Elisabeth Denis (b. 1995, Montreal, Canada) is an artist, writer, and filmmaker. Her practice engages with relational aesthetics through text, moving image, installation, long-duration performance, and site-specific photography, alongside a material exploration of sculpture and printmaking, including metalwork, ceramics, lithography, and etching. Working from lived experience, she develops projects that originate in personal lines of inquiry and extend into broader social, spatial, and cross-cultural contexts. She has developed work with migrant and minority communities in New Zealand and Japan, and maintains an ongoing interest in the domestic sphere as a site of memory, intimacy, and projection. More broadly, her work examines how environments shape emotional, intellectual, and relational exchanges. Adopting an investigative methodology, she engages in dialogue with individuals, gathering testimonies and lived experiences that are translated across media and contexts. These encounters form the core material of her practice, where private concerns are extended into collective structures. Her photographic work has been presented in public space at Parc de la Coulée-Verte (Saint-Lambert, Canada) as part of a year-long exhibition (2024–2025). She is a two-time artist-in-residence at Can Serrat (Spain), the oldest international research and production center in Catalonia, and was invited to the Marina Abramović Institute’s Cleaning the House workshop in Greece, where she received a scholarship. Her work has also been supported by a literary grant from AFÉA (UQAM, Montreal). Additional residencies and participations include ArtHouse Pani (Mexico), the Hamilton Arts Festival Toi Ora ki Kirikiriroa (New Zealand), the ARCUS Ibaraki Research Center (Japan, 2025), and the Rocaberti Writers Retreat (Spain, 2025). In 2022, she initiated the photojournalistic series Small Gestures: Exploring the Memories of a Lived Life, developed in collaboration with residents of the Raglan Rest Home and Hospital. The project received support from Community Fund Raglan Co. and Waikato Creative Communities. Denis has contributed writing to The Raglan Chronicle, Local RAG Magazine, Deeper Japan, Ex Situ Magazine, and The Owl Anthology , addressing themes including gender dynamics in Kabuki theatre, nostalgia, aging, and intimate forms of photojournalistic storytelling. She has exhibited in New Zealand and Canada, including at the Wharf Gallery, Studio One Toi Tū, Little Hill Studios (Raglan Arts Weekend), OSAC Gallery, Never Space Gallery, Parc de la Coulée-Verte (Montreal), and McClure Gallery. Her interactive art game Scallop Eyes is available through museum shops and cultural institutions including the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the National Gallery of Canada, the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Musée d’art contemporain de Baie-Saint-Paul, and Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), and including the cities of Candiac, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Brossard, and Sainte-Catherine. She has been described by Tesh, co-founder of Raglan Co., as a catalyst for community engagement. Her work has been featured in The New Zealand Herald, Waikato Times, Radio New Zealand (RNZ Culture 101), Women in Film and Television New Zealand, Creative Waikato, Beautiful Bizarre Magazine, Raglan Community Radio, and Issuu New Zealand.

PRESS

6-hour interactive photoshoot replaces camera shutter with bullet sounds, RNZ, October 2024

Art under fire: Photographer, model to go to extremes in long duration art performance, Waikato Times, October 2024

WATCH: A six-hour performance to get the Perfect Shot, STUFF, October 2024 

Perfect Shot – a powerful commentary on the fashion and media industry, Raglan Radio, October 2024

Elisabeth Denis at Raglan Arts Weekend, Raglan Arts Weekend, September 2024

Interview (and portrait) with Élisabeth Denis by photographer David Dunham, September 2024 

RAW 2024 On Track To Be More Festive Than Ever, Raglan 23, July 2024

Elisabeth Denis to perform at the Hamilton Arts Festival this weekend, Raglan Radio, February 2024

The vibe lifter podcast, Raglan Food Co., November 2023 

Conversation on migration, The Raglan Chronicle, April 2023

Black Rainbow documentary, WIFT (Women in Film and Television New-Zealand), March 2023

Raglan art exhibition portrays everlasting scars words leave on people, New-Zealand Herlald, January 2022

A conceptual exhibition of confessional art, The Chronicle, february 2022

Interactive Art Installation for Matariki Solstice Celebration, Raglan Arts Center, June 2022

Wharf Gallery, Raglan Chronicle, June 2022

Intimate exhibition of unmade beds explores the stories of the nights before,  Waikato Times, Augusst 2021

Geodynamic Slumbers Exhibition, Raglan radio interview, august 2021

Unmade bed inspires intimate exhibition, the chronicle, July 2021

One night only Aug 7 – Geodynamic Slumbers, Raglan Arts Center, July 2021

Melting together the arts with Guerilla Art Jam, The Chronicle, January 2020 

AWARDS

CAST CREDITS

City woman (cast), KLARA AND THE SUN, directed by Taika Waititi, 2024

Woman refugee (cast), KLARA AND THE SUN, directed by Taika Waititi, 2024

RESIDENCY

Can Serrat – Barcelona, Spain 2023

Shyam – Cali, Colombia 2024

Theatricalities by Primordiales – Mexico City, Mexico 2024

SCHOLARSHIPS AND GRANTS

Rocaberti Writers partial scholarship towards An Intellectual Affair – Barcelona, Spain, 2025

Rocaberti Writers partial scholarship towards An Intellectual Affair – Barcelona, Spain, 2024

Marina Abramovic Institution, full scholarship towards Cleaning The House workshop – Karyes, Greece, 2023

Raglan Co. , grant towards Black Rainbow – Raglan, New-Zealand, 2023

Waikato Creative Communities grant towards Community Workshop – New-Zealand, 2023

Raglan Co. , grant towards Small Gestures – Raglan, New-Zealand, 2022

AFEA, literary grant towards 1000 Japanese Cranes  – UQAM university, Montreal, Canada, 2021

PODCASTS AND INTERVIEWS

Photographs taken by Lorenzo Thapliyal, and Thomas Kimmerlin Poupart.