Arteles Catalogue 2023-2020

New Course program / APRL 2022
Amber Phelps Bondaroff
Canada
www.amberpb.com
About
I am an interdisciplinary visual artist, performer and arts
organizer, living on Treaty 4 Territory in Saskatchewan,
Canada. I craft situations that encourage people to make and
be together. Through these spaces, my work strives to soften
the rigidities of conventional social interaction. I work across
many mediums, including; performance, video, drawing,
music and film.
Born in Calgary Alberta, I have lived and traveled to many
places before settling in Saskatchewan in 2012. I continue to
be influenced by and learn from my relationships with those
around me - the animate and inanimate alike. I am a founder
and co-artistic director of Swamp Fest, a small music and
arts festival and have worked as Programming Director
at Neutral Ground, Artist-Run Centre since 2017 (both in
Regina, Canada). I am a life-long student of yoga and am
currently in training to be a yoga therapist. I received an MFA
in Intermedia Arts from the University of Regina, in 2014 and
a BFA in Interdisciplinary Fine Arts from NSCAD University,
Halifax in 2007.
Rest, reflect, renew (& rock!)
I came to Arteles to carve renewed and intentional space
for both my artistic and meditative practices. Feeling the
administrative burn out of running a busy non-profit art
space, a month to focus on my own practice was a very
much needed luxury. I was 4 months pregnant when arriving
in Finland, so I also had the goal of establishing practices
that I could sustain (and that would sustain me) through this
new phase of life.
I moved slowly, especially over the first week. Morning
asana and writing practices were consistent, in addition to
daily walks in the forest. Over the month I wrote and recorded
a collection of songs combining field recordings with voice
and synthesizer, inspired by, and written amongst, the trees,
moss and rocks. This process included deep listening to
the woods and close observation of the surrounding flora
as I witnessed the slow spring thaw. Much of what was
first revealed were the lichens, clinging to rocks, sticks and
bark. Their resilience fascinated me, with many hours spent
peering at their tiny complexities. What started as close
looking at bark and early buds, turned into a small series of
ink, pencil and watercolour drawings of lichens and other
specimens, gathered on my walks in the woods. Some of
these drawings may accompany the album of music, when
ready to be released into the world.