Beth Livensperger makes paintings that focus on society’s complicated relationship to the built environment. Her invented images tend toward artificial color and manipulated form. Depiction of ubiquitous yet imposing institutional buildings suggests a friction between individuals and structures of power. Originally from the midwest, Livensperger moved to New York in 1997 to study art at The Cooper Union. In 2008 she received her M.F.A. from Yale University in Painting and Printmaking. Prior to her arrival at the College of Staten Island, she taught painting, drawing, and foundations courses at Marymount Manhattan College, Adelphi University, and most recently Purchase College, SUNY. At Purchase she led the Bachelor of Science in Visual Art program for students intrigued by combining study in the humanities with studio art practice. Her teaching interests range from painting and drawing in various media to the construction of narratives and analysis of contemporary painting issues. She has lectured on her work at RISD, the New York Studio School, and the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design.
Degrees
Yale University School of Art, M.F.A. Painting and Printmaking
The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, B.F.A.
Livensperger has exhibited widely at venues in NYC, Philadelphia, Santa Monica and Seoul. She has created solo projects at the Abrons Art Center, Chashama, and Tomato House, and been in group exhibitions at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, RISD Memorial Hall Gallery, The Painting Center, and William Holman Gallery among many others. Livensperger has also curated two group exhibitions: Ulterior Motives in Brooklyn, and Ghosts (a collaboration with Field Projects and Residency Unlimited) in New Rochelle. Her work has been discussed by ArtCritical’s Review Panel, and reviewed in Capitol New York, Two Coats of Paint, and WNYC’s Culture Datebook. She has been an Aldrich Museum Radius Fellow, and an artist in residence at Chashama and the Abrons Art Center in NYC. Residency and grant support has been received by the Sam and Adele Golden Foundation, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and the SUNY Research Foundation.
