Martha McDonald makes performances and installations that feature handcrafted costumes and objects, which she activates through movement and song. She often develops site-specific interventions grounded in deep research into collections, archives, and historic material practices; and in response to the physical site. McDonald has developed work in historic house museums, botanic gardens, a Victorian cemetery, a construction waste recycling facility, and small boat journeying down a river.
Her work has shown internationally at Brotfabrik, Berlin; Linden Centre for Contemporary Arts, Melbourne, Australia; Elizabeth Bay House, Sydney; the Tamworth Textile Triennial, which traveled throughout Australia; and Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museum, Aberdeen, Scotland. Nationally, her work has shown at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, and Evergreen Museum & Library at Johns Hopkins University. Her work is included in Textiles: The Art of Mankind (Thames & Hudson, 2012) by Mary Schoeser. She received an MFA from Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
McDonald lives and works in Philadelphia, PA.
Photo by Jessica Kourkounis
Performance Highlights
The Wood is Singing in Color, Wharton Esherick Museum, Malvern, PA (2023)
Phantom Frequencies, Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center, Milleville, NJ (2019)
Phosphene Songs, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI (2018)
Music for Modernist Shapes: Reimagining Spectodrama, Black Mountain College Museum + Art Center, Asheville, NC (2017)
Marginal Utility, Philadelphia, PA (2018)
Songs of Memory and Forgetting, RAIR (Recycled Artist in Residency) at Revolution Recovery, Philadelphia, PA (2016)
Hospital Hymn: Elegy for Lost Soldiers, Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC (2015)
Shake Out All the Starch and Stiffening, The Fabric Workshop and Museum, Philadelphia, PA (2014)
The Lost Garden, The Woodlands, Philadelphia, PA (2014)
Deep Sea Chanties, The Substation (performance on a boat journeying the Maribyrnong River), Newport, Australia (2012)
The Weeping Dress, Craft Victoria, Melbourne, Australia (2011)
Tamworth Regional Gallery, Tamworth, Australia (2011)
The Further the Distance, the Tighter the Knot, Linden Centre for Contemporary Arts, Melbourne, Australia (2009)
Elizabeth Bay House, Sydney, Australia (2011)
Womenfolk: Songs from the Valley Below, collaborative performance with Catherine Bell, Monash University Faculty of Art & Design Out of Bounds: Art, Faith & Religiosity conference, Melbourne, Australia (2008)
Dress Me Slow, I’m in a Hurry, Evergreen Museum & Library, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD (2007)
Lament, Soft Sites, Institute of Contemporary Art (performance at Bartram’s Garden), Philadelphia, PA (2006)
drown’d in mine own tears, Philadelphia Live Arts Festival (2005)
Prince Music Theater, Philadelphia, PA (2004)
Girls on the Rocks, PS 122, New York, NY (2003)
HERE Art Center, New York, NY (2003)
Brotfabrik, Berlin, Germany (2002)
Theatre of Yugen, San Francisco, CA (2002)
Painted Bride Art Center, Philadelphia, PA (2001)
Petals from the Same Flower, Rosenbach Museum & Library, Philadelphia, PA (2001)
Diva Trouble, HERE Arts Center, New York, NY (2001)
Philly Fringe Festival, Philadelphia, PA (2000)
Solo Exhibitions
Music for Modernist Shapes: Reimagining Spectodrama, Marginal Utility, Philadelphia, PA (2018)
Active Archive: Martha McDonald, Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC (catalogue) (2017)
The Lost Garden, The Woodlands, Philadelphia, PA (2014)
Widow’s Weeds: Performing Absence Through Material Gestures, Monash University Masters Gallery, Melbourne, Australia (2011)
The Weeping Dress, Craft Victoria, Melbourne, Australia (catalogue) (2011)
On life after death, Death Be Kind, Melbourne, Australia (2010)
The Further the Distance, the Tighter the Knot, Linden Centre for Contemporary Arts, Melbourne, Australia (catalogue) (2009)
Lament, Fleisher-Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, PA (2007)
Group Exhibitions
This Mortal Coil, Zuckerman Museum of Art, Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, GA (catalogue) (2021)
Emanation 2019, Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center, Millville, NJ (2019)
RAIR: Filthy Rich—Projects made possible by the waste stream, The Galleries at Moore, Philadelphia, PA (2017)
Kiss of Death: Death and Mourning in the Victorian Era, Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums, Aberdeen, Scotland (2017)
Anguish: The Grave Misgivings of Remembrance, Institute of Contemporary Art, Portland, ME (catalogue) (2016)
RW: Reading & Writing Visual Experience, Hicks Art Center Gallery, Bucks County Community College, Newtown, PA (catalogue) (2014)
Stories from the city, stories from the sea, queer urban tales, The Substation, Newport, Australia (catalogue and 7-inch vinyl record) (2012)
Tamworth Textile Triennial, touring exhibition organized by Tamworth Regional Gallery, Tamworth, NSW, Australia. — Traveled to: Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne, VIC; Goulburn Regional Gallery, Goulburn, NSW; Manning Regional Art Gallery, Taree, NSW; Albury Regional Gallery, Albury, NSW; Broken Hill Regional Gallery, Broken Hill, NSW; Stanthorpe Regional Gallery, Stanthorpe, QLD; Manly Art Gallery and Museum, Manly, NSW; Ararat Regional Gallery, Ararat, VIC (catalogue) (2011-1013)
Knitting the House, Elizabeth Bay House, Sydney, Australia (2011)
Inside/Out: Exploring the Garment, URBNDesign, Philadelphia, PA (2010)
Clothing: Fantasies & Realities, Towson Arts Collective, Towson, MD (2008)
Vanity and Industry, Hicks Art Center Gallery, Newtown, PA (catalogue) (2004)
Awards, Grants, and Residencies
Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, Washington, DC (2024)
Artist-in-Residence, Wharton Esherick Museum, Malvern, PA (2023)
Township 10 Artist Residency, Marshall, NC (2022)
Performing Arts Residency, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI (2018)
Artist-in-Residence, Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC (2017)
Performance Fellow, RAIR (Recycled Artists In Residence), Philadelphia, PA (2015-16)
Identify: Performance Art as Portraiture Residency, Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC (2015)
Leeway Foundation Art and Change Grant (2014)
Artist-in-Residence, The Woodlands, Philadelphia, PA (2013-2014)
Satellite Arts Projects commission of 7-inch vinyl record, Deep Sea Chanties, edition of 200 (2011)
Monash University Graduate Research Scholarship (2009-2011)
Women in Research artist residency, Monash University, Faculty of Art & Design, Melbourne, Australia (2008)
1812 Productions Jilline Ringle Solo Performance Award (2007)
Artist-in-Residence, Evergreen Museum & Library, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD (2007)
Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship: New Performance Forms (2006)
Independence Foundation Fellowship in the Performing Arts (2004)
Artist Residency, The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH (2003)
Artist-in-Residence, Rosenbach Museum & Library, Philadelphia, PA (2001)
Collections
Tamworth Regional Gallery, Tamworth, Australia
State Library of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia
Monash University Library, Artist Book Collection, Melbourne, Australia
Victorian College of the Arts Library, Artist Book Collection, Melbourne, Australia
Museum of American Glass, Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center, Millville, NJ