Maddie May

Maddie May is an interdisciplinary artist in Chicago, IL. Growing up in a turbulent environment, May has lived in 26 houses to date. This near-annual relocation instilled in them an investigative lens into relationships, everyday objects, and the spaces they inhabit. Using uncanny materials and soft visual optics, their practice personifies household items to respond to the ingrained traumas of Midwest lower-class communities. Working between textiles, sculpture, print, scent, and sound, they personify everyday objects to make tangible the quiet emotional experiences left behind in the aftermath of household turmoil. Influenced by ideas of childhood, personal memories are used as a starting point to speak to the forced cycles of trauma, addiction, grief, fear, and violence.