Lisa Bergh has always been interested in the language of abstraction – blurred lines and shifting colors, shapes and sizes.
“That’s just the language I’m most interested in using,” the New London-based artist said. “There’s an interdisciplinary nature to my work. I’m always bouncing between different forms and using different materials.
“I’ve been working with vinyl since COVID. Before that, it was paper. I have a bachelor’s degree in photography and printmaking. My master’s degree is in spatial arts. I’m always interested in seeing how to use different things.”
Her experimental nature is reflected in her new exhibition “Mirage,” which opens Sept. 4 and will run through Oct. 25 in the Alice R. Rogers and Target Gallery at Saint John’s University.
A reception and artist talk is scheduled from 5 to 7 p.m. on Sept. 11.
Highlighting her interest in vinyl fabric, the show is a blend of 13 sculptures and tapestries in which the fabric is “stretched, cut, mended, constructed and suspended to perform as surface, projection and form.”
In the center of it all will hang a vinyl suit of chainmail armor.
“It’s a range of sizes and shapes,” Bergh said. “There are large scale things, like a 13-foot tapestry, and smaller scale tapestries of around three-to-four feet. I try to create an experience that allows the viewer some wayfinding. Scales shift in the same way as when you walk around in the daily world.
“You’ll see a lot of bright colors and light being projected. Things will move a little and there’s a sense of activation to them. Nothing is stagnant. Some of the pieces look a certain way when viewed from one spot and differently from another. So some of them require you to move to engage with them more thoroughly.”
An Iowa native, Bergh first became interested in art when she was a college student in Tucson, Arizona.
“I was never the kid who people told they drew so well that they should be an artist,” she said. “I took the required art classes in middle school, then stopped in high school. I was studying cultural anthropology in college, but I took an art class as a requirement. It was a basic design course and it was so much fun. It was really exciting and interesting to me. I did well and enjoyed myself so I took a photography class. All of a sudden, I had a (Bachelor of Fine Arts) degree in printmaking and photography.
“Then I went to graduate school at San Jose State and got my master’s in spatial arts.”
It was while studying in the Bay Area that she met her husband, who was a native of the Willmar area. Following the birth of their first child, the family moved to New London, where they have resided the past 20 years.
She has worked in art administration, and for the past decade, she has been an art instructor at Ridgewater College in Willmar. She’s long been familiar with the CSB and SJU community, but this will mark the first time she has presented her work on campus.
“I’ve been familiar with the (gallery) for years,” she said. “It’s really beautiful. I’m friends with a number of the faculty there and I’ve come to shows in the past. So it’s a real treat for me to be able to make work to show in this space.”