FAYE HARNEST

Faye Harnest makes art that cares for people. Her soft sculptures and comics about brain injury, grief, mental health, and motherhood have exhibited at Uncool Artist (Brooklyn), the Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto), and Tangled Art + Disability Gallery (Toronto). Harnest’s work has appeared in anthologies and magazines such as A Handmade Assembly (from Struts Gallery and Owen’s Art Gallery, New Brunswick, Canada), The Gutter anthology, Feels magazine, and Sick magazine. Her public artworks have appeared in Brooklyn Bridge Park and Dumbo in Brooklyn, and in subway cars in Toronto.

Accessible design is at the core of her work. She is a certified braille transcriber and co-creator of The Braille Project, a series of large-scale tactile paintings that have exhibited internationally. Her soft, squishy sculptures made of felt are also made to be touched. They can be hugged for comfort, or moved and reconfigured for audiences to experience the satisfaction of making their own temporary sculptures, and the joy of play.