Resume [.pdf]
Alicia McDaid grew up in Philadelphia and has called Portland home for 12 years. She has used writing, music, painting, photography, performance, “self-help” modalities, psychology, alcohol, food, starvation, love, sex, psychic readings, text messaging, video journaling, dance, sleep deprivation, cigarettes, collaging and stalking to self help/ medicate/destruct/express/actualize but considers it all performance. She sucked her thumb until 3rd grade and watched The Breakfast Club and Desperately Seeking Susan at least 50 times each between the ages of 9 and 10. She believes these are her main relationship and style influences to this day.
As an Irish Catholic who attended a Quaker High school with a predominantly Jewish student body, and who became involved in the 12 Step module of therapy as a young teen, she indulged in the processes of being lost and found ad infinitum. As a 15 year old, she received 2 (curable) STD's while losing her virginity in Trenton, New Jersey and believes comedy and tragedy are like chocolate and peanut butter. An avid, devout and possibly obsessive compulsive therapy hobbyist, she has tried everything from new age support groups to stone age psychiatry to hot stone massage. From colonics to Rasputinesque hypno-acupuncture to 12 step to step-aerobic constipation, it has been a thoroughly entertaining romp in the dark. While she has never really found the ultimate "solution", she has spent a lot of money.
In March 2009, McDaid had her first solo art exhibition entitled "Pain Is Fear Leaving Your Body" at Portland State University. The show was “a celebration of the light within the dark and the wonderful absurdity that can be actualized when we stop running and embrace our demons as ourselves.” Whether or not this was true is up for debate. However, one could certainly say it was a cathartic expression of self portraiture executed through photography, video and performance- none of which sold.
Anti-depressant commercials make her cry which makes her laugh.