ALEXANDRIA WITTMANN
Alexandria (Allie) Wittmann is an interdisciplinary artist whose work explores perceptual awareness through material, color, and light. Her practice responds to the shifting qualities of sunlight, the physical properties of materials, and the presence of the viewer, allowing each work to evolve in relation to its environment. These elements create moments of visual and spatial tension that invite viewers to slow down, observe, and become aware of their position within the space they inhabit.
Wittmann’s sculptural installations function as interactive, contemplative environment. They are spaces that encourage pause, reflection, and engagement. Her work has been described as “perceptual devices that are compositionally and passionately connected to the landscape of the outside world, while also capturing the movement of those who pass through.” Grounded in research on how humans are influenced by their surroundings, her practice investigates how awareness is shaped through sensory experience, emphasizing the relationship between body, space, and environment. Through this exploration, each installation becomes an invitation to breathe, reflect, and reconnect with the world around us.
Wittmann grew up in a small rural town just south of Madison, Wisconsin. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Humanistic Studies from the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse in 2020 before relocating to Portland, Maine to pursue her Master of Fine Arts in Applied Studio Art. She graduated in Spring 2022 and currently lives and works in Portland, Maine, where she is employed at Maine College of Art & Design.
→ About
Ongoing Research…
Whether natural or artificial, light operates as a critical mediating force that draws viewers into and through a given space. The deliberate manipulation of light directly shapes perception, while materiality functions as a structural and conceptual support in generating visual attention and spatial awareness. Natural light, with its inherent variability, often serves as a potent referent for temporality and movement, marking the passage of time through subtle shifts in intensity and direction. Artificial light, by contrast, offers the capacity for sustained control and dramatization, allowing for the construction of atmospheric environments and the amplification of conceptual narratives through illumination.
My research is anchored in an ongoing investigation of space, with a growing emphasis on how human bodies encounter, navigate, and negotiate architectural components. Drawing from a background in traditional printmaking, I approach spatial construction through processes of layering, accumulation, and surface interaction. These two-dimensional strategies inform the development of sculptural and installation-based works that prioritize human scale, sensory engagement, and perceptual awareness. While the direction of my research remains intentionally fluid, it is consistently grounded in a sustained interest in human experience, cultural systems, and the ways in which environments, both built and ephemeral, shape perception and meaning
2023 Project
Cast shadows need an applicable material from which to be casted and architecture can play a large role in materiality when removing a centered object. Windows, for example, are a transparent material that consist of melted sand held together by structural components. Natural light can be cast through this transparent material but does not become a cast shadow unless architecture is recognized and a transparent material is applied. Structural components are important for material, light source, and intentionality. Color is the tool to create playfulness in the formless.
Photo taken by Joel Tsui