grimaldi Gallery,” British Journal of Photography, October 7, 2013
Holly Myers, “Photos lure the eye to peepholes,” LA Times, November 16, 2012
Kevin Moore, “Robert Heinecken, Taiyo Onorato and Nico Krebs, and Tricia Lawless Murray,” Platforme Paris Photo, Paris, France, November 15, 2012
Luca Desienna, ed., MONO, Gomma Books Ltd., 2012
Catherine Wagley, “Peepholes and Mystics,” LA Weekly, July 26, 2012
Holly Myers, “The Very Eye of Night at Jancar Gallery,” LA Times, July 6, 2012
Cindy Rehm, “The Very Eye of Night,” Sweating Blood (blog), July 4, 2012
Catalogue Raisonné, Jancar Gallery, 2011
Carol Cheh, “Perform Chinatown,” Another Righteous Transfer (blog), July 30, 2011
Catherine Wagley, “Perform Chinatown Festival,” LA Weekly, August 1, 2011
Angela Carone, “Photo Gallery: International Photograph Show in San Diego,” Arts & Culture for KPBS, August 23, 2010
Roll Call, exhibition catalogue, 2010
Amani Olu and Jon Feinstein, eds., The Collector’s Guide to New Art Photography: Vol. 2, Humble Arts Foundation, 2010
Emergence Enchanted, exhibition catalogue, 2009
Dave Barton, “The Rot Stuff,” OC Weekly, Vol. 14, No. 20, January 16, 2009
Charming Decay, exhibition catalogue, 2008
Interview with Lynn Ballen, me, and three other LA Art Girls regarding the exhibition LAAFAFBLA08, Feminist Magazine, KFPK Pacifica Radio, July 16, 2008
PUBLICATIONS AS AUTHOR AND EDITOR
“Abstract Character Copy,” editor, an artist book on Lindsay August-Salazar, March 2023
“Eros and Civilization,” co-authored with Heather Cantrell, Dawn Kasper, Benjamin Lord, Davida Nemeroff, and Amy Sampson, booklet to accompany the exhibition, September 2011
“Triangulating Mirrorical Prisms,” MFA Thesis, April 2008
“Our Flesh, Ourselves,” author, Meatpaper, Issue One, September 2007
LECTURES AND TALKS
Conversation with Pui Tiffany Chow and Maddie Rubin-Charlesworth, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, November 2, 2022
Conversation with Pearl C. Hsiung and Maddie Rubin-Charlesworth, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, November 1, 2022
Guest Critic, Graduate Interdisciplinary Critique, California State University, Long Beach, CA, November 10, 2011
Artist Lecture, Society for Photographic Education, West Conference, San Diego, CA, November 6, 2009
Artist Lecture, Third Eye, Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA, March 21, 2009
Co-Presenter with Stef Allespach, Fellows of Contemporary Art tour of LAAGAFBLA08 exhibition, Los Angeles, CA, August 9, 2008
Co-Presenter with Laura Forst, SFMOMA FotoForum tour of the MFA Thesis Exhibition, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, May 7, 2008
Lecture, “Contemporary African Art,” San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA, April 17, 2008
Participant on Feminist Round Table conversation, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA, January 7, 2008
Conversation with Marcia Tanner, TART, San Francisco, CA, January 21, 2007
Panelist on Arts Education Portfolio Development Panel, California State University, Los Angeles, CA, April 20, 2002
Lecture, “Advanced Placement Studio Art: Two-Dimensional Design Curriculum,” Secondary Forum for the Visual Arts, Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA, March 9, 2002
COLLECTIONS
Allen Kaprow Estate, Los Angeles, CA
Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, CA
Los Angeles Contemporary Archive (LACA), Los Angeles, CA
McEvoy Family Collection, San Francisco, CA
Neidecker Collection, Santa Rosa, CA
The Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco, CA
ORGANIZATIONS
Cixous Reading Group, Los Angeles, CA, 2021-Present
LA Art Girls, Los Angeles, CA, 2008-14
College Art Association, New York, NY, 2008-11 and 2023
23E Studios Art Collaborative, Los Angeles, CA, 2008-10
Society for Photographic Education, Cleveland, OH, 2008-10
SERVICE
Staff Council Co-Chair, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2024-25
Staff Council Vice Chair, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2023-24
Public Art Committee Member, Claremont, CA, 2023
Sustained Dialogue Institute, Participant and Facilitator Training, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, 2021-22
Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Tax Preparator for low- to moderate-income individuals, persons with disabilities, the elderly, and limited English speakers, Pasadena, CA, 2014
Juror, California State University, Northridge, Annual Juried Art Student Exhibition, Northridge, CA, 2013
Co-Coordinator, Feminist Art Today Symposium, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2008
Graduate Student Representative, San Francisco Museum of Art FotoForum, San Francisco, CA, 2007-08
Photography Club Advisor, University Senior High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2008-11
Technology Committee Member, University Senior High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2004-06 and 2008-11
Budget Committee Member, University Senior High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2001-06 and 2008-11
Co-Chair, Art Department, University Senior High School, Los Angeles, CA, 2005-06
Juror, Hamilton Senior High School, Annual Student Art Awards, Los Angeles, CA, 2003
Photography Club President, Grossmont College, El Cajon, CA, 1999-00
Docent, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, CA, 1998