Alexandra Haeseker: Fleurs du Mal

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER · FLEURS DU MAL

VERNON PUBLIC ART GALLERY VERNON, BRITISH COLUMBIA CANADA www.vernonpublicartgallery.com

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER FLEURS DU MAL

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER Fleurs du Mal

Vernon Public Art Gallery July 28 - September 21, 2022

Vernon Public Art Gallery 3228 - 31st Avenue, Vernon BC, V1T 2H3 www.vernonpublicartgallery.com 250.545.3173

Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Vernon Public Art Gallery 3228 - 31st Avenue, Vernon, British Columbia, V1T 2H3, Canada July 28 - September 21, 2022 Production: Vernon Public Art Gallery Editor: Lubos Culen Layout and graphic design: Vernon Public Art Gallery Copy editing: Kelsie Balehowsky Front cover: City of Roads, 2022, UV Latex ink on recycled synthetic paper, 84.25 in high x 72.5 in wide Printing: Get Colour Copies, Vernon, British Columbia, Canada ISBN 978-1-927407-71-4 Copyright © 2022 Vernon Public Art Gallery All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act or in writing from the Vernon Public Art Gallery. Requests for permission to use these images should be addressed in writing to the Vernon Public Art Gallery, 3228 31st Avenue, Vernon BC, V1T 2H3, Canada.

Telephone: 250.545.3173 , website: www.vernonpublicartgallery.com The Vernon Public Art Gallery is a registered not-for-profit society. We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Greater Vernon Advisory Committee/RDNO, the Province of BC’s Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch, British Columbia Arts Council, the Government of Canada, corporate donors, sponsors, general donations and memberships. Charitable Organization # 108113358RR.

This exhibition is sponsored in part by:

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

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Fleurs du Mal: Introduction · Lubos Culen

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Dark Flowerings · Richard Noyce

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Artist Statement · Alexandra Haeseker

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Images of Works in the Exhibition

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Fallen Leaves: Artist Book

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Above the North: Artist Book

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Installation of Works in Fleurs du Mal at the Vernon Public Art Gallery

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Installations of Works Related to the Fleurs du Mal Exhibition

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Curriculum Vitae

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FLEURS DU MAL: INTRODUCTION

The Fleurs du Mal is the latest exhibition created by Calgary based artist Alexandra Haeseker specifically produced to be on display at the Vernon Public Art Gallery. Haeseker’s studio practice has been focused on the critical context of existence of all living organisms and inevitably their coexistence and survival in this era of advancing climate change. She uses artistic means to convey messages about the state of the ecological impact of human activity upon the environment. The focus of Haeseker’s exhibition Fleurs du Mal is on the portrayal of plant matter and insects and their critical role in the ecosystems.

Haeseker’s studio practice is based on investigation and scientific research of various ecological elements.

Her exhibition titled Fleurs du Mal focuses on the process of plant and insect decay and the images are used as references to the current climate situation, global warming, and the deterioration of ecosystems caused by the humans’ industrial and agricultural activity. In her research, Haeseker focuses on the observation and the collection of natural materials in her immediate surroundings. These include various plants which she then photographs and then further digitally manipulates. The final images are then printed in a large-scale format on recycled synthetic paper using UV Latex inks and then finally cut out so the plant elements exist as autonomous objects without the negative space. Her installations of plant based images are large in scale and on occasion they span from floor to ceiling. The installation of the artwork mounted off the wall results in a 3D appearance which is enhanced by claiming the whole gallery wall space.

The exhibition Fleurs du Mal consist of several large-scale floral elements complemented by a swarm of two hundred dead moth cut-outs, two artist books and a video. All plant elements are portrayed as decaying entities either by atrophy or insect damage. Upon the entry to the gallery space, the viewers can observe a large-scale cut-out of the Cicada known for their long cycles of hibernation. The image of the Cicada is complemented by an image of a decayed Trembling Aspen leaf. While the symbolic meaning behind the image of a Cicada is rebirth and beginning a new cycle, the image of a decayed leaf is a metaphor for the end of cycle.

The second wall is anchored by three large-scale elements. There is an image of flower and leaves with a spider, all in the colours we associate with the fall and hence the ending of a life cycle. The next element is the image of a dried floral stem which spans from the floor to the ceiling. It contains images of six caterpillars which metaphorically speaks of the cycle just before the re-birth into a flying insect. In addition to these three large elements, there are additional cut-out images of three moths, an announcement of the images of moths swarm which is situated in the corner of the walls three and four.

Wall three is dominated by large-scale leaves of vibrant purple colour and another cut-out image of an insect eaten Wood Violet leaf. Leading up to and situated in the corner is the beginning of two hundred cut-

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out images of a swarm of the dead moths. Consequently, the rest of the ‘moths’ swarm is situated on the fourth wall. In addition to the multiple cut-out images of dead moths, there are two artist books displayed on two shelves. The sixteen page artist book titled Fallen Leaves is autobiographical in nature and feature images of various leaves juxtaposed over the text. The leaves were collected from different places where Haeseker lived. The texts, however obscured by the images of leaves, give the viewers glimpses into her associations of various places that she has been calling ‘home’. The second fourteen page Haeseker’s artist book titled Above the North is based on photographic images of frozen leaves encapsulated in ice and found in her driveway. The images were further digitally manipulated and the final appearance of the images resemble aerial views of Arctic tundra with lakes, roads and mountain ranges. In addition to the cut-out images of flora and insects featured in the exhibition, Haeseker produced a 15 minute video projected on the floor which features various dissolving images of fallen leaves on the forest floor.

Haeseker’s exhibition Fleurs du Mal asks the viewers to shift their focus regarding the environment and to contemplate what environmental changes have become obvious in our lifetime. Everything from melting glaciers, warming trends in the Arctic, raging forest fires, floods, or pine beetle infestation is an indication of permanent changes in the ecosystems we live in. Haeseker’s studio practice is guided by research concerning global changes and the artwork she produces is created within the context of scientific investigation. She uses her artmaking as the means of communication and encourages the viewers to contemplate the environmental changes on all levels.

Lubos Culen Curator Vernon Public Art Gallery

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DARK FLOWERINGS Art, inevitably, is involved with the passage of time and place. It is necessarily about the world and our relationship with it. That world is changing faster than ever before, approaching a tipping point beyond which the effects of environmental change may well be irreversible. The art world itself is becoming increasingly precarious, subject not only to market forces but also to global events and shifting fashions. Artists must find their own position and the direction in which to look in this evolving world. Some choose to enter a self-referential loop with the art of the past, others to find a means for transgressing norms, others yet seek to challenge and admonish those who are engaged in the headlong despoliation of the planet. Alexandra Haeseker comes into that third category, with a considerable body of work over many years that seeks to highlight aspects of our threatened ecological nexus, working with techniques that push the boundaries of art, often at a scale that challenges the perceptions of those who encounter it. In the project that culminates in the exhibition at the Vernon Public Art Gallery she offers her response to the natural world that is in grave danger.

Each of us has a deeply personal relationship with that natural world. After all, that is where we live. Whether our homes are made in noisy and crowded cities or deep in the wilderness we are surrounded by other living organisms. The ability of nature to reassert its place in the man-made world is fascinating and instructive.

In the aftermath of WW2 in England it was common to see large swathes of Rosebay Willowherb growing on the rubble of bombed out buildings, hiding the tangles of rubble and broken lives, bringing softness and colour to the remnants of devastation. The plant, known in North America as Fireweed, together with purple Buddleia, provided not only a source of joy in dark times but also a source of food for insects and butterflies.

Now those ruins have their turn been replaced by high rise offices and apartment blocks, the roofs of which are patrolled by Peregrine Falcons more accustomed to wild forests and quarries; they are there to keep the numbers of pigeons under some sort of control. Foxes, and more recently badgers, are now commonly seen in suburban night streets. In Llandudno in North Wales the wild goats that live on the nearby headland have started to stray into the streets and gardens of this small seaside town.

But all is not well, as the negative effects on the global environmental become more evident, and as the industrialisation of our world continues unabated. Looking closely at the natural world in the deeply rural area of Wales where I live it is clear that much has changed over the past quarter century. While some of this is due to the wider impact of climate change, much more seems to be due to the changes in local farming practice. Encouraged by the agro-chemical companies the formerly rich and sustainable eco-system of arable fields, with lush mixed grasses and established hedges, has been turned into huge maize fields of chemically fertilised soil, stripped of the shelter provided by dividing hedges. This practice involves treating the whole field with aggressive herbicide before planting seed beneath sheets of plastic that is supposedly biodegradable, but which degrades into micro plastics that persist in the soil or wash into the watercourses.

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As a result, the natural traditional landscape has been utterly changed, creating a local impact with knockon effects that spread much further afield. The maize is not grown for animal feed, but to be harvested and sold for processing into bio-diesel. The cleared fields have become barren. The birds and insects that once gathered and fed on the wild flowers there have gone, the fields are silent and the local environment is impoverished. The chemically tainted rainwater runs off into local watercourses and that in turn causes serious damage to the ecology of nearby rivers and the consequent reduction in the numbers and species of fish, invertebrates and birds. Nothing happens without consequences and we are finding, perhaps too late, just how intimately our lives are interconnected with and dependent on the world in which we live.

What I have observed in the world in which I live adds to the reported experience of other people in every corner of the world. Superficially, what appears to be of no great importance beyond the locality is, when taken together with other reports, seen to be part of a widening pattern of ecological destruction that will be difficult if not impossible to reverse.

Alexandra Haeseker lives and works in the foothills of the Rockies in Southern Alberta, an environment greatly different to mine, with a different story of ecological change to tell. She has for many years cast an informed and penetrating gaze on her environment, whether at a local, national or international scale. Her explorations have led her to produce major art installations that seek to highlight the effects and dangers of deep changes in the world. She has developed distinctive techniques derived from her academic training in painting and printmaking, using materials and techniques derived from developing technology and processes. In particular she uses those of printmaking, not so much in the service of producing numbered editions as for the ways in which they allow for reproducibility where necessary and for the production of particular colour and texture surfaces. The work she produces is immersive, being frequently at a large scale and creating an installed environment in which visitors to her exhibitions can confront and consider the ways in which she presents her ideas. In this sense, just as the natural environment is best experienced in person rather than through the filter of photographic or video mediums, her work is best appreciated on a personal and individual level. This requires that the viewer adopts a collaborative willingness to engage with what is presented, to consider not only the surface of the work but also its motivation and its message.

In her statement on the Vernon exhibition, the artist positions her work as part of a long scientific and artistic trajectory reaching across time and space. Reading this allows the viewer to understand more deeply the aims and background of this important exhibition. Such information is essential if those who encounter the work are to see beyond the surface and understand that no work of art exists only at one point in history, but that it is as much part of the flow of time as are the seasons. If that is the only perceived function of the

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work, the reason for seeing it in the gallery, then that is a start. Beyond that there are opportunities to engage with the oversized and strangely coloured leaves, moths and insects, and to become part of the projected light that falls on the floor. More than that there are two artist’s books that, upon reading, add depth to the personal history of a committed artist whose continuing engagement with the natural world and the forces that threaten it provides a great deal of food for thought.

Richard Noyce May 2022

Richard Noyce (b. 1944) is a British writer, artist, scholar and art critic, well-known especially for his important international role in the world of printmaking. He writes and speaks regularly on the visual arts and, in addition to many reviews and articles published in British and European magazines, he has written several books on contemporary painting, graphic arts, and printmaking, such as Contemporary Painting in Poland (1995), Contemporary Graphic Art in Poland (1997), Printmaking at the Edge (2006), Critical Mass: Printmaking Beyond the Edge (2006, reprinted 2008, 2010, 2013) and Printmaking Off the Beaten Track (2013).

He was awarded the 1996 AAASS/Orbis Polish Book Prize and is an experienced international competition juror, serving as President of the Awards Jury at the Kraków International Print Triennial, 2003, 2006, 2009 as well being a juror for numerous other international print and drawing biennials and triennials. He was the Commissioner for the British participation in the Ulsan International Woodcut Biennial, South Korea, 2019.

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ARTIST STATEMENT My exhibition for Vernon follows my 2020 exhibition The Botanist’s Daughter installed for Edinburgh Printmakers Castle Mills Contemporary in Scotland. But the threads of origins for this subject matter unravel back to other women artists working Centuries ago with similar obsessions of artistic scientific investigation.

Maria Sibylla Merian left Frankfurt Germany in 1699 to research the metamorphosis of butterflies and moths found in Surinam, South America. Her graphic portfolios have become archives of the relationships between plants and insects as co-dependent interwoven equations. While Harriet and Helena Scott left Sydney in 1848 to the sanctuary naturalist’s paradise of Ash Island, Australia - where they engaged in working with their father’s Lepidoptera project to become natural history illustrators recording all known Australian butterflies and moths. These and other women artists created some of the most significant advances in descriptive painting from Nature in their time, that continues to enthrall and captivate viewers. Their works have inspired and informed my own in-depth artistic research.

My own early childhood, living in Sumatra, Indonesia, ignited a similar connection to the natural world, where at four years old, I was able to capture live tropical insects in the jungle and study them each day at close range, then by nightfall release them back into the jungle. Scorpions, large spiders, golden beetles, and many other odd species were fascinating creatures living parallel lives to human activity. I’d often fall asleep at night to the sound of crickets my father would capture in a matchbox for the night, also to be released at daybreak.

However, these female artist predecessors who had one foot in science and the other as adept illustrators of nature themes, were in a time of wonder and discovery. Exploration of entomology and flora had roots into Dutch still life painting, where there was an embedded narrative code of awareness of life and death in the same breath. Fine Arts becomes the language system whereby time, place and context aligns crossed paths into whatever the psyche of that particular intersection reflects in the larger demographic. For Merian, “her aim was not systematic classification, anatomical description, or priority in academic disputes, but to conduct us on a visual journey through the wonders of transformation.” 1.

I live and work in the Foothills Country of Southern Alberta near The Rocky Mountains, next to British Columbia, in Canada. This part of the country is a barometer to witness changes in the environment that can be traced by way of small differences leading to bigger consequences. The melting of mountain glaciers due to global warming, pine beetle infestations in the mountain forests, wild fires from increasing thunder storm weather conditions, resulting in flash flooding, mudslides and drought - are conditions that we see with increasing frequency in this part of the world now.

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My exhibition for Vernon is a critical context, for this geographical location is an epicenter where forest fires and flooding are altering the interior landscape at rates never before experienced in this region.

My artistic research, gathering natural materials across seasons, and depicting them - becomes warnings shown to us through this subject matter, as danger signs we must pay attention to.

Insects and plant life are scaled larger-than-life to reverse the viewer’s perception of their own relationship to nature where the familiar becomes unfamiliar. Enhanced coloration, structural fragility, and sculptural juxtapositions invite scrutiny to see these common elements in new ways as a contemporary art installation.

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER RCA

FOOTNOTE: 1.

Martin Kemp, The Nature Book of Art and Science, Oxford University Press, London UK, 2000

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Fleurs du Mal ARTWORK IN THE EXHIBITION All artwork: UV Latex ink on cut-out synthetic paper

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Wall 1; working sketch

Wall 2; working sketch

Wall 3; working sketch

Wall 4; working sketch

THE HUM OF WINGS remembrance of the sound a loud shrill drone noise in the night ... an awakening

CITY OF ROADWAYS streets after dark leading to more streets during a power failure arteries and nervous systems

EIGHT LEGS they say no matter where you are a spider is only six feet away

STEM one time I swear I heard the sound of a hundred tiny voices saying something

BLACK LAKE geography is like something you travel along hoping to find your way even if you get lost

FIRE ALARM there’s magic in the flames but I think about how terrifying it must be for the trees... knowing

GREEN ARCHITECTURE structure is what we build with and the spaces between are what we are left with

NEBULA there’s a scene from a film I’ve never seen where all the moths fly towards the full moon’s illumination on one night

PLANET X (video capture) early morning dew a spider’s web turns into a string of jewels lost on a path through the middle of the woods

FALLEN LEAVES is the title of my artist’s book that represents my gathering of pieces from the natural world in the different countries I have lived in since childhood.

From the Netherlands, to Indonesia, to New York City, Houston Texas, Central Mexico and Western Canada, crossing over cultures and languages; I see my identity as a Canadian immigrant having been constructed from these myriad influences.

Each leaf represents something as profound as an individual fingerprint to me, tied to a specific location, and reflective of different backgrounds I have been a part of. The leaves partly cover my written personal history in the same manner that languages might have words missing, their meaning occluded and so to be not necessarily understood completely.

I see my identity almost as geographical, tied to landscape, but one that exists not only as an external physicality, but also occupying a complex internalized terrain. Canada is this kind of place. My book might be considered as a trail of leaves left in a wake, the path I have always been on - leading me in two directions: back to my beginnings and forward to the future. Something fragile, enduring and rejuvenating me as I evolve...

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ABOVE THE NORTH is the title of my artist’s book that was an idea to alter one’s perception between relative scale and interpretations of the Arctic landscape.

The premise is that these are high aerial views across Canada’s North where the vast distances of mountain ranges, frozen tundra, ice flows and tree lines - are marked by deep glacial lakes, winding rivers, supply routes, roadways, and animal migratory trails...

In fact, these are images of leaves trapped in winter ice on my own country road in Southern Alberta.

They echo properties of what we imagine Northern Canada to be, if you allow your mind to wander into that mystic location in your psyche...

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Installations of Works in the Fleurs du Mal exhibition at the Vernon Public Art Gallery

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Installations of Works Related to the Fleurs du Mal exhibition

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U-Forum, Tokyo, Japan

Coa Art Museum, Portugal

Yurinkan Centre for the Arts, Japan

The Botanist’s Daughter, 2020, installation at Edinburgh Printmakers, The Castle Mills, Edinburgh, Scotland

The Botanist’s Daughter, 2020, installation at Edinburgh Printmakers, The Castle Mills, Edinburgh, Scotland

The Botanist’s Daughter, 2020, installation at Edinburgh Printmakers, The Castle Mills, Edinburgh, Scotland

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER RCA

abbreviated CURRICULUM VITAE

• ACAD 1966-68 • BFA honors University of Calgary 1963-66 • MFA degree, Painting, University of Calgary 1970-72 • Professor of Fine Arts ACAD 1973 - 2003 Canada / Professor Emeritus 2004 Alberta University of the Arts • RCA Royal Canadian Academy, Ottawa 1999 • MUDA Mayors Urban Design Awards Juror, City of Calgary 2014 • I’ve represented Canada in many International Art Biennials and Triennials globally, and had the opportunity of working with Architects, Design Teams, Engineers, Stakeholders, Government Agencies, Corporate Partners and Public representatives on my Public Art projects.

I taught Post-Secondary Fine Arts for 30 years and lecture internationally on my practice as a Canadian artist.

INVITED, SELECTED AND CURATED PROJECTS: 2022

USA 2021 2020

2019 2018

Athem: Expressions of Identity, (invitational), The Museum Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Egypt Trials and Errors (solo), feature The Masters Biennial of Drawing, Borsos House Museum, Györ, Hungary Bookplates by the Bay / FISAE World Congress, American Bookbinders Museum, San Francisco, Prototypes, Canadian feature group exhibition, Krakow International Triennial, Poland The NORTH Finland Norway Russia Initiative, Artists Book Project, Vyhod Media Centre, Petrozavodsk, Russia The Botanist’s Daughter (solo) EP Edinburgh Printmakers, The Castle Mills Contemporary, Scotland REBELLIOUS: Women Artists of the 1980s, AGA Art Gallery of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada IAPA Invitational, International Art Alliance The Taoxichuan Art Museum, Jingdezhen, China City of Calgary Public Art Transit Project, BRT Stations, Calgary, Alberta, Canada Douro International Bienal, The Coa Art Museum, Fozcoa, Portugal (appointed Canadian Commissioner)

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2017

Departures: Masterworks from Canada, The Ardel Museum, Bangkok, Thailand The Silk Road Invitational Exhibition, The Shaanxi Art Museum, Xi’an, China Inter-Woven, Kobro Museum of Fine Arts Lodz • National Cultural Centre Gallery Warsaw, Poland 2016 The Phobia Project: New Work on Beauty & Repulsion, Cerveira International Sculpture Biennial, Portugal Canada / Japan, (invited) The Kyoto City Art Museum, Japan 2015 RESONANCE, Canadian Art at the Shengzhi Art Centre, Beijing, China (invited) Impact Changing World Conference, Hangzhou, China (invited) International Biennial Contemporaine, Le Musée des Beaux-Arts, Liège, Belgium 2014 THE DEEP, solo exhibition for The Centro de Arte Moderno, Madrid, Spain 2013 The New World, MODEM Museum of Contemporary Art, Debrecen, Hungary International Biennial Contemporaine, Trois-Rivières, Quebec Canada Al-Mutanabbi Street Project, The Centre for Book Arts, New York City, USA International Graphics Biennial, Liége Belgium 2011 / 2013 / (Second Prix) 2011 IMPRINT 2011, International Triennial, Warsaw, Poland 2009 - 2010 Akademija Centre for Graphic Art + Research, Belgrade, Serbia (solo invited/ touring) Krakow International Print Triennale / The Poznan Museum, Poland (invited) 2009 Novosibirsk State Art Museum International Biennale, Russia (invited) 2008 Representing Canada in ANOTHER VOICE, The Shanghai Art Museum China (invited) Third International Artist’s Book Biennial, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt (invited) EPI Edmonton Print International , Alberta, Canada Jurors Commendation Award Another Voice, The Shanghai Art Museum, China (curated invitation) International Artist’s Book Bienniale, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt (invited) 2007 Oldenburg Triennale, Germany (in conjunction with MTG Krakow 2006) Novosibirsk State Art Museum International Contemporary Art Biennial, Russia 2006 Calgary Immigrant of Distinction Arts and Culture Award 5th International Triennial of Graphic Art, Bitola, Macedonia 7th Bharat Bhavan International Biennial, Bhopal, India (invited) Pendulum/Pendula, (Haeseker/Hall), Yukon Art Centre, Whitehorse, Canada “Quanto”, Centro Culturale Zitelle, Venice, Italy 2005 Creativity + Cognition, University of London, Goldsmiths College, London UK (invited) “Le Jardin du Precambrien” Installations d’art in situ, 10th Anniversary The Baroque of The Americas, Le Fondation Derouin, Quebec, (invited) “Orange Tulips 1945-2005”, Museum of the Regiments, Calgary, Alberta 2004 Kulturspeicher International, Horst-Janssen Stadtmuseum, Oldenburg , Germany International Triennial of Art, Bitola Institute Museum of Macedonia (catalogue) International Solar Cities Congress, Exco Exhibition Center, Daegu, Korea (book) Bharat Bhavan International Biennial 2004, Roopankar Museum of Fine Arts, India 2004 Burning Sappho’s Books, Kobe University Gallery School of Art + Architecture, Japan

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2003 2003

Nickle Arts Museum (solo ) University of Calgary, Alberta Canada (catalogue) Pendulum/Pendula, collaborative works with John Hall, Rosemont Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan (catalogues) BURNING SAPPHO’S BOOKS, (solo), Canadian Embassy, Tokyo, Japan (touring) Silpakorn University 60th Anniversary International Exhibition, Bangkok, Thailand Krakow International Triennial, Museum of Art, Krakow, Poland International Festival of Graphic Arts, National Museum of Art, Cluj-Napoca, Romania Rijeka International Graphics, Iceland (catalogue) Beijing International Biennale, Beijing, China Canada Prints Now, Guangdong Art Museum, Guangzhou, China

PARTICIPATION IN MAJOR INTERNATIONAL BIENNALES INCLUDE: 2001 1994 1993 1992 1991 1987 1984 1982 1979 2005

The National Gallery of Art, Cluj-Napoca, Romania Belgrade Biennale International, Invitational Belgrade, Serbia The MECC, Maastricht Museum, Holland Expo 1992 in Seville, Spain / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, San Miguel de Allende, tour Contemporary art museums in Guadalajara, Monterrey, Aguascalientes, and Queretaro, Mexico.

Krakow, Poland / Nürnburg, Deutschland Premio Biella Internazionale, Italy Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Ibiza, Spain The Bronx Museum, New York City USA The Grenchen Art Society Triennale, Switzerland Invited to 2005 International Conference: Creativity + Cognition, Goldsmiths College, University of London U.K., the Bharat Bhavan International Biennial in Bhopal, India 2006, Novosibirsk International Biennial Russia 2007, Oldenburg International Triennial, Germany 2007.

AWARDS INCLUDE: 2013 2013 2008 2006 2003 1983 1977

Museum prize for Le Musée des Beaux-Arts, Liège, Belgium Matrices Award, Magyar Electrographic Art Association, Budapest Hungary 2013 The Shanghai Art Museum, China for VOICE project + exhibition 2008 Immigrant of Distinction Arts + Culture Award, City of Calgary Selected for the Florean Museum Artists Award in Maramures, Romania The National Museum of Modern Art Superior Prize in the Seoul Biennale, Korea The De Cordova Museum Purchase Award / Boston Printmakers Exhibition, USA

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MAJOR MUSEUM INSTALLATION PROJECTS AT: 2004 - 2003 Solo exhibitions in 2003-4 in Japan at the Prince Takamado Gallery / Canadian Embassy Tokyo and School of Art + Architecture, Kobe University, titled “Burning Sappho’s Books”, as well as The Nickle Arts Museum, Canada 2004 (with catalogue text by British author, Jeanette Winterson).

2003 The 60th Anniversary of Silpakorn University, Bangkok, Thailand 2003 The Krakow Triennale, Poland 2003 The Guangzhou Museum of Art and The Beijing International Biennale in China 2002 Liu Haisu Art Museum Shanghai, China 2002 Sunkok Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea

SELECTED COLLECTIONS: The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts The National Ballet of Canada Queensland College of Art Gallery, Australia The National Art Gallery, Varna, Bulgaria The Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt Shanghai Art Museum, China MODEM Art Museum, Debrecen, Hungary Musée des Beaux-Arts, Belgium Dept. of Foreign Affairs Canada, Tokyo Embassy

PUBLIC COMMISSIONS INCLUDE: 2017 2013 2009 2005 2004

City of Airdrie Alberta, Genesis Place Sports Complex murals Savage Trailhead Exterior façade Mural, Edmonton Arts Council, Alberta, Canada The Dark, Outdoor installation, Danish Arts Council + ET4U, Denmark Outdoor large in-situ installations Quebec, Foundation Derouin. The Library of The PreCambrian Calgary International Airport, mural for Air Canada Terminal A

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The Business Revitalization Zone, BRZ 17 Avenue Mural Commission

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 2017 1996

“Un air de liberté” André Seleanu, Vie Des Arts 248, Montreal, Québec, Canada “Selected Canadian Artists”, Instituto de Seguridad Y Servicios de Los Traba Jadores Del Estado”, Celaya, Mexico

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1995

1994

1993 1992 1992

“Ideas and Inspiration: contemporary Canadian Art”, Heartland Motion Pictures Inc. for Saskatchewan Education (CD ROM) (expanded version, 1996), Included with essay by Director of Collections, Patricia Ainslie, Glenbow Museum in; North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century, biographical dictionary by Jules Heller and Nancy G. Heller, Garland Publishing Inc., New York & London 1995 Investing in Art Series, Documentary Video, Media One Productions, Alberta Foundation for the Arts, CBC Sunday Art, Friends of University Hospitals Edmonton postcard and calendar fundraising project, Swain, Robert Hidden Values, Contemporary Canadian Art in Corporate Collections, Douglas & McIntyre, Vancouver and Toronto Laviolette, Mary-Beth. Alexandra Haeseker, Twenty Years, Artichoke, Spring 1993 Tousley, Nancy. Haeseker Celebrates 20 Years of Art, The Calgary Herald, Dec. 4, 1992 Tippett, Maria. By a Lady: Celebrating Three Centuries of Art By Canadian Women, Penguin Books Canada Ltd., Markham, Ontario

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ALEXANDRA HAESEKER · FLEURS DU MAL

VERNON PUBLIC ART GALLERY VERNON, BRITISH COLUMBIA CANADA www.vernonpublicartgallery.com

ALEXANDRA HAESEKER FLEURS DU MAL