Aespyne Alix | Resident
Aespyne Alix is a Tulsa, Oklahoma-born contemporary artist based in Chicago. As a child, Alix was deeply shaped by her parents’ friendship with the late American Abstract painter Norman Lewis’ wife, Ouida. Aespyne spent summers admiring the artist’s old sketchbooks and abstract paintings hanging in his wife's Oklahoma residence. This profoundly influenced Aespyne’s love of art at an early age and also provided comfort for anxiety.
"Each color has a feeling to me, and when I can create a feeling on canvas, it eases that feeling in both a physical and emotional sense for me. I’m calm." Creating art became a way to relax the mind.
Alix has held exhibitions and artist salons focused on mental health advocacy and awareness in communities of color. She has collaborated with Lucy Ford and other artists in exhibitions at SXSW and Art Basel. Aespyne has been featured in Bougie Art Gallery’s Abstract Art Now magazine, which highlights current and up-and-coming abstract artists.
She has also been a guest speaker at Indiana University South Bend and Her Art, a night dedicated to women of color in South Bend, Indiana. Alix spent time in Barcelona, Spain, under the RARO Residency, exhibiting internationally at Exposición Colectiva in 2021.
Upon returning to the U.S., Alix exhibited her second solo show in downtown Chicago, BLVK, in February 2022 on Michigan Avenue. Her 2022 collection, The Color Healing, features portraits of community members affected by trauma during the pandemic and their personal journeys to healing, using multimedia and journaling interviews.
Alix held Open Studios at the Arts Letters and Numbers Residency in Albany, New York, during the summer of 2023. In May 2024, she collaborated with Ensemble in Process: Ensemble in Visual Motion at Epiphany Arts, showcasing musical works inspired by her painting Red Summer.
This July, Aespyne will complete her fifth residency in France at Château Orquevaux. She continues to build her community by teaching 11th and 12th grade Art on Chicago’s North Side, working with students from all 47 districts, and offering courses in traditional drawing and fashion design.
As a teacher, Alix creates and implements an art curriculum that addresses both academic and social-emotional needs in underserved communities.