May 12, 2019 - June 15, 2019

ARTIST TALK: Wednesday, June 5, 5:00 PM, at Struts & Faucet

Lou Sheppard is a Canadian artist working in interdisciplinary audio, performance and installation based practice. Of Irish, English and Scottish settler ancestry, Sheppard was raised on unceded Mi’Kmaq territory, and is based in K’jiputuk/Halifax. Sheppard graduated from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 2006 and then studied English and Education at Mount Saint Vincent University. In their recent practice Sheppard uses processes of translation and metaphor to interrogate structures of power in data and language. Their work is evidenced through installation, performance and score and often leads them to collaborate with other artists, including musicians, visual artists and performing artists. Sheppard has exhibited work both in Canada and internationally, and was included in the first Antarctic Biennale and the Antarctic Pavilion in Venice. In 2017 Sheppard received the Emerging Atlantic Artist Award and in 2018 they were an international residency recipient of the Sobey Art Award for an upcoming residency at ISCP in Brooklyn. Sheppard has been an artist in residence at the Khyber Centre for the Arts, The Doris McCarthy Artist in Residence Program, Banff Centre for the Arts, Cite des Arts in Paris, in the Faculty of Education at McGill University, and currently at Struts Gallery & Faucet Media Arts Centre in Siknikt, Mi’kmaqi/Sackville, New Brunswick.

During their five week residency at Struts Lou will be working on several projects including the development of graphic scores and a musical performance in concert with bird species and birdsong in the area, and an opera-installation, My Fears of Tomorrow are Melting Away, considering texts of self actualization and affirmation as scores for the formation of the Neo-liberal subject.

Image: Pamela Hart