BIOGRAPHY
Melissa Nunez was born and raised in Miami, Florida. Nunez received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Photography at New World School of the Arts and Master’s degree in Creative Photography and Museum Studies at the University of Florida. Nunez is currently working at Santa Fe College as an Adjunct Assistant Professor in Photography. Nunez has displayed her works nationally and internationally from New York, Texas, England, and Rome, Italy.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Within my art practice, I construct imaginary futures from the ruins of the American early twentieth-century industrial revolution. I capture and physically degrade my images of ruined industrial landscapes to an entropic state within its surrounding environment. I evaluate how mass consumerism during this period has influenced degraded environments, initiating us towards the entropocene epoch. When physically degrading my images towards an entropic state, I am challenging the entropocene, the entropic period we are currently living in, to find an alternative pathway, seeking to revive, restructure, or reimagine an unknown future towards the neganthropocene, a way out. Within my images, I manually erase the images with multiple post-processing techniques to capture the ruins in both a subjective and objective approach. Erasing the photographs renders ideas on restoration, openness, and to create an atmospheric charged with demolition and rebuilding. By erasing areas in the images, it is displaying the mourning of the passing of material and visionary reality to set the ruined structure in motion once more. It is restoring the potential possibility of an unrealized and emerging future.
EDUCATION
2020 MFA in Creative Photography, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
2019 MFA Certificate Museum Studies, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
2016 BFA in Creative Photography, New World School of the Arts, Miami, FL
EXHIBITIONS
2020
• Alternative Processes. Soho Photo Gallery, New York, NY
• Separate/Together. Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona, FL
• Time Sensitive. University Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• (Solo show) Arctic Explorer. Reitz Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• Isolation Living Apart. Loosen Art, Rome, Italy
• Art in Isolation. Envision Arts Online Gallery
2019
• A Night of Justice Among the Stars. SFJWJ, Orlando Science Center, Orlando, FL
• (Juried 3rd place award) Cross Sections. MFA Online Exhibition
• Time Bombs. Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH
• Unique Alternative Processes. A. Smith Gallery, Austin, TX
• Emerge. Station House, St. Petersburg, FL
• Exposure. Air Gallery, Manchester, England
• The Lonely Hearts Club. 4Most Gallery, Gainesville, FL
2018
• Student Photography Exhibition. Gary R. Libby Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• Affinity to Water. 4Most Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• Book Arts Showcase. 4Most Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• (Invite only) Artistry. University Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• (Juried, Theil Gallery Award) FACC Juried Arts Exhibition. University Gallery, Gainesville, FL
2016
• Urgent BFA Exhibition. CIFO, Miami, FL
2015
• Rising Stars. New World School of the Arts Gallery, Miami, FL
CURATORIAL PROJECTS
2020
• SA & AH Juried Exhibition. University Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• Women of the Everglades. Florida Natural History Museum, Gainesville, FL
2019
• SA & AH Art Basel Grad Pop-Up Exhibition. The Betsy, Miami, FL
• WARP Final Exhibition. WARP Haus Gallery, Gainesville, FL
• Image: A Pop-Up Photo Show. Art Bash, Gainesville, FL
2016
• A Patch of Blue. Museum of Art and Design, Miami, FL
RESIDENCIES
2017 Bakehouse Art Complex, Miami, FL
AWARDS / FELLOWSHIP / ESSAYS / CONFERENCES
2020
2019
2018
2017-2020
2016
2015