Angella d’Avignon
is a freelance writer.
My fiction was longlisted in the 2021 First Pages Prize and I was a finalist for the 2022 Ellen Meloy Desert Writers Prize and the 2022 Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant. I am a 2023 ArtTable Fellow.
Bylines
Picture Perfect, for ELLEdecor
Free Dirt, for The Paris Review
But is it Junk? for AIGA Eye on Design
Wayne Thiebaud and Ghia’s Le Spritz, for Variable West
They Live Alone in Ghost Towns, for New York Times Styles
Location Not Found, for Real Life Magazine
A Review of: "Death in Her Hands by Ottessa Moshfegh", for The Believer
Affirmation memes for millennial dreams, for DIRT
Ghost Towns of Instagram, for The Baffler
The Mortician and the Murderer, for Topic Studios
Citrus Season, for Popula
︎Everything else
Services here.
︎
Image: Piles of “Free Dirt”Cold Calls
︎ heyangella at gmail
︎ @heyangella
Newsletters
West Ends
Late Night Listings
Links
ilovecreatives profile
My old advice blog for artists
National Writer's Union
Newswomen's Club of New York
Everything else
Essays, nonfiction, reporting
Picture Perfect, for ELLEdecor
Free Dirt, for The Paris Review
Finding Meaning in Forgotten Objects: Pamela Ramos Interviewed, Variable West
But is it Junk? AIGA Eye on Design
Wayne Thiebaud and Ghia’s Le Spritz, Variable West
Power Exhibited Through Sexualized Desire: Julie Henson Interviewed, Variable West
Dirt: Bootleg Sunset, for DIRT
Dirt: Liminal potato house, for DIRT
Dirt: Affirmation memes for millennial dreams, on mass delusion and memes for DIRT by Daisy Alioto and Kyle Chayka
On Tenderness, a letter to editor Liana Jegers, The Smudge Vol. 5, Issue 2
On Corn Society or Uncle Bobby's Mystical Journey, The Smudge Vol. 4, Issue 8
Distancing #29: Fading Frontier, The Believer Logger
They Live Alone in Ghost Towns, for New York Times Styles
On Being "Wrong": An Ode to John Baldessari, for Degree Critical
Holy Water, for The Smudge Vol. 3 Issue 9, Tan & Loose Press
Ghost Towns of Instagram, for The Baffler
The Butterfly Effect, for GARAGE
Location Not Found, for Real Life Magazine
There it is, Drink it., for The Smudge, Vol. 2, Issue 12, Tan & Loose Press
How Close to Reality is Velvet Buzzsaw's Depiction of the LA Art World?, for i-D
Union at Cal State Long Beach Leaks Email from Fired Museum Director, Revealing Divisive Perspectives, for Hyperallergic
Tanya Brodsky, for Women Artists Five
Decoding the Whitney's Art Haul,for GARAGE Magazine
Los Angeles Gallery Takes Down Exhibition After Anti-Gentrification Protest, for Hyperallergic
The Joker: The Art World’s Best Patron, for GARAGE Magazine
Neighbors Converge and Share Their Memories Around a Public Art Project in LA, for Hyperallergic
A Concise Guide to LA’s Outdoor Art Spaces, from a Pool to a Garage, for Hyperallergic
Los Angeles: The City of Dreams and Sprawling Art Book Fairs, for GARAGE Magazine
Perennial Bloom: Florals in Feminism and Across L.A., printed in Carla 12
How to Write About The Richest Artist in The World, printed in The Smudge, Vol 2. No. 5, Tan & Loose Press (PDF)
These Surreal Paintings Embody L.A.’s Hedonism and Spirituality, for Artsy
This Joyful Video of Women Laughing Sends a Strong Feminist Message, for Artsy
The Power Suit's Subversive Legacy, for The Atlantic
To Live and Fade in LA, for Open Space (SFMOMA)
Here's What Little Girls Are Made Of, for TOPIC STORIES
Not Driving in California, printed in The Smudge Vol. 1, No. 5, Tan & Loose Press
Nazi Chic: The style that just won't go away, for Medium (Aesthetics of Fascism series), 2017
#999966, for Websafe2k16
I Waited Until I was 30 to Go to College., for The Washington Post
Late Superbloom, for Notes on Looking
A Brief History of Women's Housing in Los Angeles, for The Atlantic's CityLab
Going with the Flow, Los Angeles’s first biennial, printed in Public Art Review magazine
Why Have We Always Been So Obsessed With Virginity?, for The Establishment
Cities May Alienate Women, But ‘Hypersolitude’ Is a Way to Reclaim Lost Space, for How We Get To Next
Pretty in Pink: How a Color Came to Represent a Gender, for Broadly
A Woman Shorn: The Disruptive History of the Female Shaved Head, for VICE
Curatorial Texts
Forthcoming catalogue essay forTo Bear the Mark of Time, September 23, 2022-January 28, 2023 at Tarble Arts Center, Eastern Illinois University, 2023
Press Release for Amelia Lockwood, Eighth Lane at Various Small Fires, May 14 - August 27, 2022
Forward to “A Nomadic Art Museum: Black Cube 2015 – 2020”, for Black Cube
A Perfect Ocean, or A Losing Guide to Beachcombing, an essay about loss, the tide, throwing things back and letting them come back to you for Chantal Wnuk: I Dream of a Perfect Ocean, I Dreamt of Stepping in a Hole at Best Practice, San Diego, CA.
Etymology of a Ghost, the trajectory of a folk song sung by a cartoon, rotoscoped ghost of Cab Calloway, for Joe Yorty: The Ghost I Love the Most at Southwestern College, San Diego, CA.
SUPERSTAR, a nonfiction prose piece about the technological mechanics of heartbreak for catalog text for Andy Ralph: Idle Cure & The Deep Tissue at New Release, Small Editions, New York City, NY.
New Narratives from Los Angeles, curatorial text for the grad student art exhibition at Cal State Long Beach, for GLAMFA 2017, Long Beach, CA.
Calling from Vermont, a combination of found text wrangled into curatorial prose for Bruna Massadas: Calling from Vermont at Room & Border, Long Beach, CA.
Profiles
Seth Bogart's Feelin' Fruity is Bringing a Punk Aesthetic to TV, a profile on queer punk musician and art hero Seth Bogart who produced his TV series Feelin' Fruity entirely himself (with help from friends of course), for Vulture, June 2018
Interview with Artemisa Clark, “Like if you’re naked and tied up for your performance, you should make sure you have someone to check in on you. You should also probably stretch!”, an interview with performance artist and brainiac Artemisa Clark for Art Practical, 2018
"Car Culture" Takes on a New Meaning in This Mobile Gallery, about a gallery that lives in the cabin of a champagne-colored Crown Vic as it drifts through the streets of Los Angeles, for GARAGE Magazine, December 2017
Meet Big Sal, Jewelry District Security Guard, Historian and Ghostbuster, a profile on Sal Licone, a DTLA security guard who protects a historic theater, now a jewelry store, where he used to see John Wayne movies in as a kid, for the original LA Weekly, 2017
John Early has taken to LA like a Scientologist to a Celebrity Centre, a profile on comedian John Early who had just moved to LA where he ordered the chopped cobb for lunch at the iconic 101 Diner and draped his pale body across the marquee of the Scientology Celebrity Centre, for the original LA Weekly, 2017
Reviews
40 Years Later, Rigoberto Torres and John Ahearn Are Still Making Life Casts of Bronx Residents, for Hyperallergic
A Review of: "Death in Her Hands by Ottessa Moshfegh", for The Believer
Review: (LA in NY) Mike Kelley at Hauser & Wirth, even in his paintings, Kelley rooted around at the rot of American nostalgia and yanked it clean out of its socket, for Carla 19
Review: (LA in NY) Catherine Opie at Lehmann Maupin, arson, mid century modernism, and ambivalence, for Carla 15
Review: POSSESSED: Eckhaus Latta at the Whitney, I went to the Eckhaus Latta special exhibition store and couldn't afford the concept, for Carla 14
The Price is Wrong, a review and roast of the art world and its bloated art market and self-satisfied crowd for The Baffler
Inspired by the Story of a Women’s Sanitarium, a Book Explores Mental Health as a Feminist Issue, a book review on an independently published art book of essays on mental health and feminism, for Hyperallergic
Review: Oren Pinhassi at Skibum MacArthur, “Pinhassi’s sculptures are monuments to connections lost—whether by withering bodies, bad politics, or a compulsive use of technology,” a Snap Review for Carla, May 17 2018
Review: Angie Jennings at Abode Gallery, "She rigs blanket-like tapestries smothered with house paint, compost, sand, beads, yarn, and lace ripped from old quilts to protect her,” a Snap Review for Carla, March 28 2018
Review: Nevine Mahmoud at M+B, a long review about stone fruit, marble carving, Greek sculpture, Medusa’s hair, and Anne Carson, printed in Carla 11, 2018
Review: Tactility of the Line at Elevator Mondays, long review about teenage driving, line work, and the constraints of a freight elevator turned gallery space, printed in Carla 10, 2017
Review: Conceding, our eyes shift at Basement Projects, “burning candles gripped in fists pop through satin fabric and let the wax drip over knuckles,” a Snap Review for Carla, October 25 2018
Review: Jessica Williams at SADE, “Women sigh on balconies, at beaches, and in suburban bedrooms, perhaps mistaking one another for their own reflections,” a Snap Review for Carla, October 12 2017
Review: Broken Language at Shulamit Nazarian, “In the early days of the internet, fluency was self-determined. Intimacy blossomed between keystrokes. Without body language, a typed-out affectation negated grammar,” a long review, printed in Carla 9, 2017
Review: Camille Schefter at NowSpace, “a bored suburban home, a grandfather’s auto garage, a pietá hewn in the heartland,” a Snap Review for Carla, August 2 2017
Review: The Dick Pic Show at Chimento Contemporary, “In contrasting the preciousness of penile depictions of the past with the understanding that jpegs of dicks float wild and free in the digital cloud (milieu?), the curators encapsulate a cultural threshold and suggest the dick is more of a mortal than a god.,” a Snap Review for Carla, June 30 2017
Review: Flowerland at Charlie James Gallery, “ambrosia-colored and lopsided, as if arranged by a distracted florist. Asymmetry makes more sense when measuring frustration,” a Snap Review for Carla, June 15 2017
Review: PARATEXTUAL at Samuel Freeman Gallery, “photographic images help sift the density of each work’s context, but without them, other works feel laborious or overwrought,” a Snap Review for Carla, June 1 2017
Review: Weird Rain at Garden, “Each honors interiority with tenderness, and if the body is a biosphere, home was first the womb,” a Snap Review for Carla, May 19 2017
Review: Apollo on Earth at HILDE, “disembodiment, presence, and abstraction draw a link between classical antiquity and a genderfluid future,” a Snap Review for Carla, March 22 2017
Review: Kathleen Ryan, Weightless Again at Ghebaly, “Where levity feels unachievable, Ryan’s perception of heft and lightness feels preternatural and witchy; levitation and balance somehow come easily,” a Snap Review for Carla, February 8 2017
Review: Slippery When Wet at GAIT LA, Carla
Review: Figure as Form at ltd Los Angeles, Hollywood Hills House, Carla
Review: LET LOVE BURN IN ALL THE LAMPS at Ms Barbers, Carla
Review: Marwa Abdul-Rahman at Museum as Retail Space, Carla
Review: Hannah Boone, Aria Dean, Merideth Hillbrand at Club Pro Los Angeles, Carla
Review: Sarah Cain at Honor Fraser, Carla, 2015
a one stop shop for copywriting, editing, content strategy, and coaching primarily for artists and art adjacent workers
Writing about art is glorified gatekeeping and often bad!
Have you ever felt completely alienated by art? Read an artist statement that sounded impressive but made no sense? Attended an artist talk and had zero idea what the hell the artist was saying? Looked at your own work and thought, “How do I explain this?”
Sometimes what’s in your head doesn’t make sense on the page and explaining your art to other people can be daunting. I’m here to help.
Services
First phone call or Zoom is always free. I can point you in the right direction.
I look forward to helping you:
✿ Generate, Edit, Review and Revise your
✿ Artist statement
✿ Portfolio
✿ Artist biography and curriculum vitae
✿ Grant applications essay sections
✿ Exhibition proposals
✿ Press releases
✿ Advise on MFA, MA programs and review MFA, MA applications
✿ Organize and catalogue artworks and other archival organization
✿ Create strategy for applying to grants, residencies and exhibitions; organize calendar of deadlines
✿ Prepare for studio visits
✿ Hone your public speaking and presentation skills
✿ Create outreach strategy: press, social media, etc., website and social media presence/text
✿ Align press and social media to position for greater opportunities
✿ Identify and leverage existing networks to maximize impact
✿ Help with exhibition planning and execution
✿ Brainstorm public programming and potential collaborators for multi-disciplinary projects
✿ Art coaching to reach next level of career goals
Pricing
At the moment, my established package is $500 to create three (3) strong, modular paragraphs that can be used for a variety of applications, statement needs, and/or press releases. This compensation includes my industry knowledge, my experience, and my time. My ongoing rate is adjusted for artists at $100/hour.
That said, I often work with smaller budgets and on a scale dependent on need. I also work for trade. Contact me ︎ for further rates. No one is turned away for lack of funds; if you are unable to meet the rate, I will refer you to someone within your range.
Why I’m qualified
With more than 10 years experience, I’ve run project spaces, worked with artists, and continue to write about art. I hold a degrees in Art History and earned my Master’s in a art-based writing program; I continue to regularly write criticism for a variety of publications. I’ve curated exhibitions, written countless press releases, and worked as a curatorial research assistant, publishing catalogues and independent artist publications.
My goal is to help you explain your work to the world in a way that’s smart but accessible, explanatory but not didactic. I'm precise but supportive. I will give you personalized homework that will enrich your and others’ understanding of your work and tools to help you adjust your statements as you grow. Presenting your work is a skill you must develop and I can help you jump start the process.
Recommendations
“I am so grateful I was connected with Angella, her guidance and expertise made the experience of writing my artist statement a breeze. Not only is Angella a joy to work with, she was very collaborative, open, and professional when getting the work done. I didn't feel like I needed to compromise my voice, or my message in the process, and she did a wonderful job of translating my thoughts into something very eloquent and effective. Thank you Angella.”
“I sought Angella's help in applying for a Master's degree in Brussels. She made me feel that my artistic voice was worth being heard and in a way, she even gave me back my belief in my artistic career. Sure it is hard to formulate creative processes, but her interest in the content of my work and her commitment helped me to express myself concretely and to formulate who I am and what I want. As a result, I was not only accepted at the university, but the letter of motivation was explicitly praised by the professors.”
Hannah Todt, multimedia artist in Vienna, Austria ✿
“Angella remains to be a reliable and significant writing peer who is always generous with her required reading tips, submission deadline resources, and editing feedback. She is a tenacious, critical, and sentimental angel with a google doc.”
Cortney Cassidy, writer and artist based in Brooklyn, New York ✿
“In late 2018 I asked Angella to write an accompanying text to augment a solo exhibition of my recent work. What resulted was, rather than an interpretive text around the exhibition or my work in general, was an exegetical essay about a 1933 Betty Boop cartoon that so charmingly illuminated the spirit of the show. Angella gnaws at the edges of her subjects and points at their relationships to other things, bringing her readers to a nuanced and broader perception of that subject. Her writing teaches us to do the same.”
“Angella's writing and editing services are an integral part of my creative process. On numerous occasions Angella has provided me with constructive and empathetic feedback regarding the organizational structure, content, and grammar for press releases, grant proposals, exhibition proposals, and my artist statement. I highly recommend her services.”