Whalen, Alissa

Alissa Whalen was born in Toronto, Ontario. Between 1983 and 1991, she studied pottery, wheel throwing and hand-building, part-time in Pickering, Ontario. Her main body of work developed into uniquely carved designed functional tableware, a variety of garden art, planters and indoor wall art. During 1998 to 2013, Whalen participated in numerous outdoor and indoor art shows and displayed her work on artist studio tours and in co-op art galleries in Southern Ontario. Whalen transitioned to working with acrylic paint in 2014. She studied with Martha Johnson and Kathryn Bemrose in Toronto, Ontario, concentrating on impressionistic themed paintings. Between 2018 and 2021, she showed her work at several galleries in Northern Ontario. In 2022-23, Whalen moved towards abstract expressionism and mixed media artwork. In May, 2024 Whalen participated and showed her abstract art in “A Matter of Time” for emerging artists, presented in Dartmouth, NS. Whalen has participated in the Pre-Shrunk 2025 and 2026 shows curated by Argyle Fine Art and currently has work displayed at the Teichert Gallery in Halifax, NS

ARTIST STATEMENT

I am a visual artist working primarily in abstract expressionism. When I paint, I react to what is happening immediately on the surface of my work. I experiment by making intuitive decisions in the moment. I enjoy building layers of mixed media, acrylic paint, sometimes collage or ink, adding various marks with water-soluble crayons and pencils. I add and remove paint, scrape and dab, spontaneously creating a history of textures, resulting in a rich visual surface.

I am drawn towards working with both hands: making, tearing, gluing, painting, scraping, etc. I am a former potter, and thus the physicality of creating using both arms, hands and all digits comes naturally and instinctively. I aspire to paint larger canvases to further experience the freedom of dual-hand mark making and painting.