Bio
Alison O’Neill is a video artist who makes non-narrative, experimental moving image works. Her current work examines how space can both construct and constrain the female subject. Underpinned by theoretical ideas of female subjectivity and the female imaginary, the work explores the formal, and often abstract, beauty of the ordinary and the everyday. This mundane beauty becomes the catalyst for an escape route into an imaginary world.
Earlier video work explored the maternal experience within the context of power relations as well as visualising maternal subjectivity, longing and desire. This body of work included the videos Puntures and (S)mother which were both shortlisted for the Birth Rites Collection Prize.
Alison lives and works in Cambridge, UK. She trained in Fine Art at Falmouth College of Art in Cornwall and gained her MA in Feminist Theory and Practice in the Visual Arts from the University of Leeds, where she studied under the feminist art historian Griselda Pollock.
Recent exhibitions and screenings include Bridge Video, Chicago (2023), Artist-Parent Pandemic Video and New Genres at the CAA Annual Conference, New York (2021), Open Out at The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh (2019), The Birth Rites Collection Shortlist Screenings at The Whitworth Gallery, Manchester and King's College London (2018), The Art of Surrender at The Stills Centre for Photography, Edinburgh (2018) and Quickening at The Nightingale Cinema, Chicago (2017).
From 2024-2025 Alison’s work was supported with DYCP funding from Arts Council England.
Education
PGCE Art and Design, University of Cambridge
MA Feminist Theory and Practice in the Visual Arts, University of Leeds
BA (Hons) Fine Art, Falmouth College of Arts
Awards/Prizes
2024-25 DYCP Award, Arts Council England
2023 Oppenheim-John Downes Memorial Trust Award
2020 a-n Professional Development Mentoring Bursary
2019 Oppenheim-John Downes Memorial Trust Award
2017 Birth Rites Collection Prize Shortlist
2017 Sketch Open Drawing Prize Shortlist
2015 Birth Rites Collection Prize Shortlist
Selected Recent Screenings
2023 Bridge Video, Chicago, USA
2021 Artist-Parent Pandemic Video and New Genres, CAA Annual Conference, New York, USA
2018 The Art of Surrender: Motherhood and Moving Image, Stills Centre for Photography, Edinburgh, UK
2018 Birth Rites Collection Prize: Shortlist Screening, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, UK
2018 Birth Rites Collection Prize: Shortlist Screening, Kings College, London
2017 Quickening, Curated by Extended Practice, Nightingale Cinema, Chicago, USA
2016 Brood Film Festival, Exeter Phoenix, Devon, UK
2015 Birth Rites Collection Competition: shortlisted artworks - MediaCityUK, Salford, UK
Selected Recent Exhibitions
2024 SFSA Drawing Open, No Format Gallery, London, UK
2023 Viloma, Royal Free Hospital, London, UK
2023 SFSA Drawing Open, No Format Gallery, London, UK
2023 Unconsumed, The Shoe Factory Social Club, Norwich, UK
2023 Viloma, Citizens Art Gallery, London, UK
2021 Shutterhub Open, Cafe Gallery, St Margaret's House, London, UK
2020 Homeworks, Spilt Milk Gallery, Edinburgh (Online) UK
2020 Time to Think (Encore), Pil'ours festival, St Gilles Croix de Vie France
2019 Acropolis Remix, The Wrong Biennale, Athens and online
2019 Home, Gallery at Home, Usk, Wales, UK
2019 Time to Think, Pil'ours festival, St Gilles Croix de Vie, France
2019 Open Out, The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2019 Oh MotHER, Spilt Milk Gallery, Custom House Leith, Edinburgh, UK
2018 The Art of Relation, Cambridge Artworks, Cambridge, UK
2017 Nasty Women London, The Black and White Building, London, UK
2017 Sketch Open Drawing Prize, Rabley Drawing Centre, Marlborough, UK
2017 Nasty Women Cambridge, Cambridge Artworks, UK
2017 Sketch Open Drawing Prize, Peter Scott Gallery Lancaster, UK
2017 Desperate Artwives: 5th Edition, Granby Space, London, UK
2017 Sketch Open Drawing Prize, Plymouth College of Arts, Plymouth, UK
2017 Sketch Open Drawing Prize, Black Swan Arts, Frome, UK
2016 Object, Object, Alison Richard’s Building, University of Cambridge, UK
2015 Project AfterBirth, White Moose Gallery, Devon, UK
2015 ProCreate Project Launch, Women's Art Library, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK
2015 One For Sorrow, Arts Centre Gallery, North Hertfordshire College, UK
2014 Residents Artists Exhibition, Arts Centre Gallery, North Hertfordshire College, UK
2012 We did not dream, Open Studio, Cambridge School of Art Residency, Cambridge, UK
2011 Follow the Fellow, Changing Spaces, Regent Street, Cambridge, UK
Curatorial Projects
2017 Lass Struggle (Exhibition and screening programme) FiliArt at Filia Conference Institute of Education, London, UK (Co-curator)
Residencies
2018 Digital Artist Residency http://digitalartistresidency.org/
2016-2018 Associate Artist at DIEP (Digital Institute for Early Parenthood)
2014-2015 AA2A Artist in Residence, Arts Centre, North Hertfordshire College
2011-2012 AA2A Artist in Residence at Cambridge School of Art, Anglia Ruskin University
Publications/ Catalogues/ Conference Papers
2019 O'Neill A and Paul J, One for Sorrow: the collaborative work of mother and not-yet mother in The Maternal in Creative Work: Intergenerational Discussions on Motherhood and Art Ed. Elena Marchevska and Valerie Walkerdine. Routledge (Book Chapter)
2017 Lass Struggle, FiliArt (Exhibition Catalogue)
2017 SKETCH Open Drawing Prize, Rabley Publications (Exhibition Catalogue)
2016 Art History and the Objectification of Women, Objectification and Gendered Violence Symposium, Crassh, University of Cambridge (Conference Paper)
2015 Mother and Child Divided, Thatcher, J, in Art Monthly, July/Aug 2015 (Review)
2015 Imaginary Children, Motherhood and Creative Practice: Maternal Structures in Creative Work, London Southbank University (Conference Paper)
