Mia WEINBERG

Biography

Born in London, England, Mia Weinberg left a career in industrial manufacturing, and moved to Vancouver in 1987. She graduated from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design in 1994. Subsequently, her work has been exhibited across Canada and internationally. In 2002, Mia participated in a collaborative residency at The Banff Centre (Alberta) that resulted in the acquisition of her work by the Walter Phillips Gallery. Mia has collaborated with artists, ballet dancers and musicians. In 2004 she was awarded an Earthwatch artist fellowship to participate in an archeological project in Washington State, USA. Mia's image "Atlin II" received the Director's Selection Award from The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado, USA in 2008. Her first public art commission—an engraved granite pyramid—was installed in 2009 at the entrance to the Muttart Conservatory in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Recently, Mia has created two public art projects for the Canadian City of Richmond: one was displayed at the Brighouse Station of the Canada Line and the other is a permanent historical piece at the Hamilton Community Centre.

Artist Statement

Canadian visual artist Mia Weinberg creates artwork that brings people into close contact with the extraordinary beauty of nature. In her studio in Vancouver, British Columbia, she uses a digital scanner to enlarge the architectural intricacies of flower petals, plants, and the living veins and dried skeletons of leaves. Mia's artwork sometimes plays upon the remarkable resemblances between fragments of plants, tree branches and roots, river deltas, topographical and street maps, and features of human bodies. Mia believes passionately in the power of art to reawaken us and to encourage us all to become more present and engaged in our world. She often chooses to work with botanical specimens that are in the process of decay because especially in their passage through death, they lead to regeneration, new beginnings, and a sublime quality of elegance and grace. In addition to her solo studio work, Mia creates site-specific public art projects that enrich viewers' personal connections to their communities and their local environments.