heather ROY
ARTIST STATEMENT
Through years of teaching and making art, I have seen the enrichment that making, viewing and sharing art can bring to people who are hungry for deep connections in their lives. I really enjoy facilitating art projects at the Green Wood Coalition Art Hive, with a diverse group of people from the marginalized community within our town – people who are struggling with poverty, homelessness, mental health and other challenges. They are truly grateful for the light which art making brings to their lives.
My own hunger for these deep connections drives me to develop paintings which stem from dream, and represent altered realities. Some of the work arises from using familiar images in alien contexts, often inspired by old National Geographic photos. Some work derives from the textures, mark making and brushstrokes of random paint application, which resolve into more abstract pieces.
My recent figurative work invites viewers to contemplate their relationship with the natural world. In animistic scenes, I bring wood, clay,wax, paint and fabric together to suggest a humanity as organic as the foraged sticks I incorporate in these relief paintings.
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Featured Artist – COAGULATIO
“Coagulatio is about creating form… from that which was not formed. So for any concept to come in to being a coagulatio is needed. For every image, a coagulatio is needed.” Source: alchemicalgarden.com
The process of transformation fascinated the medieval alchemists, who, as early scientists, intentionally sought ways to change base materials into more refined ones through mixture of substances, heat and submersion in water. They worked in solitude and guarded their experiments by recording them in arcane symbolic language. The parallels to artist are many.
We can be said to live the alchemical operation of coagulatio when we turn something ephemeral into something concrete, solid, fixed in position and shape. This may, in fact be our very selves, our physical manifestation of spiritual values and beliefs, our creative products and enterprises.
“The materialisation of spirit and the spiritualisation of matter. As above, so below. The alchemist’s job is to raise what is earthy to the level of spirit and to bring to full incarnation that which is in potential.” Source: alchemicalgarden.com
This process of transmutation is one artists know intimately. We inquire into the nature of materials, and experiment with their combination, to produce something other.
It comes back to the materials – the stuff, which has its own properties and life. In this work I struggle with the stuff – combining raw natural materials with more refined ones, to suggest a unity of life that is often obscured by the synthetic quality of much of our living environment. Technical difficulties, issues of what will stick to what – make me feel like an alchemist exploring the “what if” of new combinations and processes.
Changed by wind, weather, time and water, the wood in these pieces has undergone separation from its source, leaving it stripped raw, ready to begin the cycle of decomposition which will allow it to be reborn in new form: the coagulatio of wood, clay, wax, heat and imagination.
Examples of Heather's Art
SPRITE
Mixed Encaustic
BOG WOMAN
Encaustic
CHAIR
Giclée Photographic Print
$200
CHAIR
Giclée Photographic Print
$200
BENCH
Giclée Photographic Print
$200
CROWE BRIDGE WEIR
Giclée Photographic Print
$600
WHERE CAN YOU SEE MY WORK?
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EXHIBITS & SHOWS
Solo Exhibitions
- Furby’s Bookstore, Port Hope 2018
- Edward Jones Gallery, Cobourg, Ontario 2014
- “Islands and Gardens” Art Gallery of Northumberland, Port Hope, July 2014
- “Get a Life” Colborne Gallery, Colborne, Ontario, July 2011
Group Exhibitions
- Ganaraska Art and Framing, Port Hope, Ontario 2013, 2014
- Etobicoke Art Centre, Etobicoke, Ontario – ’Beauty in the Eye’, 2012
- Furby’s Bookstore, Port Hope, Ontario – “Champainting”, 2012
- Pop Up Show, Queen Street Port Hope, Ontario 2012
- Port Hope Jazz Festival, Port Hope, Ontario 2012
- Ganaraska Studio Tour, Port Hope, Ontario 2009, 2010, 2011, 2014
- Colborne Art Gallery, Colborne, Ontario 2009-2012
- Journey Through the Arts Gallery, Port Hope Ontario 2008, 2009
- The Blue Tomato, Peterborough, Ontario 2009
- Artsite, Peterborough, Ontario ‘The Nude’ 2008
- Cossars Gallery, Peterborough, Ontario 2006
- Visual Arts Centre of Clarington, Bowmanville, Ontario 2006
- Northumberland Art Gallery, Cobourg, Ontario 2003, 2004
- Northumberland Hills Studio Tour, Port Hope 2002
Gallery Address
51 King Street East
(905) 355-1798
P.O. Boc 903
Colborne Ontario
K0K 1S0
Gallery Hours
Thursday – Sunday: Noon – 4pm