Meet Alyssa, our 2023 Creative in Residence

The Design Fabrication Zone’s annual Creative in Residence (CiR) program is a 3 month self-directed residency opportunity for ‘making-based creatives’ practising at all stages of their career. The CiR program was established in 2022 with the goal of presenting Toronto-based makers with unconventional programming opportunities that bridge fine arts, craft, and design, with digital fabrication technology.

This year, the Design Fabrication Zone has partnered with the TMU Urban Farm to present the 2023 Creative in Residence program. Our collaborative team is very excited to introduce Alyssa Alikpala as our 2023 Creative in Residence! Over the coming months Alyssa will work with our teams closely to produce an artwork for solo exhibition and steward a community engagement event in response to the residency’s curatorial theme of ‘Decay’. This final work will exhibit on the TMU Urban Farm rooftop in the heart of downtown.

In her approach, the role of permission is examined in obscuring the boundaries of the body and the spaces it occupies. Through a practice of gathering, she considers the embedded cycles and histories of the organic, found, and discarded materials that are used. Her ongoing interventions with wheatpasted grass and other plant matter respond to time, place, and conditions of the built and natural environment and ultimately accept their impermanence. 

Alyssa is currently based in Toronto, Canada and has recently exhibited at Open Studio, Myta Sayo Gallery, Project 107, Gallery TPW (Toronto), and participated internationally in residence at La Napoule Art Foundation (France). Her work has been included in Images Festival, Scotiabank Contact Festival, and publications such as Studio Magazine and Newest Magazine.

Check out some of Alyssa's recent work below!