About
Residency Dates
  • May 2015 – June 2015
Region
USA

Marie Bergstedt first exhibited in the 1970s and 80s,
concentrating in large-format hand-colored photography and beginning to visually
open troubling stories. Coupled with this inspection of her own and other families’
breakdowns were memories of the models she had found to help hurdle obstacles
in growing up, simple people who forged a path through great challenges.

Financial necessity steered Marie on a 25-year “day job” career
in fund development.  However, she was
fortunate to continue learning, always working at organizations with a strong
visual art component until, nine years ago, she returned to her life goal of
full-time art practice. Conceptually she has revived the mining of her personal
encounters, telling visual stories meant for viewers to translate into their
own or more-universal tales.  Learning
through experience that, for her, problems are best resolved through rhythmic
hand movements, she has looped back to the techniques she first learned to
ground her childhood.  Sculptural pieces
combine new stitching, crochet, and knitting with antique, used and found
objects to tell and amend stories, all about people.

In the past decade Bergstedt’s art has appeared in more than
90 exhibitions, receiving 15 awards.  She
has been invited to present lectures and workshops at seven organizations,
including the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles, California College of
Arts, and The Studios of Key West. Along with 37 previous books, magazines,
catalogs and interviews, in 2014/2015 her work was published as the cover and
4-page spread in Canada’s Anthology of Contemporary Textile and Fibre
Art, the Netherlands’ Textile Art Around the World, and in the “On
View Portraiture” section of Fiber Art Now magazine.  Invited for a 2015 solo exhibition at Rebecca
Randall Bryan Art Gallery, Coastal Carolina University, South Carolina; future
award exhibits will be held at Ann Marie Sculpture Garden & Arts Center (a
Smithsonian Affiliate), Dowell, Maryland; and SomeThingsLooming Gallery,
Reading, Pennsylvania.

Strongly imprinted by her Midwestern upbringing, Marie
Bergstedt has maintained a base residence in San Francisco, California, for the
past 35 years.  Art schools,
universities, colleges, and professional workshops across the country have
provided a broad base to her study of traditional art techniques. While enrolled
over a lifetime in art classes, her “more practical” degree was in education
followed by numerous courses and 25 years of practice in nonprofit fund
development, including Montalvo Art Center from 1999 to 2007.  See Bergstedt’s website at http://mariebergstedtartist.com and
Facebook page at https:www.facebook.com/marie.bergstedt.79