FEBRUARY & MARCH Art Exhibit

LEIGH BARBIER: song of the seed in the night garden

Artist Statement

I imagine the Night Garden with fertile soil, created by the persistent cycle of observation, reflection and digestion. I plant the seeds that need their song to be heard. The darkness offers quiet, solitude and freedom to construct imaginary worlds and characters which become the conceptual landscape for my image making. I love creating female centered domains where emotions dictate the culture and building community is the foundation for enlightenment.

Artist Bio

I was born and raised in the San Fernando Valley, California, and grew up on a gravel road, running barefoot and free between neighbor's homes. I attended a Christian Science church every Sunday and Disneyland once a year. I remember thinking as a small child that Sees candy was a religious destination and God looked like a tube of toothpaste. Later museums replaced Sees candy and I found order in the universe through art.

I am drawn to religious art, admire Thomas Hart Benton's line and color, adore the muralist of the Mexican Revolution and can’t get the images of Disney from my 1960s childhood out of my visual vocabulary.

I have found that the work I have done to earn a living has impacted me more than anything I learned in college. From museum model-making to digital painting for the special effects industry; they have both shaped and condensed my hands-on skills and sharpened my eye. The highlights have been working on dioramas for the California Academy of Sciences, being part of an all-girl team to make a giant baseball mitt for the Giants stadium and digitally painting on Star Wars, Episode 2 and 3. My best freelance opportunity to date has come from my experience working with the San Francisco musical group, The Residents over the last 15 years. This has been the perfect combination of work and art, an opportunity to combine my vision with the narrative visuals of the Residents' myth-making.

For me, making drawings, paintings and sculpture is a simple and direct process of giving emotions form. This compulsion, along with my over-active imagination that perceives peril around every corner, drives my image making.