Archives, found items, historical documents, and printed matter are primary materials in my studio practice. I am curious about how the practice and methodology of repair, reuse and collage can be used to investigate and speculate about place and time. I have found that this approach of method and speculation encourages a transitional space where functional objects and reclaimed materials can shift from their initial purpose and intended capacity.

Working in kinship with collage series and writing may open a pathway of exploration and curiosity (rather than definitive singular statements) about Foucault’s definition of heterotopic spaces – “worlds within worlds, mirroring and yet upsetting what is outside.” Speculative Portal is a strategy to shift art/work outside the initial context of colonial printed matter, toward an other, no-person’s space.

Aimée Henny Brown, an artist and educator of settler ancestry, completed her BFA at the University of Alberta and obtained her Masters in Fine and Media Arts at NSCAD University. Aimée’s artistic practice engages archives, research and printed matter to question historical content within her contemporary art practice. She has received several awards and grants, notably the Joseph Beuys Scholarship for Artistic Merit and several Canada Council Production Grants. Her collages, drawings, performances and bookworks have been presented nationally and internationally, with group shows in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Kentucky, Japan, Germany, Scotland, and Portugal, alongside many exhibitions in Canada. She has attended numerous artist residencies with galleries, artist-run centres and universities in North America and abroad. She is an Assistant Professor: foundations, 3D and extended media, with the University of the Fraser Valley.