Biography

Moira Fearnley (she/her) is an Edmonton based emerging illustrative artist studying at MacEwan University. Her practice focuses primarily on narrative depictions of animals and nature, extracting compelling stories from the names, behaviours, and mythologies tied to creatures that catch her interest. It feels like giving animals voices through interpretation, and she bridges the gap between humans and animals, showing that they are more similar than we tend to acknowledge.

She is drawn to the repetitive and changeable nature of printmaking, enjoying the cyclical motions of the practice, and the way that the body falls into a rhythm while creating a print. Moira finds that printmaking allows for a lot of time to reflect. Once the sketch is on the block and she begins carving, the process becomes much more tactile, and her hands can feel their way through completing the print as her mind wanders. It forges a connection between herself and her body with artwork and its subject.

She explores the overlap between humans and animals, often depicting animals in more human frameworks to personify them. Her more recent artworks explore the sense of community or home. Portraying the tug one feels in their chest that calls them home, or the disquiet of feeling a sense of belonging to a memory you don't quite remember. Making pieces that show places she feels at home in mixed with natural settings, and using those as locations for her animal storytelling. Her practice marries the stories we tell as humans and our efforts in categorizing and understanding the world around us.