My name is Elena Curcio. I was born and raised in Jersey City, NJ: a sensitive, head-in-the-clouds kid who collected my baby teeth and pretended to be a horse¹. As socializing was not my strong suit, art became an outlet for me early on. I doodled my way through grade school, following along with a Sketch Your Own Monster book or drawing-and-redrawing Xena the Warrior Princess. Clearly, I had found my calling. I went on to seriously study art at The Art Students League, The College of New Jersey, Syracuse University, and The Vermont Carving Studio. I studied figure drawing, oil painting, color theory, conceptual art… all invaluable knowledge that has shaped my artistic voice and technique. But something was missing: where was Xena and where were the monsters?

In my early 20s, I apprenticed for a year and a half with folk artist, Warren Kimble. This is where I began the important journey of unlearning the formality and pressure of my formal art background, and where I began creating the art that I wanted to create². In adulthood, I picked up a new medium, clay, and taught myself to sculpt - beginning, of course, with my own monsters³.

Making art is human. Everyone can do it in the way that makes sense for them. After a lifetime of studying, I find myself most comfortable with making art like that tooth-collecting horse-girl from New Jersey: to cope. <3