About Alisha

b. 1979, New York

Alisha Sickler Brunelli is a multidisciplinary artist, designer and educator living in upstate New York.

Artist Statement:

As a multidisciplinary artist, my work navigates the tension between urgency and stillness in a world increasingly shaped by digital saturation. Material presence plays a central role in my practice—found imagery, layered surfaces, and intuitive mark making become sites of both resistance and revelation. Shapes emerge as portals or thresholds, while edges act as liminal zones—suggesting instability, multiplicity, and the potential for reorientation. This engagement is informed not only by the tactile inheritance of my blue-collar upbringing in the 80s and 90s, where labor and making were inseparable, but also by a meditation practice that cultivates stillness, awareness, and attention to the present moment. Through process, I explore how meaning can arise not from concept alone, but from the physical, sensory, and contemplative dimensions of practice itself.

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Brunelli’s work has been exhibited in Hiroshima, Japan; Gallery Ondo, Seoul, Korea; the Brooklyn Art Cluster Gallery, Brooklyn, NY; the Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY; the Arnot Art Museum, Elmira, NY; Spool Contemporary Art Space, Johnson City, NY, among others. As a commercial artist, she has completed various projects, from illustration to layout and identity. She curates catalogs and exhibition typography for Anthony Brunelli Fine Arts. of Binghamton, New York.

Brunelli’s research in alternative and expanded visual arts education led to the creation of KAPOW! Art Studio, a community art school that served the Southern Tier Region of Upstate, NY, from 2014 to 2021. In 2022, she was awarded a teaching artist grant through NYSCA/NY Arts in Education Roundtable, Empire Creates. She recently was a semi-finalist in the 2023 NYSCA Artist Fellowship in the Printmaking/Drawing/BookArts category.

Brunelli teaches drawing, design, and studio practice in the Art & Design department at Binghamton University, Binghamton, New York (2015 - present).

• MS Ed. | Focus on developmental wellness in visual arts education, Elmira College

• BFA | Printmaking, Binghamton University

• NYS Teaching Certification |. Visual Arts K-12

For fun, Alisha likes to make kimchi and read about past life regression. She practices Transcendental Meditation every day.

Researchers, creators, and authors that inspire and inform me - in no particular order/ genre /time period (list is evolving)…

Carl Jung (analytical psychology), Joseph Chilton Pearce (human development), David R. Hawkins, M.D., PhD. (human consciousness), Thich Nhat Hanh (Buddhist monk, activist), Carol Dweck (growth mindset), Betty Edwards (neuroscience in drawing), Abraham Maslow (hierarchy of needs), John Archibald Wheeler (quantum physics), Arnold Mindell (transpersonal psychcology), Jacob Liberman (sight) , Paul Levy (quantum psychology), John Sarno (mind-body medicine), Rumi (Sufi mystic/poet), Josef Albers (design), Anni Albers (design), Kiki Smith (artist - human/nature), Louise Bougeois (artist - female identity), Wangechi Mutu (artist - gender, sexuality, identity), Joseph Beuys (artist/teacher - humanism/sociology), James Hollis, Ph D. (Jungian psychology), Rupert Sheldrake (morphic resonance), Masaru Emoto (water & human consciousness), John Dewey (philosophy, psychology, education reform), . . .

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