* All images used with permission. Please do not distribute without first contacting the artist.
Sierra Barber graduated from OCAD University’s Sculpture & Installation Program in 2015. She is currently basing her practice in Port Dover, Ontario, Canada.
Sierra is a self-taught encaustic artist, and has been working with the ancient painting technique for nearly 10 years. Her practice explores the natural characteristics of beeswax as a material, creating a seamless bind between reality and the imagined. Her process involves a repetitive build-up of thin layers of melted wax that create mesmerizing forms specific to how the material was applied at the time. The layered process allows the wax to gradually grow and change on its own, transforming into controlled chaos that appears to have happened organically.
Throughout her professional practice, Sierra’s work has explored themes of preservation, transformation, the collection of memory, virtual nostalgia and curiosities of time. These concepts are re-imagined and retold in beeswax, pulling them back into a natural world to be analyzed and interpreted.
