Julie Alpert is a Seattle-based installation artist originally from Silver Spring, MD. She earned a BA from the University of Maryland and an MFA from the University of Washington, both in painting and drawing. She has received grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Artist Trust, and Oklahoma Visual Art Coalition. Julie has participated in artist residencies across the US including two MacDowell fellowships, Roswell Artist in Residence Program, Tulsa Artist Fellowship, VCCA, and I-Park Foundation. Her work is in the collections of the Anderson Museum, Facebook Seattle, Ledger Bentonville, Seattle Public Utilities, King County, and the Washington State Art Collection. She recently exhibited “Strange Magic,” a new site-specific installation at San Luis Obispo Museum of Art, and is currently fabricating a major public art commission for SeaTac Airport, opening this fall in Alaska Airlines baggage claim. In April and May of 2025, Julie will be the Understory Artist-in-Residence at the Amazon Spheres. She is married to the artist Andy Arkley and they have three cats: Coconut, Koala, and Baby Cloud. Julie is represented by J. Rinehart Gallery in Seattle.

I make exuberant site-specific installations using ordinary arts and crafts supplies, hardware store materials, and modified household objects. In a single three-dimensional scene akin to a stage set, I subconsciously explore things like my 1980s suburban Maryland girlhood, the comfort and monotony of routine, the distance between our realities and expectations, and the nostalgia we imbue our collectibles with. My intention is to spark delight, curiosity and wonder, feelings that come naturally to us as children, but ones we have to work hard to cultivate as adults.

In between labor-intensive installations I use a stream-of-consciousness process to make lots of drawings and collages. These smaller pieces enable me to work out color, texture and shape that I eventually bring into the large-scale work. Coloring, cutting and gluing is my favorite way to connect with the world and to myself.

Anderson Museum of Contemporary Art, Roswell, NM
Facebook, Seattle, WA
Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Pullman, WA
Ledger Coworking, Bentonville, AR
King County Public Art Collection, Seattle, WA
Kunst Rijnstate, Arnhem, NL
Office of Arts and Culture, Seattle Public Utilities Portable Works Collection, Seattle, WA Port of Seattle, SeaTac Airport Commission, WA (scheduled for 2025)
Tulsa Artist Fellowship, Tulsa, OK
University of Utrecht, Utrecht, NL
Washington State Arts Commission, North Hill Elementary, Des Moines, WA
Private collections across the US