Get to Know: Alexis Hunter

The feeling of being picked last for a team in gym class.

Of deciding where on Earth you should sit in the cafeteria.

Of always feeling like an outsider, never “enough” of something for any group.

BINARY (Last to Be Picked), a painting by Alexis Hunter on display at ArtUs Co. Image via the artist’s website, https://alexishunter.work/

Alexis Hunter originally felt the need to make art embodying the biracial experience because she was not seeing much conversation about it in the contemporary art world. 

“I feel like I have started a good thing,” Hunter says. “And like, a lot of biracial people feel alone. I don’t know too many, especially half-black, half-white, so it’s just kind of navigating this weird space feeling unwanted sometimes. Like, ‘Who am I? What even am I?’”

Hunter, ArtUs Co’s current featured solo exhibition artist, not only captures this feeling in her show, BINARY: An Exploration of the In-Between, but goes one step further by putting the viewer in that exact position.

“I’ve always wanted to be able to express what it’s like to be biracial through art,” Hunter says, “but I didn’t ever actually take the time to sit down and think about it.”

After brainstorming for a while, Hunter shot up out of bed with the realization that the feeling she had been trying to pinpoint was being chosen last for a team in gym class.

“No one has picked you the whole time, and more people are leaving to go to the teams, and over time you just get more and more nervous, and then you’re like, ‘I’m the last f------ one.’” 

From there, it did not take Hunter long to figure out how to execute this feeling.

Hunter in her home studio. Photo courtesy of Hunter.

“I really like brightly colored underpaintings to show through in my paintings,” Hunter says of her style for this series. “I’ll do neon-ish colors, and my figures are all completely silhouetted to communicate that that’s how these cultures kind of look to me because I don’t completely understand what it’s like to belong to them, so I wanted these ghostly, mysterious, intimidating figures to represent black and white cultures.”

The highly saturated colors juxtaposed by the shadowy, haunting figures makes for a deliciously uncomfortable experience for anyone who takes a look at Hunter’s work. However, the biggest reward for her comes when a piece resonates with a viewer as much as it does with Hunter.

“It’s so satisfying whenever you have an intention with something, and it does come across and viewers do understand, especially a biracial viewer,” Hunter explains. “I’m trying to really push those, like, tension feelings, too. I also feel a need to hurry up and ‘be chosen’ or ‘be claimed.’ So, I’m doing a wall of clocks… I want the clocks to be ticking at the same time next to this painting that has a clock in it. It has this scene of a café scene, and the viewer walks in, and everyone in the café is turning around looking at them, and it’s [as though they are being asked], ‘Where are you going to sit amongst these cultures?’”

Before getting her start in art, her parents “did the classic thing” of putting Hunter in as many sports as possible to see if she excelled at any in particular. Instead, Hunter was miserable. That is, until she finally quit all those sports teams, and her parents bought her an easel.

Hunter doing some panel building. Photo courtesy of Hunter’s Instagram, @m00n_daddy.

“I was not having fun,” laughs Hunter, reminiscing on her athletic childhood days. “But then they bought me an easel and some art supplies… I think the first thing I ever drew was a Mickey Mouse.”

From there, Hunter took art classes in high school before starting at Austin Community College (ACC) in 2011. Hunter left not long after and applied to interior design jobs without much luck.

“I wanted to be an interior designer,” Hunter says. “I really love interior design, and I put in applications at so many places... and no one called me, except for Crate & Barrel for, like, one interview, and then they didn’t follow up.” Eventually, Hunter decided to give school another try.

“I went back in 2017, and I tried.” Hunter laughs. “I was like, ‘Funny concept: what if I just tried, like a little bit, I guess?’ And I did, and I’ve gotten straight A’s ever since,” excluding one unfortunate ceramics class, she adds with some annoyance.

Hunter has some lofty ideas for her future, such as moving out of Texas, pursuing a Master of Fine Arts from an ivy league university, and possibly being featured in large, well-known galleries and museums someday. But for the time being, Hunter is most looking forward to graduating from Texas State University next May.

“There’s this tradition at Texas State where you jump in the river right after you graduate,” Hunter explains, “so I’m definitely doing that. I feel like I’m going to cry the whole time because I never thought that I would ever get a bachelor’s degree.”

This past summer was a rough one for Hunter. Before ArtUs Co’s gallery curator, Maggie Lyon, who was a fellow studio art student at Texas State with Hunter, reached out about a possible solo exhibition, Hunter had gone through five back-to-back rejections and was beginning to feel depression creeping in.

“It was, like, a summer of darkness,” Hunter reflects. “Then I got one opportunity and they all came rolling in.”

Now, Hunter is busier than ever, balancing classes, working on her thesis, and several various exhibitions around the Austin area, including a feature in a Black history museum during Austin Studio Tour in November—a dream of Hunter’s.

Hunter at the opening reception for BINARY (An Exploration of the In-Between). Photo by Maggie Lyon.

“I'm just so grateful to Maggie for giving me the opportunity and seeing the vision,” Hunter says, glowing with warmth, “and I’m just so happy for her that she’s a curator over there and that she’s able to do this for fellow artists.”

Even with a full schedule, Hunter is doing her best to soak it all in and remember how far she has come.

“I never imagined myself going to university or graduating from ACC or getting A’s or any of this s---,” Hunter says. “It’s always been my dream to go to art school and just take whatever art classes I wanted to and just experiment and have fun, and I’ve just been so grateful to be there since day one. And whenever I walk around campus, I’m just like, ‘You did it, b----!’”

You did do it, Alexis! Congratulations, and we are so happy to have you in our gallery this month!

Written by Kaiti Neuman.

Hunter with her dog, Zero. “He’s my art assistant,” Hunter says. Photo courtesy of Hunter’s Instagram, @m00n_daddy.