Situated at the intersection of feminism, craft, and activism, Ellen Lesperance (b. 1971, Minneapolis, MN; lives and works in Eugene, Oregon) makes work inspired by garments worn by women involved in acts of both empowerment and struggle. Mining an array of source material including protest knitwear of the twentieth and twenty-first century and costumes worn by Amazon warriors as depicted on Ancient Greek pottery, Lesperance looks to clothing embedded with text and pattern reflective of subversive self-expression and feminist symbology. With this vast spectrum of history as a foundation, her paintings on paper, hand-knit sweaters, and terra-cotta sculptures address similar issues that transcend space and time.
She holds a BFA from the University of Washington, Seattle and an MFA from the Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University. Lesperance also attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 1999.
Lesperance has been exhibiting at the Gallery since 2017. She has had solo exhibitions at Hollybush Gardens, London, UK (2024); ICA Miami, Miami (2021); Baltimore Museum of Art, Maryland (2020); and Adams & Ollman, Portland (2019). She has also been in group exhibitions at a number of galleries and institutions including at the Museum Of Modern Art, New York (2025); Wardlaw Museum, St. Andrews, Scotland (2025); Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York (2024); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles (2024); and Hauser & Wirth, New York (2023). Lesperance’s works can be seen in public collections at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth; Baltimore Museum of Art; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Städel Museum, Frankfurt, Germany, among others.