Vicissitude

SNAP is pleased to present Vicissitude, featuring work by Monique Martin and Alexandra Hedberg. The exhibition runs from March 2 – April 6, 2024 at SNAP Gallery.

We thought the environment was frozen in time. It is now a slow emergency.

Vicissitude is a 120 sq metre silkscreened floor cloth that depicts the various impacts on the earth from climate change; flood, fire, erosion and drought that can be walked on by viewers. The ceiling is covered in thousands of silkscreened butterflies.

Opening Reception: Saturday March 2, 7pm-9pm

Artist Talk with Monique Martin (In Gallery): Saturday March 2, 6pm-7pm prior to opening reception

Vicissitude
noun
plural noun: vicissitudes
a change of circumstances or fortune, typically one that is unwelcome or unpleasant.

Artist Statement

Transformation occurs through deep time when life hangs like a question mark, fragile and always changing. A moment in time can impact this planet, but it can also take years and decades to notice the change. Transformation is a process within human existence and within the ecosystems on the earth that allows us to live in the continuous present as we know we will not be the same person or planet tomorrow that we were today. The arithmetic of life can be looked at as continuous subtraction or as continuous transformation. When parts of our life and the earth run thin like the transparent chrysalis of a butterfly there is room for transformation, change, growth and movement.

We thought the environment was frozen in time. It is now a slow emergency. Nature measures time in epochs, eras, eons; it is not based on a human construct of days or years. Humans trespass without notice on nature’s time scale but have altered deep time. Our trespassing renders a lasting impact, stripping mother earth, leaving her vulnerable and weak. We were complacent thinking we had the answers and believing that tomorrow is always promised. Did we even really try? The eternal seconds of our nascent attempts to address climate change may be too late. The regrets will be carried by the future generations comparing what we could have done with what actually occurred.

Time is eternal and everything is gradually covered by the earth.

“Vicissitude” is a 120 sq metre silkscreened floor cloth created in Sweden in the summer of 2022 at the Konstnärernas Kollektivverkstad by Monique Martin and Alexandra Hedberg (Sweden) with funding from the Canada Council of the Arts and the Saskatchewan Arts Board.

The piece was created using silkscreen techniques with all the images being hand drawn. The floor cloth depicts the various impacts on the earth from climate change; flood, fire, erosion and drought. Viewers can walk right on the floor cloth for a unique art experience and hopefully this experience will open up dialogue about the environmental changes to our planet.

The exhibition also includes the installation of approximately 19,000 intricately silkscreened and hand cut paper butterflies. The butterflies are created to scale, using a hand drawn positive silkscreen technique. There are currently 19 species of butterflies. They are 15-30 colours on each side, with each layer a hand drawn positive.

Photo credit: Trint Thomas

About the Artists

Alexandra Hedberg (she/her/elle/la)

My work is at the core about the human condition, existence and the futile. During recent years the climate crisis has come to affect me and my work. As a result the theme of the Apocalypse has become a framework, my art pieces being “my visions” presented in large confrontational scale; natural disasters brought on by climate change (wildfire, landslides,flood and drought), bad omens (blood rain, eclipse, dead butterflies) and consequences (people running for their life, sex as escapism, desperate love). I present my visions as glimpses of scenes to allow for the spectators to create their own narrative. Some of my art pieces might appear to be abstract when seen at distance or in small digital format. But upon closer inspection or experienced in reality, figurative elements are discovered.
alexandrahedberg.com
Instagram: @alexandrahedberg

Monique Martin 

Monique’s art is an intricate fabric woven of all the people around her, the experiences she has and the things she feels. Chapters of an artistic life are unlike chapters of a book. An art life flows forward, backward, side to side with no understanding at many times where one chapter ends and another begins. An artistic life can be marked by a series of work beginning or ending, exhibitions opening or closing, an artistic life is fluid and constantly mocking ‘being done’ as one idea begins as another merges and builds upon the last. She never knows when is the last time she will touch upon an idea or build upon a past concept. As an artist she doesn’t know when the fork in the road is a medium, an idea, a residency, an exhibition or an image, and often for her it is as simple as a conversation with another person. She follows her brush, carving tool, screens, scissors and glue where they take her. She trusts that the trail that is created behind her will be an interesting one.
moniqueart.com
Instagram: @moniquesart