Anya Liftig

Liftig was born in 1977 in Norwalk, Connecticut. Her parents were both public school teachers, although her father was from an upper-middle-class Jewish family and her mother was from Appalachian Kentucky. She cites her annual tradition of spending her school years in Westport and her summers with her extended family in East Kentucky as influences on her artwork.{{Cite web |last=Edmonds |first=Theo |date=2013-02-06 |title=Interview: Anya Liftig (Roots in Kentucky USA) NSFW |url=https://contemporaryperformance.com/2013/02/06/interview-anya-liftig-roots-in-kentucky-usa-nsfw/ |access-date=2023-05-11 |website=Contemporary Performance |language=en-US}}

After graduating from Staples High School in Westport, Connecticut, Liftig enrolled at Yale University. While there, she was a member of the literary fraternity St. Anthony Hall. A member of Morse College, she graduated with a degree in English.{{Cite web |title=Anya Liftig |url=https://www.carnegieprep.com/team/anya-liftig/ |access-date=2023-05-11 |website=Carnegie Prep |language=en-US}}

While a full fellowship student at Georgia State University, Liftig's work shifted from photography to performance pieces. She received a Master of Fine Arts degree from Georgia State University in 2004.{{Cite web |date=November 6, 2017 |title=GSU MFA |url=https://gsuphotodotcom.wordpress.com/tag/gsu-mfa/ |access-date=2023-05-11 |website=GSU Photo, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design |language=en}} Liftig's thesis, self-evidence, was the first live performance art thesis exhibited at GSU.

Before transitioning to performance art, Liftig's early photography work was documented in peer-reviewed academic journals such as Public Culture.{{Cite journal |last=Stewart |first=Kathleen |date=May 1, 2022 |title=Scenes of Life/Kentucky Mountains |url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/public-culture/article-abstract/14/2/349/31694/Scenes-of-Life-Kentucky-Mountains?redirectedFrom=fulltext |journal=Public Culture |volume=14 |issue=2 |pages=349–360 |via=Duke University Press}} Since returning to the New York area in 2005, Liftig has curated and performed at the TATE Modern, MoMA, Center for Performance Research, Panoply Performance Lab, Highways Performance Space, Lapsody4 Finland, [https://performanceart.ca/ FADO Performance Art Centre] in Toronto, Performance Art Institute San Francisco, Queens Museum, Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Rose Art Museum at the University of Kentucky, Grace Exhibition Space, Movement Research at Judson Church, The Kitchen at the Independent Art Fair, Performer Stammtisch Berlin, Performance Space London, Month of Performance Art Berlin, OVADA-Oxford, Joyce Soho, and other venues around the world.{{Cite web |title=Selected CV for Anya Liftig |url=http://www.anyaliftig.com/pagecv |access-date=2023-05-12 |website=Anya Liftig/Love and Trouble |language=en-US}}

After obtaining her MFA from Georgia State University, Liftig exhibited work responding to the history of the South and Atlanta specifically. I'm a Groucho Marxist, exhibited in July 2012, featured Liftig attempting to climb a {{Convert|25|ft|m}} high barricade of reclaimed material covered in peanut butter for three hours, blindfolded and with one hand tied behind her back. She stated, "I want my audience to experience the barricade by seeing me go through it," referring to both internal struggle and political tensions.{{Cite web |last=Lee |first=Minji |date=July 6, 2012 |title=Anya Liftig Presents: "I'm a Groucho Marxist" |url=https://artinoddplaces.org/anya-liftig-presents-im-a-groucho-marxist/ |website=art in odd places}}

In 2010, Liftig responded to artist Marina Abramović's performance, The Artist is Present, at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) with her own work titled The Anxiety of Influence. This was intended as an intervention of Abramović's work, which had the artist sitting silently at a table in the MoMA's lobby across from audience members. Here, Liftig dressed as a doppelgänger of Abramović and remained silently seated across from the artist all day, preventing other audience members from engaging with Abramović.{{Cite web |last=Berg |first=Tatiana |date=March 29, 2010 |title=The Anxiety of Influence |url=https://bombmagazine.org/articles/the-anxiety-of-influence/ |access-date=2023-05-12 |website=BOMB Magazine}}

Active since 2001, Liftig's written work includes both long and short pieces. Her written pieces have been extensively published in chapbooks and literary journals such as Now and Then, The Other Journal, Hippocampus,{{Cite web |last=Liftig |first=Anya |date=2021-03-08 |title=October by Anya Liftig {{!}} Hippocampus Magazine |url=https://hippocampusmagazine.com/2021/03/october-by-anya-liftig/ |access-date=2023-07-09 |language=en-US}} Kindred, and The Chattahoochee Review.{{Cite web |title=Recent writing by Anya Liftig author of the memoir Holler Rat |url=http://www.anyaliftig.com/writing |access-date=2023-05-12 |website=Anya Liftig/Love and Trouble |language=en-US}} Her first book, a memoir entitled Holler Rat, was published by Abrams in August 2023."[https://cdn.ymaws.com/www.stanthonyhall.org/resource/resmgr/reviews/review-2023-sp.pdf Milestones]" (PDF). The Review. St. Anthony Hall (Spring): 18. 2023. The book focuses on how Liftig's upbringing in Appalachian Kentucky and upper-middle-class Connecticut influenced her lifelong path to self-discovery and development as a performing artist.{{Cite web |title=Holler Rat |url=https://store.abramsbooks.com/products/holler-rat |access-date=2023-05-12 |website=Abrams Books |language=en}}

Liftig's visual work has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times Magazine, BOMB, The Wall Street Journal, and Vogue Italia. She has received a Mertz Gilmore Award, the Adrian Van Sinderan Award, and the Franklin Furnace Award. She has had fellowships and residencies at Atlantic Center for the Arts, Casa Tres Patios, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, MacDowell, and Yaddo.{{Cite web |title=Anya Liftig |url=https://www.khncenterforthearts.org/resident/anya-liftig |url-status= |access-date=May 22, 2023 |website=KHN Center for the Arts}}

Liftig's participation in contemporary art is primarily in the form of avant-garde performances and dance exhibited live and as recorded video media.

{{Reflist}}

• [http://anyaliftig.com/ Anya Liftig (official website)]
• [https://vimeo.com/user3513254 Anya Liftig recorded performances]
• [http://hyperallergic.com/197474/the-intimate-art-of-active-reading/ Healey, Dale Megan. "The Intimate Art of Active Reading." Hyperallergic. April 9, 2015.]
• [https://muse.jhu.edu/journals/performing_arts_journal/v037/37.3.liftig.html Liftig, Anya, Mohr, Matthew, and Low, Clarinda Mac in conversation with Andrea Kleine. "Looking at Dancers, Buildings, and People in the Street." PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 37.3 (2015): 65-76.]
• [https://culture.tech/spotlight-subverting-boundaries-anya-liftig/?fbclid=IwAR3iFnP7_tR2XQQ-uxqR0WT8AjWG3IH_boaOGWCItt7YMb6Vr9DrkMWUHTs Liftig, Anya in conversation with Nicholas Cipolla. "Spotlight: Subverting Boundaries." Culture Tech. February 2023.]

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Category:1977 births

Category:Living people

Category:American women artists

Category:Georgia State University alumni

Category:Women performance artists

Category:Yale University alumni

Category:21st-century American women

Category:St. Anthony Hall

Category:People from Connecticut