Ann Shelton (b. 1967, Pākehā/Italian) received her MFA from the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada and identifies as queer. Shelton lives in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand and exhibits internationally. The first of her several solo exhibitions in the United States was at Denny Gallery in 2019. Shelton’s recent body of work, jane says, has been exhibited internationally and the accompanying performance The physical garden, has been performed numerous times. Her museum survey, Dark Matter, curated by Zara Stanhope (Director, Govett-Brewster Art Gallery) was hosted by Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki in 2016 and toured to Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū in 2017. The catalogue accompanying the exhibition included essays by Abigail Solomon-Godeau, Ulrich Bauer, Donna West Brett, Dorita Hannah and John Di Stefano, and Stanhope.
Shelton’s work engages with questions around the disciplined body, and how that discipline is organised around gender, sexuality, misogyny, medicine, food, or crime. Her most recent research engages with plant knowledge and the impacts of plants on the body, particularly their history relating to the re-construction of the role of women in Western Society since the witch hunts in early modern Europe, the role of plants historically in reproductive contexts, in relation to contemporary feminisms and the current climate emergency.
Shelton’s work has been extensively reviewed in publications including Artforum, Hyperallergic, artnet news, and Evergreen Review. Shelton is represented in New York by Over/Under Fine Art, and in Aotearoa New Zealand by Two Rooms. Her work is collected in public and private contexts throughout Aotearoa, Australia, and North America.
Shelton presented her third solo exhibition i am an old phenomenon at Denny Gallery in November 2022. Shelton’s exhibition worm, root, wort… & bane at Alice Austen House in March 2024 is her first institutional solo exhibition in the United States.
Shelton is Honorary Research Fellow in Photography at Whiti o Rehua, School of Art, Massey University, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa.
Shelton is represented by Over/Under Fine Art in New York, and Two Rooms in Aotearoa.