Monumental, Gaudy, and Full of Hot Air: Claire Ashley on Inflatable Art

By Kevin Murphy Wilson • Photos Provided

According to her website bio, Scottish-born, Chicago-based artist Claire Ashley “mines the language of painterly abstraction, monumental sculpture, and slapstick humor to investigate inflatables as painting, sculpture, installation, and performance costume.” We recently caught up with Ashley during a visit to Louisville to talk about the artists who have inspired her—including local legend Sam Gilliam, her work with students at Kentucky College of Art + Design, and the creative path that led her to become one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary visual art.

VOICE-TRIBUNE: Can you tell us a bit about your background, education, and experience?

Claire Ashley: “I think there are a few key pieces of biographical information that might help readers understand my pathway as an artist. I am from Edinburgh, Scotland where I came of age in the 1980s immersed in the fluorescent palette of pop culture and synth-pop/new wave music. Scotland is a very colorful place. People paint their houses, inside and out, with high-chroma colors as a way of coping with the often-formidable weather. My parents were teachers and had a yacht, so we would sail for six weeks every summer during our school holidays off the west coast of Scotland. I am embarrassed to say how long it took me to realize how influential that experience was in the development of my love of large swaths of billowing sail cloth filled with air. Finally in terms of the Scottish piece of my puzzle, I will say that Scottish humor, physical comedy, and a deeply ingrained self-deprecating personality trait as a kind of national requirement, seeps into my thinking and position as an artist. I have also been raised on a diet of art school. There is no other place like it. I have been lucky enough to be trained in two: I received my MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago [Chicago, IL]; and my BFA from Gray’s School of Art [Aberdeen, Scotland]. And I am privileged to have taught in two over the last thirty-three years: at the Kentucky College of Art + Design in Louisville, KY; and at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in Illinois. I mention this because I would not be making the work I do without having to stay abreast of all the incredible work in the artworld, connect with new generations of student artists, and retool to keep up with new technologies in my teaching. And the last piece of recent biographical information is that I now live in the cornfields of Illinois with my old husband and a menagerie of pets. My three offspring have flown the coop and are living their best lives in various parts of the world. I have built a giant red barn, so I finally, in my 50s, have enough room to make the large-scale inflatable work that I am known for.”

VT: Are there any specific artists that inspired you or that you wanted to emulate, or alternatively were there any that you knew you didn't want to be like?

CA: “Yes! I am inspired by loads of people, but the major players would be Elizabeth Murray, Niki de Saint Phalle, Sam Gilliam [who once called Louisville home], Claude Monet, Jessica Stockholder, Rebecca Horn, Joan Eardley, and Henry Moore among many others.”

VT: How would you describe your visual art in general? 

CA: “I usually describe my work as obnoxious, monumental, gaudy, and full of hot air. But if I am being more serious, I say that I work with inflatable sculpture as the surface for painting to live and breathe, becoming a tattooed skin of sorts on a kind of hybrid body. These sculptural paintings also become performance costumes and, once kinetic, lumber through the landscape on twelve sets of legs. I find the inflatable form compelling, as it exists in two states - both as flaccid skin and taut volume - metaphors for our bodily processes: inhaling/exhaling; taught/wrinkled skin; flaccid/erect organs etc. These self-portraits take up space. They make their presence felt. They vibrate with raunchy, energetic life - being lumpy, imperfect, and real.”

VT: Have your materials, techniques, or interests evolved over the years?  

CA: “I have become more interested in ways to be more environmentally conscious in the last five years. When we moved out to the cornfields we bought an electric car, installed solar panels, allowed the prairie to regrow on our property, began composting more seriously, and of course we continued recycling albeit with more trouble as the garbage companies out here do not have recycling pick-ups like in Oak Park where we raised our kids. In my work I’ve been experimenting with making my own bioplastics. This concoction is sometimes mixed with paint, or poured into a tray and allowed to dry and shrink. This creates small seaweed-like forms. I’m also trying to modify found plastics from my recycling bin to create small scale embellishments on the inflatable’s surface. And I’m testing out small solar panels attached to the surface of the inflatable to power the fans. I am, however, a maximalist so these experiments are by no means ‘purist.’ I like to think that the work becomes a kind of rolling stone, gathering clues of its pathway through the world on its hide. I’ve been gathering dirt and plant matter on dog walks around my property in Illinois, and experimenting with seaweed from my native Scotland, with a view to using them as a myriad of clues on the bodies of my Anthropocene-like forms. They are maximal conglomerations of the world rather than minimal singularities.”

VT: Looking back, what has been the most exciting part of being a professional artist? 

CA: “I feel supremely privileged to have been able to spend my life following my own quirky set of questions that stretch the traditions of painting, sculpture, and performance art. Although there have been ‘many, many, many’ failures, experiments, and dead-ends along the way, I have made my own set of artistic discoveries and inventions. And I’ve been incredibly lucky to be able to collaborate with other artists on projects that have extended my line of questioning in new and surprising ways too. And I’m still excited about being an artist – work begets work – you never run out of things to do.”

VT: So, what comes next for you? 

CA: “I’m about to travel to Mumbai, India to teach a high school summer intensive art class with Uncommon Labs Asia. I’m also in an exhibition with my super-heroes Nick Cave, Momoyo Torimitsu, Nicole Banowetz, Nancy Davidson, and Andy Warhol, called ‘Fresh Air: Inflatable Sculptures’ at the Cameron Art Museum in Wilmington, NC [It opened on June 19, 2026]. And I’m going to have some dedicated time in my studio in July and August to work on a new group of ‘Standing Stone’ inflatable sculptures. I’ve been thinking of them as ghosts, remnants, residue of ancient monuments and landscapes. They are portable modern monuments for ancient pagan rituals, a tongue-in-cheek nod to the American passion for inflatable garden ornaments, slamming against the towering authenticity of Stonehenge, or in my case the Callanish Standing Stones on the Isle of Lewis in Scotland.”

For more information about the artist, visit clairehelenashley.com.