The Art of Faye HeavyShield

Exhibition Details

The Art of Faye HeavyShield will present work that spans forty years of her practice. The exhibition situates HeavyShield as a major contributor to contemporary Indigenous art through her creation of a new aesthetic vocabulary. While bearing a resemblance to conceptual installation, her work is rooted in the deep art history of the Canadian prairies and in personal/communal experience. HeavyShield is a senior visual artist who has had a profound impact on Indigenous artists from the Northern Plains and across Turtle Island through an approach based on relationality, an aesthetics of humility, and her poetic visual articulations of Blackfoot language—all rooted within her cultural context as a Blackfoot (Blood) woman from the Kainai territory.

Born in 1953, Faye HeavyShield entered the Canadian contemporary art scene in the early 1980’s and has since inspired several generations through her work as an artist, mentor, and writer. Faye’s work grows out of her experience as a Blood woman and cultural matriarch, resulting in a potent minimalist aesthetic that differentiates her from other senior artists of her territory. HeavyShield has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally, including: Nations in Urban Landscapes at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, BC; rock paper river at Gallery Connexion, Fredericton, NB; Into the Garden of Angels at The Power Plant in Toronto, ON; blood at the Southern Alberta Art Gallery; Land, Spirit, Power at the National Gallery of Canada; Close Encounters: The Next 500 Years at Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art in Winnipeg, MB; and Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Her work is found in the collections of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, Glenbow Museum, Heard Museum (Phoenix), Kelowna Art Gallery, MacKenzie Art Gallery, McMichael Canadian Art Collection, National Gallery of Canada, and Nickle Galleries (Calgary).

Curated By
Felicia Gay

The Art of Faye HeavyShield is organized and circulated by the MacKenzie Art Gallery. This project has been made possible in part by the Government of Canada. The MacKenzie receives ongoing support from the South Saskatchewan Community Foundation, Canada Council for the Arts, Sask Lotteries, City of Regina, University of Regina, and SK Arts.