The Ohio Artist Registry (OAR) is an exciting opportunity for artists to share their work, connect with the creative community, and establish an online presence—all on a free, virtual platform! The OAR encourages artists working in all art forms, throughout Ohio and beyond, to create a profile, which allows them to better promote themselves and their work. Being listed in the OAR provides artists with new opportunities to share their work with clients, galleries, patrons, and audiences. A listing in the OAR does not confer an endorsement, approval, or verification by the Ohio Arts Council.
For more information, contact Kathy Signorino, artist programs director, at kathy.signorino@oac.ohio.gov or 614-728-6140.
2025 Ohio Artist Registry Juried Exhibition
Brooke Stanley
Artist / Designer Brooke Alisz StudioArtColumbus Ohio 43206 United States Home Phone: 614-593-9810 Website: Brooke Alisz Studio
Bio
Brooke Stanley is an artist and designer based in Columbus, Ohio whose work spans traditional fine art and contemporary digital design. Her practice is rooted in observation and human experience, with a background in life drawing, portraiture, still life, and plein air painting. She works across mediums including acrylic, oil, watercolor, graphite, mixed media, and collage.
Stanley earned a BFA in Art & Technology from The Ohio State University, where her focus included 3D fabrication, animation, robotics, and installation art. This period marked a shift into digital exploration, layered onto a foundation of classical training in painting and drawing. She later completed an MA in Visual Communication: Information Graphics & Interactive Design from Ohio University. There, she studied both print and web-based design, including publication layout, information graphics, and user-centered web design.
Her current body of work includes acrylic paintings on mirrors, each piece informed by original poetry and reflective materiality. Alongside her studio practice, Stanley works professionally as a designer, developing websites and graphic design for small and mid-sized businesses. Her approach to both art and design is guided by a consistent interest in emotional experience, user experience, and the exploration of identity.
Artist Statement
For the past several years, I’ve been creating acrylic paintings on found mirrors. These works explore the physical limits of acrylic paint—its quick-drying nature, its resistance to blending—and how those properties challenge the pursuit of realism in painting. I come from a background in life drawing, portraiture, and still life, so painting on mirrors was originally outside my comfort zone. The hard, reflective surface records every stroke without forgiveness. There’s nowhere to hide.
This tension is part of the work. The mirror reflects real life back at the viewer, while the painted form tries—and often fails—to replicate it. The distance between the two becomes the point. I’m interested in the sharpness of that gap, the way it reveals how fragile or slippery identity can feel when you’re caught between seeing yourself and trying to represent yourself.
Each piece begins with a mirror I’ve found—something with shape and presence—and a poem I’ve written during a time of personal or romantic upheaval. I pull shapes from my analog collage practice and use them to sketch figures or forms that echo what I was feeling when I wrote the poem. Many of the figures are loosely human, often woman-like, abstracted but bodily. I use acrylic paint straight onto the glass, sometimes mixing with water or medium to keep parts of the mirror visible. Light passes through certain strokes, catching the reflection underneath.
At its core, my work is about identity. I don’t feel able to make work about anything other than myself. That might be vanity—or maybe it’s just honesty. I’m not convinced I can speak for anyone else. But I do invite the viewer in: to see themselves in the mirror, alongside the painted forms, and to feel something about that tension.