UPDATE!!!

It's been a while! I've been busy and Instagram has taken over most of my digital record-making. But there's something nice about a blog, isn't there? Something more deliberate and slow and intimate. 

Recently I have been...

* FUNDRAISING for Creating Language Through Arts. We received another grant to continue our Arts Residencies that focus on using art as a language when there are communication barriers present due to hearing loss. Our new Metropolitan Regional Arts Council grant requires that we provide some matching funds so we are fundraising left and right! If you are able to contribute (even $10!) we will be eternally grateful. You can do so HERE. (These are some of our Third grade students)



* Participating in my new fellowship. I am honored to announce that I have been selected as a fellow for Art(ists) on the Verge 7. AOV is an intensive, mentor-based fellowship program for 5 Minnesota based emerging artists working experimentally at the interstion of art and technology. Myself, along with artists Eric F. Avery, Torre Edahl, Jessica Henderson and Joshua McGarvy will participate in a year-long program that will culminate in an exhibition at The Soap Factory in the Spring of 2016. Art(ists) on the Verge is generously supported by the Jerome Foundation. 

* Exploring new media- in January of this year I created a video that has been a long time in the making. This endeavor combines my love of writing with video performance and story telling and draws heavily on my experience growing up with a profound and progressive hearing loss. You can click here to view it on vimeo. 

* Working my butt off in the studio getting ready for upcoming shows at Public Functionary and The Phipps Center. I'm focusing on larger works, and I have six in-progress 4' paintings in the studio at the moment. So far my attempts to deliberately change the way I make art has been both challenging and rewarding. Change is a heavy thing and has its own order. All I can say about these new pieces is that they feel distressed, un-done, weathered, unraveled. Maybe I need to literally demolish these pieces in order to grow?

Elements Unheard at the MacRostie Art Center

My solo show Elements Unheard opens at the MacRostie Art Center in Grand Rapids, MN next month.

MacRostie Art Center
405 1st Ave NW
Grand Rapids, MN 55744

I am lucky and honored to say that I received an Artist Initiative Grant from the MN State Arts Board to produce the work for this show which is a visual investigation of my senses and how I experience my self and the world through them. Below is the Artist Statement I have produced for this show:

My artwork is the result of an intuitive process and is a reflection of the space I enter when I am creating. I lean over my paintings, a stiffness in the tips of my fingers. I carry my body around. I write my body down. Fiber by fiber. Cell by cell. The hours are long and I have never been more aware of how my good body aches.  

My experience of the world has been altered and defined by a significant and progressive hearing loss that started in early childhood. It is a distinct lens through which I perceive my self and the world. Through this latest body of work I am conducting a visual investigation of my senses and how my body experiences these senses. What does sound look like? How does it move through my body? How do my senses attach themselves to each other and mix up? 

Liza Sylvestre is a fiscal year 2014 recipient of an artist initiative grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.