Monique Allain

Biography

Monique Allain (1958) is an artist, educator, and researcher. She was born in São Paulo to French and Mexican parents. She moved to New York in 2018, subsequently settling in North Salem in 2020.

Before engaging in the art field, she was an environmental consultant for the Terra Capital Fund, the first fund in the world to capitalize on business projects aimed at preserving biodiversity.

In 1999 Allain redirected her career, pursuing a new life as an artist. Allain worked from 2000 to 2002 as Assistant Cultural Manager at Casa das Rosas, a contemporary public art center in São Paulo. This experience enabled her to understand the contemporary art scene and the elements involved in working as an artist.

One of her objectives was to share the desire to promote the participation of visual artists in the processes of cultural decisions, and expansion of the recognition and diffusion of visual art developed in Brazil. Thus, she and a group of artists created the Cooperativa de Artistas Visuais do Brasil (2003-2006).

In 2004, with a view to deepening and structuring knowledge in the art field, and developing a personal language, Allain went back to university to study Visual Arts. In 2005-2006 she joined the artists Dácio Bicudo and Ivald Granato to create the CEL1121, a space for artistic actions. After completing a Bachelor’s degree in Visual Arts (2007), she was awarded a residency at Cité Internationale des Arts (Paris, 2008), and received a Master’s degree in Visual Arts (2011).

Discovering a high resonance with the thoughts of Moshe Feldenkrais, and being interested in improving her process through the method he created, Allain completed the training and was certified by The International Feldenkrais Foundation (2015).

Invited by ABER (Associação Brasileira de Encadernação e Restauro) to create and coordinate the art division NÚCLEO DE ARTE, in 2013 she developed multiple programs which promoted the study and production of artist's books, through a study group for artists, an Artist Book course, and the Vitrine Project. The experience expanded her interest in printed art and enabled rich exchanges with other artists. These programs allowed the practice and the maturation of a pedagogical project that involved the conception, construction, and presentation of artworks. In the Vitrine Project, four annual exhibitions of printed art showcased the work of consolidated artists (2013-2019).

In 2017 Allain was approved and participated in the Program and Group of Contemporary Art and Production Studies (which focus on the deconstruction of certainties, experimentation, and deepening of the creative processes) led by the curator Paulo Miyada at the Tomie Ohtake Institute.

Monique Allain’s work has been presented in solo and collective exhibitions in museums, galleries, and public spaces in Brazil and abroad. Her work is included in the permanent collections of the following institutions: MAB, Espaço Cultural dos Correios, Palácio 9 de Julho, and Benetton Foundation.

Artist statement

I am a multidisciplinary and multimedia ART(IV)IST who supports life with peace in a sustainable environment. A foreigner everywhere, with scattered memories and roots, I live and produce in search of my place and my peers.

The mystery of being alive fascinates me. Fractals, Dynamic Systems, and Chaos Theory are sources of inspiration. Among snakes and lizards, at first and by mistake I became a biologist. When I tripped over a camera, I realized that life was to be lived with poetry. In 2000, I gave everything up and started to produce artwork.

My subject of interest is IDENTITY regarding its particular and collective nature, and its relationship with space, time, and otherness. Following this matter, I do performances, installations, and interventions in which situations of connection with the environment (GROUNDING or HABITATIONS) and with others (DIALOGUES), as well as immersive situations of self-connection, can be experienced. I use video, photography, and painting to explore the synesthetic potential of the limits, transitions, and overlays of these diverse media.

Biology, my first training, is an inspiring source for my thematic and creative process. Lydia Clark, in her Structuring of the Self, and Moshe Feldenkrais with his Awareness through Movement method are my prime references.