I am Gwenn Liberty Seemel. My father wanted to name me Liberty Bell Seemel—after the great Philadelphian e-flat chimer—but made the compromise when my mother pointed out that that particular ding-dong is, in fact, cracked.

I was raised part-time in San Francisco and part-time in a small village in France. In Brittany, I attended the same grammar school my mother did growing up, and I learned to play a mean game of boule bretonne for an eight year old.

Eventually, my family settled in the United States, in Oregon, and, these past few years, I have stayed on. I graduated summa cum laude from Willamette University in 2003, and I now live in Portland with my sweetheart.

I am a full-time artist and have been for ten years. My portrait work comes in two varieties: the individual portrait and the portrait in a series. I paint likenesses of individuals for commission, and I also paint portraits of groups of people for the purpose of exploring a particular issue. I exhibit the latter in conceptual shows, and, in 2010 and 2011, I toured one such series, Subjective, throughout the Pacific Northwest. A collaboration with Becca Bernstein, Subjective is available as a catalog with an introduction by the portraiture scholar Dr. Richard Brilliant.

My current project, Crime Against Nature, is both a series and a children’s book for the kid in all of us. It explores all the ways women and men in our society feel they have to be in order to be natural, and the book includes a foreword by the evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden.

I also recently released an e-book about art marketing to celebrate my decade of professional art-making. Read it here for free or purchase the PDF here!

This video is an example of the sort of thing I do on my blog. In my writing and vlogging, I tend to focus on my own art practice, the business of art, being an artist for free culture, and the difficulties of living with endometriosis.

Please email me at gwenn@gwennseemel.com if you would like to be added to my mailing list for notices about upcoming shows and events or find me online here:

-—RÉSUMÉ—-

Born 1981, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS:
2012 - Crime Against Nature, Place, Portland, Oregon.
2011 - Subjective, Art Festival Museum, Edmonds, Washington -- in collaboration with Becca Bernstein.
2010 - Subjective, Pence Gallery, Bend, Oregon -- in collaboration with Becca Bernstein.
2010 - Subjective, Arts Center, Corvallis, Oregon -- in collaboration with Becca Bernstein.
2010 - Subjective, North View Gallery, Portland, Oregon -- in collaboration with Becca Bernstein.
2009 - Apple Pie, Downtown Initiative for the Visual Arts, Eugene, Oregon.
2008 - Apple Pie, Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - Sympathetic Magic, Filter Talent, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - Swollen, Littman Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2006 - Mutually Beneficial, Concrete, Portland, Oregon.
2005 - Public Faces, City Club of Portland, Portland, Oregon.
2005 - Private Masks, Starling Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2004 - Snow Days, Northwest Sony Only, Portland, Oregon.
2004 - Trickster Project, Backdoor Theater, Portland, Oregon.
2003 - Critics Critiqued, Visage, Portland, Oregon.

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS:
2012 - Image, Identity, Allegory, Dan and Gail Cannon Gallery of Art, Monmouth, Oregon.
2011 - A Somewhat Secret Place, PRESENTspace, Portland, Oregon.
2010 - Spread Ego with TJ Norris, Place, Portland, Oregon.
2010 - Resonance, Anka Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2010 - Transcendent, Anka Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2010 - Views And Reviews, Art Building Gallery, Willamette University, Salem, Oregon.
2009 - Mixed, Ray Warren Multicultural Symposium, Lewis and Clark College, Portland, Oregon.
2009 - Art & Labor & The Labor Of Art, Olympic Mills, Portland, Oregon -- featured artist.
2008 - A Brief History, Littman Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2008 - Keep Portland Weird, City Hall, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - PDX Panels, Portland Art Center, Portland, Oregon.
2006 - inCLOVER, Mount Scott Park, Portland, Oregon.
2006 - Boredom: I Learned It By Watching You, Portland Art Center, Portland, Oregon.
2003 - Recent Graduate Show, Blackfish Gallery, Portland, Oregon.
2003 - Senior Art Show, Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, Oregon.

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS:
2012 - Regional Arts and Culture Council’s Portable Works Collection, Portland, Oregon.
2010 - Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, Oregon.
2003 - Willamette University, Salem, Oregon.

PUBLICATIONS:
2013 - Art Marketing, e-book to celebrate a decade as a working artist.
2013 - T(OUR), literary art magazine.
2012 - Crime Against Nature, book with foreword by Joan Roughgarden.
2010 - Subjective, exhibition catalog with foreword by Richard Brilliant.
2008 - Apple Pie, exhibition catalog with foreword by Inara Verzemnieks.

SOME REVIEWS AND INTERVIEWS:
2013 - “Is homosexuality natural?,” Symbiartic on Scientific American, Kalliopi Monoyios.
2013 - “Love in the wild,” Apartment Therapy, Tess Wilson.
2013 - “Painter illustrates the diversity of sex and gender in the natural world,” Hyperallergic, Allison Meier.
2013 - “Our crime against nature,” The Quiet Lunch, editor.
2013 - “Crime against nature,” BoingBoing, Maggie Koerth-Baker.
2012 - “Les bibliothèques et l’océan du web,” SILex, Lionel Maurel.
2012 - “Les bonnes recettes du libre,” OWNI, Lionel Maurel.
2012 - “Artist Gwenn Seemel: Copyright is about fear, not money,” Question Copyright, Karl Fogel.
2012 - “Imitation is still the sincerest form of flattery,” Tech Dirt, Leigh Beadon.
2011 - “Thinking inside the box,” Oregon Quarterly, Jim McChesney.
2011 - “News and notes,” Oregon ArtsWatch, Barry Johnson.
2010 - “HOWTO make art without getting ‘ripped off’ online,” BoingBoing, Cory Doctorow.
2010 - “Riverside-Brookfield art students learn from an expert,” Lyons Suburban Life, Mark Busch.
2010 - “BlogHer voice of the week: Gwenn Liberty Seemel on Small Strokes,” BlogHer, Elisa Camahort.
2010 - “Paint by numbers,” The Portland Business Journal, Matthew Kish.
2010 - “1 Project, 2 artists, 10 subjects make a world of difference,” The Oregonian, Margie Boulé.
2009 - “Interview: Gwenn Seemel,” Sweet Station, Welshie.
2009 - “Art swap,” The Hillsboro Argus, JoAnn Boatwright.
2009 - “DK’s Hot Sheet,” The Oregonian, DK Row.
2009 - “Art for politic’s sake,” The Oregonian, editor.
2009 - “Leonard portrait is flattering, all right,” Oregon Live, Mary Kitch.
2007 - “Faces from the edge of the earth,” The Oregonian, Inara Verzemnieks.
2007 - “Before and after,” Just Out, Jim Radosta.
2007 - “Swollen,” PDX Magazine, Vanessa Nix.
2006 - “In the market for some portraits,” The Oregonian, DK Row.
2006 - “You scratch her back and she’ll paint yours,” Portland Tribune, Eric Bartels.
2005 - “Government and death,” The Oregonian, Harvest Henderson.

TELEVISION, RADIO, VIDEO AND AUDIO INTERVIEWS:
2013 - “Vidéo interview de l’artiste Gwenn Seemel,” CultureWok, Gaëlle Pertot.
2012 - “CubFluffer chats with Gwenn Seemel,” CubFluffer, Gabe Flores and Mark Martinez.
2011 - “Masterclass interview with Gwenn Seemel,” The Abundant Artist, Cory Huff.
2010 - “10 O’Clock News,” for the Kirk Reeves art auction, KPTV Channel 12 Portland, Sophie Soong.
2010 - “Oregon Art Beat,” Oregon Public Broadcasting, KC Cowan.
2008 - “EZone,” PDX49, Chloe Houser and Darcy Zettler.
2004 - “10 O’Clock News,” for Snow Days, KPTV Channel 12 Portland, Shauna Parsons.
2003 - “Artstar Radio,” KPSU, Eva Lake.

SOME LECTURES AND WORKSHOPS:
2013 - Guest artist, Washington State University, Vancouver, Washington.
2013 - Guest artist, David Douglas High School, Portland, Oregon.
2013 - Guest artist, Portland Community College, Portland, Oregon.
2013 - Speaker, Freedom to Connect, Washington DC.
2012 - Panelist, Pedigree, Portland, Oregon.
2011 - Guest artist, Willamette University, Salem, Oregon.
2011 - Guest artist, Oregon Art Education Association Conference, Eugene, Oregon.
2010 - Guest artist, Riverside Brookfield High School, Riverside, Illinois.
2009 - Guest artist, Oregon Society of Artists, Portland, Oregon.
2009 - Speaker, Pecha Kucha Night, Eugene, Oregon.
2009 - Guest artist, Madison High School, Portland, Oregon.
2008 - Storyteller, Super Project Lab, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - Guest artist, Portland Community College, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - Guest artist, Madison High School, Portland, Oregon.
2007 - Guest artist, Newspace Center for Photography, Portland, Oregon.
2006 - Guest artist, Portland Community College, Portland, Oregon.

AWARDS:
2012 - Emergency Relief Grant, Haven Foundation, Brewer, Maine.
2012 - Emergency Relief Grant, Artists’ Fellowship Inc, New York, New York.
2012 - Project Grant, Regional Arts and Culture Council, Portland, Oregon.
2011 - Featured Blogger, BlogHer Money.
2011 - Kickstarter, crowd-sourced funding for creatives.
2010 - Emergency Relief Grant, Haven Foundation, Brewer, Maine.
2009 - Emergency Relief Grant, Artists’ Fellowship Inc, New York, New York.
2009 - Emergency Relief Grant, Change Inc, Captiva, Florida.
2009 - Project Grant, Celebration Foundation, Portland, Oregon.
2009 - Career Opportunity Grant, Oregon Arts Commission, Salem, Oregon.
2008 - Project Grant, Regional Arts and Culture Council, Portland, Oregon.
2003 - Member of Phi Beta Kappa.

EDUCATION:
2003 - BA in Studio Art and French, summa cum laude, Willamette University, Salem, Oregon.
2002 - Magenia, Ella Jaroszewicz’s school for mime and dance, Paris, France.