Gladys Wozny Siemens: The Archival Shore

AGSC is pleased to present recent work by established Swift Current area artist Gladys Wozny Siemens in an exhibition entitled The Archival Shore that includes a series of sculptural reliefs. In the artist’s words, her work revolves around recording and representing records of the naturally occurring environment around her.

It began in 2005 when I noticed the tracks of a wild animal passing through my garden where I live in Rush Lake. There had been talk of cougar sightings in the hayfields nearby and I set out to make a plaster cast of an imprint to see if I could identify it. I was stunned with the resulting cast.  It articulated the ridges of the pads, and the sharpness of the claws in such detail it seemed to pulse with life. It set in motion an idea to incorporate these wondrous records of track patterns, soil formations, the detritus of roots, stones, feathers, shells, and other earth textures found along shores, into my abstract sculptures at the time.

As part artist and part archivist I juxtapose these direct earth casts with elements of human culture: words and geometric forms. I present these haptic and often visceral records in three-dimensional form, to reconnect with the natural world and to reflect on our relationship to it.