Audrey Stirling (BFA 2023 Integrated Studio Arts) is one of two 2024-2025 Iowa State University alumni artists-in-residence at Mainframe Studios in Des Moines. Offered through a partnership between the Department of Art and Visual Culture and Mainframe Studios, the year-long residencies provide studio space to recent graduates of the BFA or MFA programs who are selected by art and visual culture faculty through an application process. Join Stirling for this artist talk about her experiences during the residency program!

Stirling has worked with metal for eight years, creating jewelry and small sculptures. She graduated with a BFA in integrated studio arts from Iowa State in 2023. As a student, she was awarded two Focus Grants for creative projects outside the classroom, served as a teaching assistant for three semesters for the Introduction to Metals class, and worked one semester as a research assistant in metals. She received the 2023 Janice Peterson Anderson Medallion Award in Design, which is presented annually to an outstanding graduating senior in graphic design, interior design or integrated studio arts who shows the greatest potential for distinguished work in design.

Stirling has exhibited and sold her work at art shows and festivals over the past four years. She was juried into the Des Moines Art Festival as an emerging artist for the past two years and won first prize in the Iowa State Fair Fine Jewelry Competition in 2022 and 2023.

Stirling will exhibit her work concurrently with fellow artist-in-residence Isabel Wilson (BFA 2024 Integrated Studio Arts) from March 7–25 (reception from 5–8 p.m. March 7) in the third-floor gallery at Mainframe Studios. Stirling’s show, “Small Wonders: An Exhibition Celebrating Insects,” will feature work exploring the impact that insects have on humans and our environment. Using a variety of traditional metalsmithing processes, the objects she creates celebrate and honor insects for the roles they play and their contributions to human society. She intends for her work to influence the way people think about insects and to cultivate positive relationships between humans and insects.