Saying Goodbye to AiR Shay Hucklebridge!
May 10th was the last day of Shay Hucklebridge’s residency here at Eastern Edge! While we were sad to have her leave us, we parted ways on such a high note—her residency finished off with a fantastic artist talk on the weekend!
While she was with us, Shay worked away on various watercolour projects, cozied up in a blanket in her studio space. As she worked, we’d sometimes check in to peek at her work, often getting caught up in fruitful conversations about art, health, fiction and fantasy, linguistics… everything under the sun! We also had the pleasure of meeting Shay’s wife, who visited regularly and even collaborated with Shay on a particular special project (read on to see more)!
During her artist talk, Shay showed us examples of work she has made throughout her time as an artist, spanning many techniques and approaches. She spoke to her interest in “possible worlds” and how this informs much of the imagery in her paintings.
“Conceptually, my paintings are interested in alternative natural histories as a window into the relationship between the internal world of individuals (thoughts, beliefs, perception) and the world (externally measurable facts).”
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- slideshow from Shay’s artist talk
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- slideshow from Shay’s artist talk
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- slideshow from Shay’s artist talk
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- slideshow from Shay’s artist talk
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- The Whales That Once Were, Shay Hucklebridge
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- Two Barn Owls, Shay Hucklebridge
Shay linked these ideas back to her academic background in Linguistics, explaining, “Some branches of Linguistics use these ideas to model sentences like the following: I might go to the store = In at least some of the worlds that are compatible with what I believe about the real world, I go to the store.”
“We don’t really know which of a number of ‘possible’ world’s we’re in,” Shay said during her talk. “I explore this by incorporating storytelling into my art, and often by thinking about imagined natural histories–things that don’t occur in nature but plausibly could.”
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- Hyacinth, Shay Hucklebridge
Shay also showed us a wonderful project she recently completed with her wife, Dr. Anissa Neal; they collaborated on a quilt that combined Shay’s watercolour paintings of a local graveyard, and Anissa’s detailed sewing and embroidery. They brought this special piece with them to Shay’s artist talk and shared with all who attended!
It was wonderful that the community had a chance to chat with Shay about her work and take an in-person look at what she worked on during her residency. We are so grateful for the opportunity to meet Shay and have her in our space for the last month and a half! We can’t wait to see where her work takes her next!
