Virginia Beach-Based Artist to Showcase Work in Exhibit at the Chrysler Museum of Art

Heather Beardsley (American), Strange Plants, Norfolk, 2022, Embroidery on photograph, ©Heather Beardsley

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.

Programming:

Heather Beardsley Artist Talk
Thursday, August 3 from 6–8 p.m.
Join the artist for a conversational walk through the current exhibition, Heather Beardsley: Strange Plants. Explore intricately embroidered photographs, reinventions of found textiles, and even the transformation of her childhood doll house. Hear the artist weave together her inspiration from global travel, thoughts on craft, and passion for the environment. After the gallery talk, continue the conversation with an artist meet-and-greet in Huber Court. Cash bar available.

Adult Studio Class: Cut and Place Collage Workshop
Saturday, September 16 from 10:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
Let’s make the familiar strange in a collage workshop with exhibiting artist, Heather Beardsley, now on view in the Frank Photography Gallery. Participants will use historic photographs of Hampton Roads to make collages that consider the relationship between photography, history, and place.
$25 for members, $40 for non-members

View the events calendar for more information

About the artist:

Heather Beardsley is a visual artist that creates mixed-media projects at the intersection of art, science, and environmental issues. She works primarily with embroidery, cyanotype, and air-dry clay, mixing the aesthetics of scientific illustration with craft and children’s art materials to play with display conventions and visual hierarchies. Beardsley received her MFA in fiber and material studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2015 and her BA in studio art from the University of Virginia in 2009. After completing her master’s, she spent a year in Vienna, Austria on a Fulbright Scholarship for Installation Art, and in 2017, she was awarded a year-long Braunschweig Projects International Artist Fellowship by the Ministry of Science and Culture for Lower Saxony, Germany. Through a series of international residencies, travel has become an important aspect of Beardsley’s art; she incorporates elements from cities she’s visited into her projects. Some of her residencies include KulturKontakt Austria in Vienna; Shangyuan Art Museum in Beijing, China; IZOLYATSIA in Kyiv, Ukraine; Rogers Art Loft in Las Vegas; Sirius Arts Centre in Ireland; and La Box in Bourges, France. Beardsley has shown her work both nationally and internationally, including group exhibitions at Science Gallery Dublin, Museo del Traje in Madrid, the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, and Museum Rijswijk in the Netherlands.

About the Chrysler Museum of Art:

The Chrysler Museum of Art is one of America’s most distinguished mid-sized art museums, with a nationally recognized collection of more than 30,000 objects, including one of the great glass collections in America. The core of the Chrysler’s collection comes from Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., an avid art collector who donated thousands of objects from his private collection to the Museum. The Museum has growing collections in many areas and mounts an ambitious schedule of visiting exhibitions and educational programs each season. The Chrysler has also been recognized nationally for its unique commitment to hospitality with its innovative gallery host program.

The Perry Glass Studio is a state-of-the-art facility on the Museum’s campus. The studio offers programming for aspiring and master artists alike in a variety of processes including glassblowing, fusing, flameworking, coldworking, and neon. 

In addition, the Chrysler Museum of Art administers the Moses Myers House, a historic house in downtown Norfolk, as well as the Jean Outland Chrysler Library. For more information on the Chrysler Museum of Art, visit chrysler.org.

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For more information, interview assistance, or a high-resolution image suitable for publication, please contact Jordan Fontenot at The Meridian Group at 757-340-7425 or jordanf@themeridiangroup.com.