solo exhibition
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA USA
June 30th- October 29th, 2023
In the series Strange Plants, Heather Beardsley works across a range of media such as found photography and textiles, embroidery, image transfer, sculpture, and video to create scenes of architecture seemingly reclaimed by wild vegetal overgrowth. These eerie depictions express the sublime power of nature against the manmade, provoking, current dialogues on climate change and the environment.
The varied locations have a personal connection to Beardsley as they chronicle the many places her art practice has taken her from Chicago, Vienna, Kyiv, Budapest, Beijing, Tallinn, and Hampton Roads. Beardsley’s 2017 visit to Pripyat, the ghost town closest to the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in present-day Ukraine, instilled a real-life vision for these imagined scenes. With postcards and textiles found in local flea markets across Europe, Beardsley juxtaposes structures with encroaching fauna, using embroidery to challenge the pejorative confines of “decorative art” or “craft.” In a time when cities are growing at an unprecedented rate, nuclear tensions are at a post-Cold War high, and the effects of climate change seem more pronounced every year, Beardsley’s plant “invasions” pose questions instead of providing answers, ultimately showing that even from the brink of environmental disaster nature can fight back, and new life will grow.
The varied locations have a personal connection to Beardsley as they chronicle the many places her art practice has taken her from Chicago, Vienna, Kyiv, Budapest, Beijing, Tallinn, and Hampton Roads. Beardsley’s 2017 visit to Pripyat, the ghost town closest to the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in present-day Ukraine, instilled a real-life vision for these imagined scenes. With postcards and textiles found in local flea markets across Europe, Beardsley juxtaposes structures with encroaching fauna, using embroidery to challenge the pejorative confines of “decorative art” or “craft.” In a time when cities are growing at an unprecedented rate, nuclear tensions are at a post-Cold War high, and the effects of climate change seem more pronounced every year, Beardsley’s plant “invasions” pose questions instead of providing answers, ultimately showing that even from the brink of environmental disaster nature can fight back, and new life will grow.
Exhibition Press
Press Release
Virginia Beach-Based Artist to Showcase Work in Exhibit at the Chrysler Museum of Art
June 15, 2023 (Norfolk, Va.) The Chrysler Museum of Art is pleased to announce the exhibition of Virginia Beach-based artist Heather Beardsley. In the series Strange Plants, Beardsley works across a range of media such as found photography and textiles, embroidery, image transfer, sculpture, and video to create scenes of architecture seemingly reclaimed by wild vegetal overgrowth. These eerie depictions express the sublime power of nature against the manmade, provoking current dialogues on climate change and the environment. Beardsley’s 2017 visit to Pripyat, the ghost town closest to the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in present-day Ukraine, instilled a real-life vision for these imagined scenes. Following that otherworldly glimpse of civilization devoid of humans, Beardsley began drawing over a suite of photographs sourced in Budapest, inventing plant forms that crowd and comingle with buildings and bridges. Beardsley has since developed the concept across other two-dimensional and sculptural formats as a viral proliferation of plants that is ever-expanding.
“Heather’s practice is rooted in a spirit of interdisciplinarity, reflecting not only a shared love of art and biology but also an interest in expanding her knowledge of various media,” said Chelsea Pierce, PhD, McKinnon Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art and exhibition curator for the Chrysler Museum. “The exhibition promises to be a truly sensorial delight that will captivate our visitors’ imaginations.”
Heather Beardsley (American), Strange Plants, Kyiv, 2020, Collage and embroidery on found textile, ©Heather Beardsley
Collected from the varied locations Beardsley’s art practice has taken her from Chicago, Vienna, Kyiv, Budapest, Beijing, Tallinn, and Hampton Roads, the found postcards, photographs, and textiles that Beardsley intervenes over in thread and ink, have a personal connection. Beardsley captures the global and local through her source imagery while at the same time challenging the pejorative confines of “decorative art” or “craft,” often associated with the female gender. Beardsley salvages traditional embroidered textiles from flea markets in Central and Eastern Europe, adding collaged or transferred images of modernist architecture in a delicate balance with the found motifs. The juxtaposition of the identifiably modern and brutalist forms on a backdrop of dainty, colorful floral forms further confounds “high” and “low” art demarcations. At the same time, Strange Plants promotes a sincere appreciation for flora. Noting John Wyndham’s 1951 novel titled, The Day of the Triffids, as a reference, in which carnivorous plants appear and begin to multiply much to the apprehension of humankind (not unlike a certain HBO series in which a zombie-like fungi is the antagonist), Beardsley’s plants, by contrast, are benevolent. In a time when cities are growing at an unprecedented rate, nuclear tensions are at a post-Cold War high, and the effects of climate change seem more pronounced every year, Beardsley’s plant “invasions” evoke a sense of resiliency, ultimately showing that even from the brink of environmental disaster nature can fight back, and new life will grow.
“We are thrilled to be the first museum to present a solo exhibition of Beardsley’s expansive body of compelling work,” said Mark Castro, PhD, newly appointed Director of Curatorial Affairs at the Chrysler Museum. “The Chrysler has a history of engaging with regional artists and this show is a reminder to all of just how rich and exciting the art scene is in Hampton Roads,” added Castro.
The exhibition is on view June 30 through October 29, 2023 in the Museum’s Frank Photography Gallery.
This exhibition is organized by the Chrysler Museum of Art.