Rebecca Drolen

Unstable Entity explores balancing and tipping points within culturally unstable expectations of female strength, resilience, and bodily performance. The work compares bodily forms to ad-hoc assemblages that are tenuously balanced using common building materials. Within this juxtaposition is a meditation on the body and the unsettled standards of what it means to be a “strong woman” alongside the structures that often fail us. The collage of forms speculates on the relationship of female strength to intimidation, sexuality, and desire as well as the individual stamina required to pursue both mental and physical wellness. Female bodybuilders enter the work as a form of archetype or heroic body representing a maximized performance of strength and physicality. The work is a montage of layered priorities that speaks to the performative nature of strength, the precarious temporality of the “ideal,” and the psychological safety of inhabiting and being present in a body.

Rebecca Drolen is an artist and educator working in Arkansas. Her photographs are concerned with how identities are visually assembled, and the constructed ideals placed on gendered bodily performance. Her work playfully explores the expansive nature of photography in contemporary art as it incorporates installation, assemblage and performance.

Drolen’s work has been shown in group and solo exhibitions as well as publications on a national and international level, within noteworthy venues such as the Springfield Art Museum, The Oklahoma State Museum of Art, the CICA Museum in Gimpo, Korea, the Galveston Art Center, Filter Photo, the Huffington Post, Oxford American’s “Eyes on the South,” the Light Factory, the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, and the Theory of Clouds Gallery in Kobe, Japan. Drolen was awarded the Innovate Artist Grant in 2022 and was an invited artist in residence at Anderson Ranch Art Center in 2024 and at the Mattress Factory Contemporary Art Museum in 2025.

Drolen is an Associate Professor of Art at the University of Arkansas School of Art where she collaborates to lead the Photography program and has also serves as the Co-Program Director of Studio Art. She considers teaching a core priority within her art practice and is continuously impacted by her students.

EDUCATION

2009 Master of Fine Arts, Photography, Indiana University – Bloomington, IN

2005 Bachelor of Arts, Journalism, Minors in Art History & Studio Art, Photography,

Indiana University – Bloomington, IN

SOLO & SMALL GROUP CURATED EXHIBITIONS

2023 Unstable Entity / Filter Photo – Chicago, IL

Unstable Entity / University of Tulsa, Alexandre Hogue Gallery – Tulsa, OK

2022 Working Together: Neil Callander & Rebecca Drolen / 2-person exhibition / Niles-Maine

District Library – Niles, IL

Below the Sight Line / SRO Photo Gallery, Texas Tech University – Lubbock, TX

2021 Four by Four: Midwest Invitational Exhibition / Springfield Art Museum – Springfield, MO

Unstable Entity / Galveston Arts Center – Galveston, TX

Factory (select works) / 21C Museum Hotel Vitrine – Bentonville, AR

2020 Something Familiar: Work by Rebecca Drolen & Bree Lamb / Louise Hopkins

Underwood Center for the Arts – Lubbock, TX

Resolution / Clamp Light Gallery / 4-person exhibition – San Antonio, TX

2019 Body & Identity, 12thJeonju International Photo Festival / 4-person invitational – Jeonju,

S. Korea

2018 Ponytails and Souvenirs / The Light Factory Gallery – Charlotte, NC

Factory / Oklahoma State Museum of Art – Stillwater, OK

Hair Pieces / St. Joseph’s University – Philadelphia, PA

Hair / Tarleton State University – Stephenville, TX

2016 Transplants / Palmetto Center for the Visual Arts / FotoSeptiembre

Northwest Vista College – San Antonio, TX

2014 Hair Pieces / Three Squared Gallery – Nashville, TN

2013 Hair Pieces / Royale Hair Parlor – Bloomington, IN

Hair Pieces / Gallery 121 – Belmont University, Nashville, TN

2012 Hair Pieces / Gallery 101 – University of Georgia– Athens, GA

Hair Pieces / SRO Photo Gallery – Texas Tech University – Lubbock, TX

2011 Particular Histories / Castell Photography Gallery – Asheville, NC

2009 Particular Histories / SoFA Gallery – Indiana University – Bloomington, IN

AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS

2026 Imagemaker Lecture / Society for Photographic Education National Conference, March 2026

2025 Artist-in-Residence / Mattress Factory / Pittsburgh, PA

2024 Review Santa Fe Participant / Juried Photography Review / Santa Fe, NM

2023 Artist-in-Residence Family Residency / Anderson Ranch Arts Center / Dec 2023 –

Snowmass Village, CO

Recognition: 20 Under 40: 2023 / Annual List of Amazing Young Alumni / Indiana University

College of Arts & Sciences / Bloomington, IN

2022 Grant Recipient / Innovate Grant – Winter 2022 (Photography) Grant Cycle

2021 Grant Recipient / SPACE on Ryder Farm, Brewster, NY (Summer 21)

Curatorial Fellowship / Stay Home Gallery & Residency, Paris TN

Fulbright Faculty Travel Grant – University of Arkansas, Fall 2021

2018 Circle Foundation for the Arts – Artist of the Year Award Finalist

Artists 360 Grant Finalist, 2018

2015 Juror’s Selection Award – SPE SC Educator Exhibition – Mainsite Gallery

2011 Outstanding Adjunct Faculty Award – Ivy Tech Community College

2010 Juror’s Choice Award – The Human Condition – Castell Photography Gallery

2009 Director’s Selection Image – Idea of Self Exhibition – The Center for Fine Art Photography

Permanent Collection Purchase Award – 22nd National McNeese Works on Paper Exhibition

– Abercrombie Gallery

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

2024 Flats Files / Artist Feature, Issue 4

2022 Innovate Grant Artist Interview, Winter 2022

2021 Friend of the Artist, vol. 13 – Independent Publisher, 2021

A Yellow Rose Project – Texas A&M University Press, 2021

Becoming Sisters: Women Photography Collectives & Organizations: Women

Photographers International Archive (WOPHA) Congress Catalog – WOPHA

Foundation, Nov. 2021

Four by Four 2020: Midwest Invitational Exhibition Catalogue, Springfield Art

Museum, Missouri Arts Council, 2021

2020 Don’t Cut Your Hair It’s Beautiful (Parley Project Publication) – Black Rock Press,

University of Nevada – by Kellee Morgado (Redfield Fellow), 2020

Photographer’s Companion Magazine – “Hair Pieces” (article) – Nov 2020 Issue (China)

2018 See Yourself X (SYX), by Madeline Schwartzman, Black Dog Publishing – December 2018

2016 Oxford American: Eyes on the South / Featured work “Transplanted”

2014 Huffington Post Arts / Featured work “Surreal Photos Explore Why Women…” – Nov 2014