Carmen Hathaway is a Canadian artist of Abenaki and German ancestry. Her visual arts practice evolves through experiences of exhibition, teaching, and creating works in a variety of mediums including painting, photography, video, and audio.
In combining traditional methods with digital technologies, the surreal narratives of her mixed media originals seek to excite, provoke, and entice. The recipient of several Manitoba Arts Council grants, she has participated in group shows since the late ’90s. Her solo exhibitions Carte Blanche, (Abenaki Museum, Odanak, Québec), and Self-Similarity, (Portage Arts Centre, Portage la Prairie, Manitoba) were presented in 2011.
A member of the Abenaki First Nation, Odanak, Québec, she lives and works in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. Ms. Hathaway is represented by Ashukan Cultural Space in Montreal. She is currently developing a new body of work for her Ashukan solo exhibit, August 3 – September 1, 2017. A synthesis of diverse concepts interpreting idiosyncrasies of various codes, characters’ and symbols, From Smoke to Cyber Signals is inspired by visual and audio codes such as digital binary, DNA, music notation, and more.
Her contemporary interpretations of the cultural heritage of Abenaki weaving continually evolve, informing adaptations and hybridizations. The infinite range of woven structural form potential has led to investigating and experimenting in her creation of interlaced 3D digitally modeled sculpture.Weaving virtual realities has become a parallel to this aspect in the artist’s digital projects– by incorporating and expanding on ideas relevant to the warp and weft of the fabric of life.
