Shelby Louise Baldridge is an interdisciplinary artist based in Missoula, MT.

She recently returned to Missoula after spending some time living in Portland, OR, where she received an MFA in Visual Studies from the Pacific Northwest College of Art.  This graduate school program expanded her art practice from primarily painting into found object sculpture and working with textiles. She still enjoys painting, however, and works across these disciplines.  Regardless of the medium, Shelby’s work centers around scientific themes like biological evolution, ecological cycles and the connections between species. Her upbringing in Montana allowed for ample access to the outdoors and encouraged a curiosity for natural sciences like botany and ecology at a young age. These interests influenced her development as a painter while studying in the BFA program at the University of Montana, and continue to inform her work today. 

Her current work explores the Anthropocene and its implications for the relationship between humans and nonhuman beings. These ideas are depicted through the use of materiality in sculpture: she utilizes highly synthetic, post-consumer waste materials to construct organic forms that mimic living organisms.  This juxtaposition of materials and forms results in associations that complicate the man/nature binary and question commonly held hierarchical viewpoints of the natural world.

Shelby is thrilled to be back in Montana reconnecting to the landscape and communities again!