Photo by Belén Romero
Artist statement
Auden Granger (they/them) is a Chicago-based paper collage artist who works in a distinctive mosaic style defined by swirling lines, vivid colors, and fluid movement. Their work employs found materials and ephemera, pulling the paper and scrap that fills our modern world into new forms and contexts and reframing trash as art.
While the original source of the paper materials is frequently unrecognizable in the final piece, sometimes a distinctive line peeps through; a nod to the originators of the materials as collaborators and co-artists.
Auden’s paper work and the intricate, precise layering technique it involves is deeply connected to their work as a theatrical costumer and their love of textile and sewing. Each mosaic line is constructed like a line of stitching, with evenly-sized segments of paper laid out end to end and layered together to weave the richly colored and textured “fabric” of the piece.
Frequent subjects of Auden’s work include disability, chronic illness, mental health, and Jewish identity. Guiding principles of disability culture inform their work — the transformative nature of working slow, the artistry of adaptation, and the unexpected beauty that results from encouraging a piece to develop through and with limitations of materials and capacity instead of fighting against them.
Ill at Ease: an artist talk on disability culture, found materials, and illness
Disability arts and culture
Bodies of Work
Auden is a 2024 recipient of the 3Arts Bodies of Work Residency. Bodies of Work is an invitation-only fellowship awarded to individuals creating work that illuminates the disability experience in new and unexpected ways. This residency allowed Auden to join the 3Arts Network and participate in the Disability Culture Leadership Initiative.
MadMade Annual Mad Art and Print Fair
Disability Culture Leadership Initiative
Auden’s Wardrobe Justice project and paper mosaic practice were highlighted in 3Arts’ Disablity Culture Leadership Initiative, a series of video conversations and convenings with d/Deaf and disabled artists in Chicago, documenting the “Chicago model” of disability aesthetics. Watch their conversation with Ariella Granados and Arlene Malinowski here.
As part of their Bodies of Work residency, Auden gave a guest lecture presenting the Principles of Wardrobe Justice to students at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Chronically Crafting
Four works by Auden are included in Chronically Crafting, a group exhibition at Access Living curated by Libby Evan Dec 10, 2026-May 6, 2027.
Chronically Crafting explores the relationship between craft and chronic illness.
UIC DHD 2024 Annual Report
Auden’s work ‘My People Are Part of the Soil / This Is Not My Grave’ was featured on the cover of the University of Illinois Chicago’s Department of Disability and Human Development’s 2024 Annual Report. Their Bodies of Work Residency was also highlighted in the report.
On Nov. 14, 2026, Auden participated in the MadMade Art Fair and the panel discussion ‘Madness, Evidence, and Refusing to be Erased,’ a conversation about artistic lived experience, community, and reclaiming madness as a site of creativity and cultural expression.
