ARTIST PROFILE
HEATHER B. SWANN
ACTIVATED
OBJECTS
Heather B. Swann’s Auckland Art Fair
presentation reveals new elements of
a solo exhibition to be held in Japan
in late 2018. Briony Downes writes.A
s an undergrad, I would often pass by
Heather B. Swann in the halls of the Uni-
versity of Tasmania’s School of Art. With
hair billowing in a curly electrified cloud
and glasses perched upon her nose, she
always appeared as though her mind was
constantly ticking over with creativity.
Coming to art in her late 20s, Swann
studied bookbinding and graphic design
before majoring in printmaking and sculpture at the
University of Tasmania School of Art. She gradu-
ated with Honours in 1993 and returned to UTAS
several years later to complete a Master of Fine Art
in 2003. In between study, Swann was awarded the
1998 Rosamund McCulloch Studio Residency at the
Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris and as her first
trip overseas, the experience proved instrumental to
her practice. She was deeply inspired by the art and
culture she saw in France, particularly the Musée
de Cluny, National Museum of the Middle Ages,
a former gothic mansion now housing a treasure
trove of medieval artefacts.
For more than 20 years, Swann has maintained
a diverse and refined art practice incorporating
drawing, sculpture and performance. Early inspi-
rations were Hieronymus Bosch and the Surreal-
ists and their influence can be seen in the way her
work possesses a dreamlike elegance tinged with
a playful dark humour. Themes of wildness and
containment feature heavily in her work and black
leather, metal, resin and silk are favoured materials.
Over time, Swann has become known for her large-
scale sculptural works that seem to sit somewhere
between antique furniture, animal forms and the-
atrical costumes.
“The activated object has always been an ele-
ment of Heather’s work, ever since her wind-up
sculptures of the 1990s,” gallery director Michael
Bugelli explains. “In 1993 she made a four-me-
tre tall automaton-woman for [Tasmanian opera
company] IHOS Opera’s Days and Nights with Christ 1