The Moving Heart: Opening Reception

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About

The Moving Heart - Karlie King and Ashley Johnson

Karlie King, visual artist

We all have a heart. It is a common universal experience. Yet, each heart looks different, sounds different, and functions in its own way. Our hearts are as individual and unique as our fingerprints.

In difference to our fingerprints (which we can see and visually study), our hearts have to be known in other ways. We need new epistemologies - ways of going inward. Listening to the heart, to its rhythm and cadence. Moving in ways that creates space for the heart, so we can feel the physicality of it, or intuiting its needs and requirements.

Accessing the internal via the external is a process. These clay sculptural hearts act as a trigger of sorts, and/or catalyst in this transformation. The hearts are representational, not anatomically correct. By holding them, by considering their weight and placement, and thinking about their movement (the transference and transmutation of blood and air), and linking that visceral knowledge to one’s own heart, a bridge between the tangible and intangible is made.

Knowing one’s own heart is complex. There are biological and anatomical happenings that are imperative to know for one’s own health and longevity. Our heart holds the history of our ancestors. The heart has a narrative; it determines our mortality and encases our deep longings. To move from our inner landscapes is to express our inheritance, our memories and experiences. To harmonize with our organs brings us closer to knowing ourselves.

It is important to have an intimate relationship with our heart, considering its significance. It is, after all, our source of life. But that relationship requires work - attention, learning, empathy, patience. It is for this reason that we created this body of artwork - a multisensory approach to an interdisciplinary exhibit.

Ashley Johnson, performance artist

Conversations with a Faltering Heart

Conversations with a Faltering Heart is a solo dance performance by Ashley Johnson that examines the lived experience of congenital heart disease while exploring the heart as both biological organ and enduring metaphor. Emerging from The Moving Heart, a collaborative installation with ceramic artist Karlie King, the work invites audiences into a multi-sensory space where the internal becomes visible.

Rooted in Johnson’s personal experience, the piece draws inspiration from the sound and imagery of echocardiograms. Set to a soundscape composed using three years of recordings from her own heart by musician Clinton Ackerman, Johnson moves and speaks in direct dialogue with her heartbeat—blending story, and sensation into a love letter to the parts of her heart that await replacement.

Created and performed by Ashley Johnson Musical score by Clinton Ackerman Rehearsal direction by Traci Foster With gratitude to the many experts who contributed to the development of The Moving Heart

Organizer

Weyburn Art Gallery

The Weyburn Art Gallery is a public art gallery located within the Credit Union Spark Centre. The gallery focuses on visual art exhibitions. Working with the Credit Union Spark Centre, the Weyburn Art Gallery organizes and facilitates a variety of art and craft classes offered by the City of Weyburn. The Weyburn Art Gallery also works closely with the Weyburn Arts Council to create public art works in our city, as well as organizing a variety of art events held throughout Weyburn.

WAG's mandate is to promote, support and encourage the arts by providing a diverse range of opportunities that increase awareness, understanding, curiosity, debate, education, and knowledge.