Current Student Research

Tamara Deedman

Printmaking
tdeedman@ualberta.ca

I am processing and transforming my father’s archive – simultaneously treasured collections and hoarded trash – to wrestle with the phenomenon of object attachment as a survival mechanism. Through an autoethnographic lens, I am exploring notions of human attachment to objects that hold both physical and emotional space, and how these occupy memory, identity, and grief. On a much more personal level, through my father’s archive, I question what objects can tell us about coping with embodied trauma. I position my work in conversation with my father’s belongings to explore how one “recognizes the embedded vulnerabilities of memory, inhibition, human existence, the precariousness of home, and the politics of belonging” (Lauzon 2017) through inherited objects. As I navigate both my father’s absence and the surplus of his objects, I explore how these items materialize relationships within domestic spaces. More importantly, I consider how they mark endurance, trauma, and coping mechanisms; every collected item is a signifier and a reminder of my father's addiction and substance abuse.

Lauzon, Claudette. The Unmaking of Home in Contemporary Art. University of Toronto Press, 2017

 

Olivia Arau McSweeny

Printmaking
araumcsw@ualberta.ca

My research examines the roles of hope and resilience in navigating personal, communal, and cultural responses to climate change and other interconnected crises. I do this through my studio practice in printmaking and the expanded fields of sculpture, and socially engaged art practices. My prints and other works are often figurative, placing myself and other subjects in domestic and natural environments. In these scenes, plants and fungi abundantly grow from the body, the furniture, and every corner of the space, creating moments of sanctuary that link the growth to these out of place ecosystems directly to systems of love and care.

When we focus solely on climate doomism, we rob ourselves of any opportunity to imagine –and perhaps one day live in– a reality that can survive the current state of the world. But what does hope look like? This crisis is everywhere, it looms large over our small selves. And yet, we are not just ourselves. We are interconnected and exist in echoes. Ecosystems are built of species and species of individuals and individuals of cells, and so on. And planets make up galaxies which in turn make up universes; the micro reflects the macro and vice versa. Hope may look like doing something small and aiming for a ripple. It is a reminder that caring for the world means caring deeply for ourselves and our communities. This approach is fundamental in keeping up the momentum of environmental movements and feels worthy of exploration, as urgency and fear can motivate change but hope in the context of meaningful action maintains it.

 

Ludmila Lima De Morais

Intermedia
limademo@ualberta.ca

In the quiet moments before sleep, my mind slips into a realm where the familiar intertwines with the fantastical—a fusion of childhood reminiscences, present struggles, and dreams. Themes of sound, nature, surveillance, and human interaction emerge as the narrative foundation. When I wake up, I'm left with "Saudade," a burning longing for something that wasn't real.

Employing AI technology, robotics, soundscapes, sculptures, and game engines, I embark on transcribing this ineffable experience into tangible forms. Influenced by sci-fi epics like The Matrix, Blade Runner, Akira, Interstellar, The Thirteenth Floor, and Ghost in the Shell, my work explores intricate relationships between humans, nature, and technology. Boundaries blur into a captivating dance of comfort and unease.

Duality is a constant in my work—an intentional trap strategy. Friendly visual concepts often lure viewers into a deeper, uncomfortable reality. For instance, something seemingly adorable on the surface becomes unsettling up close.

As an artist on this introspective expedition, I aim to create a conversation that traverses the liminal spaces of consciousness. It's a space where ephemeral things like dreams are not just observed but captured and shared.

 

Madeline Sturm

Printmaking
msturm@ualberta.ca

My experience of being raised in rural Colorado has had an ongoing impact on my creative practice. I have always been drawn to isolated environments with minimal human impact. These environments bring light and attention to these small intricate and complex worlds that are encapsulated in ecosystems that we can often not see but potentially feel. My current intent as an artist is to explore questions of interconnectivity, in hopes that the viewers of my work will feel a sense of connection to greater ecosystems in which we are all intertwined. These creative explorations have led me to question how the idea of both the human and non-human and frame it in a contemporary context, and if this framing results in a simulated separation that limits our sense of ourselves and the world around us. Asking questions about what it means to think with a different mind about a completely different world.

As a printmaker and lithographer, the process of layering is established by emotional layers of the work, the touchable act of physical layering which is fundamental aspect of my work, and the historical layering of old images on each stone is a critical component in my work, as well as referring to the layering that we see in natural environments indicated by time, weathering, and growth.

 

Sheryl Spencer

Printmaking
sdspence@ualberta.ca

My art practice focuses on objects and things that surround us. Some of these objects are chosen and acquired for usefulness, some of these objects are acquired for pleasure or curiosity. When we take responsibility for objects, we give them a purpose- a life- within our surroundings. Sometimes, we are the first or only owner of an item, and wholly responsible for its timeline. Other times we collect items that come with remnants of another life, and with them, various potential timelines, and entanglements. These objects have origins, and stories – known or unknown. Just as we have agency to select the objects we keep around us, these objects have something about them that causes our desire or necessity for interaction.

In addition to personal belongings that we become entangled with on a physical level, I am also curious about certain public objects that invite metaphor, and emotional or intellectual entanglement, whether that consideration is personal, or more broadly or publicly considered.

As well as the consideration of the entanglements between people and things, I incorporate the idea of the “numinous” object. The term “numen” describes a spirit or soul. Not only do I work with the idea that objects have agency, but I prefer to examine the augmented possibility that objects also have a spirit that causes a deeper reverence for the items around us. My recent work explores some of the interactions and entanglements I have experienced with objects and their underlying potentials, agencies, and spirits.

I believe the interaction we have with any object or item, public or personal is worth considering artistically. Whether the interconnection between ourselves and objects or things is physical, or perceived, there is something important in the idea of what connects us to the world, our world, and our imagination.