Contact me at: info@larissashaw.studio
Research bio: (updated 27th June 2024)
This is a simplified version of my academic research, using assessible language. My academic profile is available here: https://www.midlands4cities.ac.uk/student_profile/larissa-shaw/
You are not permitted to use any of my intellectual ideas as your own. Please contact me for permission should you wish to reference any of my work.
AHRC UKRI full-funded PhD researcher.
Supervised by Dr. Sian Vaughan (Director of studies, Birmingham School of Art - Birmingham City University), Dr. Chris Laoutaris (Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham) and Prof. Annalise Weckesser (School of Life and Heath Sciences, Birmingham City University).
NB: When I mention ‘Women’, this term refers to a historical lens of a projected society of gender binary onto those assigned female at birth (AFABs). My research is encompassing of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Queer individuals.
I learned that I am a direct descendant of the last person burned at the stake in the UK. It happened in Lichfield, about 10 miles from where I live, in 1612 and was a man named Edward Wightman, who was burned for heresy (an accused crime that intersects time with and replaced the accused crimes of practicing Witchcraft). I was told this story by an elderly woman who stopped to talk when working on my sister’s front garden in lockdown. A few years later, when researching into my family tree, I found this to be true. The Woman who passed on this knowledge coincidentally turned out to be a distant relative (a cousin of my paternal Grandma). I find it interesting that an oral history can be passed down 400 years without it having been written down to communicate that information. I am interested in that oral history as fact; that oral histories, particuarly Women’s oral histories, that have often been erased or overlooked as legitimate and valid sources of information. Even when documented, women’s narratives were often written as suffering from hysteria, or madness.
This started my interest in the witch trials and the erasure of Women’s knowledge, knowledge of their bodies and histories -- the first Women trialled being generally midwives, community and herbal healers. The erasure of these knowledges gradually evapourated Women’s embodied knowledge through the trials and, at the same time, the professionalisation of the medical industry and the active disqualifying of Women practioners from the 1500s, where dominated patriarchal learning removed Women (labelled ‘Quacks’) from practicing medicine. I am interested in what oral and embodied knowledge was lost and I am interested in a landscape of medicine if the first Women to be burned and hanged were not the midwives and community healers.
In 2022 after becoming suicidal from pain, I finally received a diagnosis of endometriosis 15 years following the first onset of my symptoms. The main symptom being severe daily chronic pain that impacts my ability to function. I began to interrogate the historical tropes that I believe have led to the infamous delays in receiving healthcare for endometriosis, along with the medical gaslighting and psychological iatrogenesis (medical harm) that comes with it.
My research speculates on the European witch trials and diagnoses of female hysteria to interrogate historical narratives that shape current gender disparities in modern accessibility to endometriosis healthcare. My research is situated in a ‘continuum historical feminist lens’ (Federici, 2010, ‘Precarious Labour: A Feminist Viewpoint’), exploring how women’s pain, health autonomy, and access to healthcare is entangled with wider intersections of gender and disability discriminication, amalgamating from the historical tropes where medical thinking was formed.
I am particularly interested in the pathologising of women’s pain throughout history as lasting legacies leading to the current gender pain-gap, and documenting these narratives I find in archival research as what I speculate on being endometriosis (pre-coining of the word in 1925). The art practice I produce from this research are entagled imaginings of textiles, screenprints, and embriodery that document theory, autoethnographic (study of self) and embodied accounts. I often learn new processes that explores the possibility and limits of materials, recently working on ‘Hospital Gown’ (2025-2029, see ‘Research’ section of my website.
My wider interests sit within disability and gender studies, Early Modern history and Women’s oral histories. I am currently training to become a death midwife and I am interested in the realm following Earthly life and between the peripheries of life and death.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><
Old bio: I am interested in ungoverned libraries of knowledge and knowledge [re]production. The work I make aims to playfully document the commons between people and communities as places of sanctuaries, where trust and cooperation is prioritised over competition. I orientate my practice in its own self-governed and self-described ‘non-artist’ prescription, working mostly collaboratively to dilute the solitary nature of being a ‘solo’ artist.
I enjoy exploring many process and materials to illustrate research, navigating personal, trans-generational and socio-historical narratives across whatever materials interest me at that time, tending into learning something new. My work has been presented as installations, webs of [re]imagined engagements surrounding language and knowledge [re]production – which is occasionally [un]written, [un]performed and made [in]visible through relationships and learning, using text and textiles, writing and community.
I prefer collaborating with other artists over being in competition for opportunities (that will probably gravitate towards mediocrity, if not a bit exploitative, at best). I currently work with School of the Damned, Black Hole Club (Vivid Projects, Birmingham), am a co-founder of Matters of Interest (hosted by Big Shop Friday, Milton Keynes), Free House (Digbeth, Birmingham), and Found The Plot (Smethwick allotment project with Sofia Niazi, Sahjan Kooner, Roo Kaur Dhissou and Fred Hubble).
→ CV:
All activity
2026
☼ ‘Bleeding Out’, group exhibition at Seventh Circle, Birmingham. July - August 2026. More info here.
Where Art Meets Health, as part of Healing Arts Birmingham Festival. Birmingham School of Art. June 2026. More info here.
☼ Multistory, ‘The Printing Room: Issue 3’. Nov. 2025 - March 2026. Writing commission. More info here. Published later in 2026.
☼ Eastside Projects, ‘The Exchange, 2026’. Collaborating with Yvonne Tan. More info here.
2025
☼ Eastside Projects, Birmingham UK, ‘Summer Camp’, August 2025. More info here.
☼ Free House X GLOAM. Exhibition at GLOAM, Sheffield. May 2025. More info here.
2023
☼ Co-director of Free House, an artist studios in Birmingham, UK. Other co-directors and studio holders are Kristina Hall, Jaz Morrison, Dinosaur Kilby, Emily Scarrott, Kevin Hunt, Sophie Mackfall and Fred Hubble. May 2023 - current
☼ Zine workshops with MA Contemporary Arts China at Birmingham City University, Feb 2023.
☼ Zine workshops with Ikon Youth Programme (IKON Gallery) and The New Art Gallery Walsall. April - August 2023
2022
☼ School of the Damned 2022, more info here.
☼ Artist in Schools, Co-Map project - Birmingham City University with Erasmus. Schools in UK, Hungary, Germany, Spain and Portugal. 04/22 - 07/22.
☼ British Art Show 9_ Artist in Schools, with Wolverhampton Art Gallery and University of Wolverhampton_ artists also include Thomas Eke and Joanna Fursman. 09/21 - 03/22
☼ British Art Show 9_ School of the Underkraft (Mark Essen), Artist Activity Sheets, with Sahjan Kooner, Thomas Eke, Joanna Fursman & Sophie Huckfield. 12/21 - 04/22. More info here.
2021
☼ Welcome to New Earth (ARC _ Artist Rehab Club, with Roo Kaur Dhissou). 6/12/21 at Vivid Projects with Black Hole Club. 6/12/21 + More info here.
☼ Show up_ exhibition with Sofia Niazi, Sahjan Kooner, Roo Kaur Dhissou & Fred Hubble at Oldbury Allotment. 18/09/21.
☼ Art Workers Between Self Organising and Collectivity -- Pooleyville article, written with Thomas Eke, Lucie MacGregor and Emily Roderick as Matters of Interest. Published 14/07. Readable here.
☼ Every Woman Biennial London, The Copeland Gallery London. Opening 1/07/21. More info here.
☼ DOOM (Turn Away from the Sun). Vivid Projects, Birmingham UK, 06/2021. More info here.
☼ IKON for Artists: Art Sale. Birmingham UK. 17/05 - 1/06. More info here.
☼ Ping Pong: IKON Youth Programme (IYP) workshops with Black Hole Club, publication. 02-06/21. More info here.
☼ Stryx International at Lab 155, Bologna, Italy. 03/21 - 04/21 (international residency)
☼ Black Hole Club Member 2021/2022, Vivid Projects, March 2021 - Current. More info available here.
☼ PASTE UP, Billboard poster outside Cheap Cheap Gallery, Cheapside Birmingham. 03/21. More info here.
☼ a-n 40th anniversary newsletter, writing commission, published 14/01/21. Readable here. (collaborative publication with Black Hole Club)
2020
☼ It Gets Lighter From Here, Black Hole Club collaborative commission from Vivid Projects. Viewable here. 21/12/20 (collaborative video work) ☼ Archive, Exchange, and Process in Pandemic, collaborative text with Leanne O’Connor, published by Critical Art Review 27/10/20. Readable here. (collaborative publication)
☼ Unavoidable, Online MA Show. 01/09/20 - 01/09/21. Viewable here.
☼ Peep at Stryx, home residency online with Stryx Gallery, Birmingham. Nov 2020. More info here.
☼ Artist in Schools with IKON Gallery, Brindley Place Birmingham, and Bromley Pensnett Primary School, Dudley. (Programme & exhibition at IKON) Postponed due to Covid-19 until 06/21.
☼ Mayday reader, collaborative publication with Black Hole Club, May 2020. Readable here. (collaborative publication)
☼ Black Hole Club Member 2020, Vivid Projects, March 2020 - March 2021 More info available here.
2019
☼ Art Licks Weekend 2019 London, DKUK, The Old Police Station Deptford, 4Cose & 1C Enterprise. 20th Oct. 201. (group exhibition with Grand Union group GU WOMXN). More info available here.
☼ Coventry Biennial 2019, The Row. 4/10/19 - 28/01/20. More info available here. (biennial exhibition)
☼ PLAY, Stryx, Birmingham 6/09 - 4/10/2019. More info available here. (group exhibition)
☼ Masters of Something. 09/2019 - current. (Programme of artist group of 15 participants, working towards alternative education) More info available here.
☼ Black Hole Club 2019 with Vivid Projects_ 02/2019 - 01/2020 (fellowship)
☼ Random String 2018 with Ludic Rooms_ 11/2018 - 04/2019. More info available here. (fellowship)
☼ Forward: New Art from Birmingham, IKON Birmingham, 26 -31/03/19 More info available here. (group exhibition)
☼ Forward: New Art from Birmingham, Medicine Bakery & Gallery (IKON) Birmingham 23/01 - 24/03/19 (group exhibition)
2018
☼ WIP Stryx, Minverva Works Birmingham. 2 - 10/11/18. More info available here. (Group exhibition)
☼ New Art West Midlands 2018, Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery 13/02 - 13/05. More info here. (group exhibition)
☼ National Trust/New Art West Midlands residency_ 02/2018 - 02/2019 More info here. (Residency)
☼ Grand Union residency_08/2017 - 08/2018 More info here.
2017
☼ IKON prize_ 07/17
Press / news
2021
→ Vivid Projects, Black Hole Club
2020
→ Castlefield Gallery, Manchester
→ Radical Art Review
→ Birmingham Institute of Creative Arts (BCU)
2019
→ ArtLicks, London
→ IKON Gallery, Birmingham
→ ArtRabbit (as Black Hole Club, Vivid Projects)
→ ArtRabbit (Stryx, Birmingham)
→ a-n, London
→ Stryx, Birmingham
→ Contemporary Lynx
2018
→ CVAN, Contemporary Visual Artist Network
→ I Choose Birmingham
→ New Art West Midlands
→ What’s on Birmingham
→ Artefact, Birmingham
2017
→ Esthesis.org
→ D-Luxe Magazine
Education
2025 - 2029
☼ PhD AHRC UKRI full funded_ Supervisons from University of Birmingham, University of Nottingham and Birmingham City University, UK.
2024
☼ PGCHE (PGCertHE)_ Falmouth University, UK
2018 - 2020
☼ MA Arts and Education Practices (PT)_ Birmingham School of Art, UK
☼ Public Art and Pedagogy_ Art of the MooC, Duke University (North Carolina, US)
☼ PGCE Post Compulsory Education_ Birmingham City University, UK
2014 - 2017
☼ BA (Hons) Art & Design_ Birmingham School of Art, UK
2013
☼ FDA Art & Design _ Bournville School of Art, UK
Employment
☼ Visiting Lecturer at Birmingham School of Art. 2017 - current.
☼ Freelance Art Handler. 2015 - current. Here is my LinkedIn.