Rate My Professor Allison McElroy

Allison McElroy is Professor of Painting and Drawing in the Department of Art and Design at Jacksonville State University, where she joined part-time in 2007 and became full-time faculty in 2008. She earned her Master of Fine Arts in Painting from the Savannah College of Art and Design, including a Graduate Fellowship in 2003 for on-site installation study under Dr. Friedhelm Mennekes in Lacoste, France, where she created the installation "202 Steps" using ochre mined in Roussillon. Her undergraduate degree is a Bachelor of Fine Arts with an individualized program allowing focus on sculpture and painting. McElroy's career at JSU encompasses teaching courses such as Creative Thinking, Painting, Mixed Media, and BioArt through independent study, emphasizing interdisciplinary approaches.

McElroy's research specializations center on ecosystems, natural processes, and materials, employing mixed media, sound recordings, on-site installations, paintings, and drawings with native and everyday elements like soil from all 50 U.S. states, spiderwebs, bark, pine sap, wasp nests, agar, and ochre. She collaborates with microbiologist Dr. Benjie G. Blair on projects analyzing soil samples for diodes and creating 3D agar paintings that merge art and science to address environmental issues. As instructor for JSU's Biodesign Challenge teams, she has guided students to international competitions, exhibitions at Parsons School of Design, and events at the Museum of Modern Art. McElroy developed the "Naturphilia" artist residency at Little River Canyon National Preserve, inviting international artists from programs like Labverde in the Amazon Rainforest to explore Alabama's landscapes, with resulting works exhibited at the Gadsden Museum of Art. Her exhibitions include "Time-keeper" (wasp nest, phone book pages), juror's top pick at the National Association of Women Artists in New York and published in their catalog, and "It will be again" (graphite, coffee stain, micro slides), selected by Cora Rosevear, Associate Curator of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art. She received a faculty research grant to collect soil nationwide for dirt paintings treated with gum arabic and vinegar, and has been accepted to the "Baroque Blue" residency in Italy for earth works. McElroy has earned recognitions for outstanding faculty service and contributions to JSU symposia, exhibitions, and online instruction certification.