Paige Speight lives in Bar Harbor, ME, where she currently works in maintenance. Her art practice often explores vulnerability and non-linear narratives, drawing influence from artists and writers including Lucian Freud, Evelyn Beliveau, Daniel Harms, Madeleine Miller, and Anne Carson. Working primarily in oil paint on canvas, she creates pieces that are both intimate and psychologically resonant.
Speight is a graduate of Bowdoin College and has exhibited in solo and group shows across the United States. Her recent exhibitions include The Artist at Work (2024) at the Robert Lincoln Levy Gallery; Beheld (2024) at Tilton School; and the Museum Art School Faculty Exhibit (2023) at the Vero Beach Museum of Art. Earlier exhibitions include Witness (2022), a dual show with Katherine Errecart at the Robert Lincoln Levy Gallery; Intimacy (2022) at the Shenandoah Valley Art Center in Waynesboro, VA; Village Canoe Exhibition (2019) in Belfast, ME; and 40Under40 (2019) at the Shenandoah Valley Art Center.
Her work has been recognized with several awards and residencies, including the Remy Steevensz Artist Residency (2023) at Tilton School and the Village Canoe Floating Residency (2019) in Belfast, ME. She received the Jean Nagy Award for Excellence in Acrylic or Oil Painting at the Under the Oaks Art Show (2023) in Vero Beach, FL, and was awarded Second Place in Oils and Acrylics at the Fall Foliage Art Show (2018) in Waynesboro, VA.
Speight describes this body of work as follows:
“This body of work interweaves images from Greek mythology and the artist’s own life. Like the original myths, the paintings are larger than life while remaining deeply human. The artist reinterprets themes from the myths through the lens of her emotional life, using the mythic as a vantage point from which to approach the personal and the universal. These pieces speak to love and loss, flaws and perseverance. The paintings stand in discussion with timeless narratives about what it means to be human in the face of death, self-loathing, and heartache.”