Heidi Bergstrom is a multimedia visual artist, curator, and cultural researcher located on the unceded and traditional territories of the Scia’new First Nation, near Victoria, BC, Canada.

Her fine art practice and exhibitions include works in painting, printmaking, book arts, video, photography, multimedia and community engaged installations. She has exhibited her work in Canada and the United States and has worked as a professional curator in public and private galleries.

ARTIST’S STATEMENT

My work is grounded in and emerges from personal history, social and political narratives, and interactive community engagement. I observe and share meanings, symbolism, distortions of ‘reality’, imaginaries, and disruptions; I find inspiration and interest everywhere– people, landscape, current social, historical, and political theory and issues, and philosophy.

I am keenly aware of the importance of language and definitions, gestures and actions and seek to unveil the underlying meanings of things. My work will often return to the importance of place, local histories, and my local experience of things in relation to the bigger view of the world and our place in it.

ABOUT FRONTIER

Where I live on the west coast of Canada on Vancouver Island, there is entrenched local mythology concerning our “Frontier” heritage. The historical narrative is an heroic backdrop of so-called discovery and exploration in a vast, unused territory – ripe for exploitation and development by the settlers. Even though the ideas of methods of decolonization are becoming more widely understood and adopted, the settler mindset is alive and well and affirming this frontier narrative.

During the residency I began a personal mission to research my local area and the relationship with the First Nations, the Scia’New. I wanted to examine the status of Reconciliation and Decolonization here and unpack the local settler and Indigenous histories and look for concrete ways to redress these issues (if possible) and decolonize Smets-Shosin.

My project starts with creating a journal of research including academic papers, historical and contemporary maps from Native Lands.ca and local narratives from our Museum Society for example. I created a framework of geography and re-mapping in the book using north, east, south, west, and latitudes and longitudes – that shift counter-clockwise as one progresses through the book, causing a sense of disorientation and confusion as the flow is disrupted.

Sometimes you must turn the book to read information, then turn it back to read other information. Pages are inserted and folded  – by unfolding them you find other layers and symbols- red feathers and red ribbons-  reminders of the murdered and missing Indigenous women and the colour of the Canadian maple leaf. By then your world is upside down and it is not comfortable, nor should it be. This is not a neat and tidy presentation of facts and information, though the cover of the book (not designed by me), suggests an idyllic narrative within. I greatly appreciate the opportunity to initiate this work here during the residency – it may not have happened otherwise.

In the collaborative project I have the great joy to work with two artists from the UK; Annie Rapstoff and Anna Goodchild. Our collaboration goal was to explore Littoral Zones – those spaces between and at the edge of waters – oceans, rivers, lakes – metaphors for interrelationships and understanding the nature of our geographical frontiers. We focused on our common element – water – and synchronized our gestures and explorations, progressively merging in a video project.

We sought common ground – those things that we that could connect us vs. separate us despite the geographical expanse. Our collaboration flowed well (pun intended) because of our commitment to each other and the process, staying open and uncritical, dropping defenses and ego, and trusting in the process. Coming to consensus quickly with each of us contributing loads of ideas and content, and taking risks (new tech tools, words, breath, poetry) with surprising and satisfying results. I am looking forward to continuing this collaborative work and seeing where it leads our artistic expressions and friendships.