Barbara Harman

Artist Statement

I work in series, using the natural environment of a specific place as the focus for my explorations. Since 2000, that place has been the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge in Bloomington, Minnesota. A typical series consists of more than 100 pieces, including photographs, writing, site notes, sketches, monotypes, paintings on paper and fabric, embroidery, beading and artist books.

When I capture the physicality of the natural world in my art, the process fixes transient memory to one place at one time in the year, the quality of light and my own feelings on that day. My work is about journeys through change: regular journeys - moving from one place to another - and metaphorical journeys - moving from one kind of life to another, one way of looking at things to another, one age to another, one role to another.