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A Conversation with Artist-in-Residence, Lexi Staton
Lexi Staton (she/her) is one of the Visual Arts Center of Richmond’s Spring/Summer 2025 Studio Access Residents. Lexi is a Virginia-born multimedia artist with interests in ceramics (both functional and sculptural), painting, and illustration.
Creative activity has been a huge part of her life since childhood; however in the wake of the pandemic, she found herself a nurse on a COVID floor. This experience was very shaking. She began leaning heavily into her art as a way to help cope with the stress of the world around her. Since then, art has become as necessary for her as air. She says her creative practice helps her manage the stress of coping with disability, mental health, and day-to-day worries. Her aim is to experience life to the fullest and create a world of creativity to be shared with others around her.
We sat down with Lexi partway through her residency to hear more about what inspires her and what she’s been working on. Find a transcript of this embedded video below.
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My name is Lexi, my pronouns are she/her.
I am working on just about anything that I fancy. Right now, I’ve been doing a lot of illustration. I’ve been working on kid lit [children’s literature] illustration. I’ve made a couple of really fun comic zines; I’m teaching myself that. But I’m also taking a screenprinting class, so I’ve been having a lot of fun learning that whole process.
I will always say that creativity compounds on itself. If you’re the most creative person ever and you’re alone, you’ll make something really beautiful. But if you get into a room with other creatives, you’re going to make something extraordinary.
I never thought of [art] being like a job or something that was really of any significance in my life. But as I got older I started to realize, “Wow, this is what makes my life worth living. This is the part of my life that makes all the frustration that comes with being an adult and the frustrations that come with being a nurse, this is what makes it worth it.”
And then, as my mental health illness has progressed, I realized, “oh, this is what is saving my life.”
And so then, a couple of years ago, I read the book, Your Brain on Art by Ivy Ross and Susan Magsamen, and it totally changed my life. And that was the moment that I said to myself: “I’m an artist. This is what I’m going to do.”
My works involve what it’s like to have mental illness, but also to be someone who’s striving for happiness and to be a part of the world around you. And then I do also really like humor, so most of my stuff has a lot of humor to it, because I’ve never been the type of person that really wants people to feel bad for me. I really want to just be like, “well, if life was a comedy, the audience is going to be laughing right now, so I might as well laugh, too.”
And you can have both of those things. You can be someone who’s maybe a little bit on the sad side and still have like a very happy aura and environment around you. So, I think just showing people who I am and telling them that I see them, too.
Learn more about Lexi + her work: Instagram: @the.artist.lexi / Website: pinktankpottery.com
Interests and opinions expressed by artists-in-residence are their own. Learn more about VisArts’ organizational values and code of conduct.