Barb Flemington - Brandon, Manitoba
© Barb Flemington 2015
Photo credit: Kevin Bertram |
Study Skins - 2014
Criteria
Technique: low technique Layout: random or unplanned Text: collaborate with a writer or poet Paper: neutral Colour: least favourite Image: abstract traced, re-drawn, lifted from outside sources Adjectives: Gigantic; Layered; Fragmented or mosaic; Wild Card add tabs, pockets or windows to your project; Allegorical Statement/Bio
My visual art practice relies largely upon found material from the natural and built world. I assemble and build installations using these collections along with drawings, text and mixed media work. Study Skins is a work constructed with taxidermy finches borrowed from the BJ Hales Historical Collection, a blemished velvet display cloth from an old cabinet and an antique perfume bottle containing only residue beneath its beautiful hand-blown glass stopper. I spent many childhood hours in the manicured control and containment of the Niagara Parks Commission. The gardens were grouped by an imposed order of colour and variety and pruning preserved innocence by cutting out the narrative of the garden as a cycle of life and death. Alongside this exactitude, I reminisce about a natural landscape left to its own devices like the child who explored it. In many ways I am planting an emotional experience of nature alongside a formal cataloging of civilian objects, over and over again, creating a sort of Specimen Garden that repeats itself but is never the same. Barb Flemington is a visual artist, educator and advocate for the arts. She lives and works in her country studio near Brandon, Manitoba and has received awards from the Brandon Arts Council, the Manitoba Arts Council and the Canada Council in support of her work. Contact Information [email protected] |