Dispersion—Immersion is a celebration of Saskatoon’s next wave in digital media art.

This group exhibition presents multi-media installations, animation, sound, video works and augmented reality projects created by students from the Digital and Integrated Practice (DIP) program in the School for the Arts at the University of Saskatchewan.  A multiplicity of perspectives focuses on notions of identity, performance, societal expectations, mass media, and consumerism, all while navigating presentation through a variety of screens and augmented possibilities. This exhibition, curated by USask Prof. Lisa Birke, is a survey of up-and-coming talent in digital media art in Saskatoon.

Alexa Hainsworth has a Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Saskatchewan. She produces fiber sculpture and installation environments that offer unique experiences and surprises. Hainsworth enjoys playing with materials, finding ways to manipulate and stretch them to behave in new and unexpected ways. Her works have animated qualities that give the sensation that they are living creatures. She has shown her works in Nuit Blanche Toronto and in Saskatoon. She has won multiple prizes in the Saskatoon Wearable Art Gala for the Jack Millikin Center. She has also shown work at the Anna Leonowen's Gallery in Nova Scotia, the Mendel Art Gallery and participated in numerous residencies locally and abroad. Alexa Hainsworth works for the Saskatchewan Craft Council. She is a member of Bridges Art Movement in Saskatoon and is a board member of Emma International Collaboration. Alexa Hainsworth brings a wild energy to everything she does, dressing in colourful clothing to stay connected to her art practice on the daily.

Visit Nefelibata during Nuit Blanche Saskatoon. Chat with local artists as they work on projects in their preferred medium, check out the Miniature Club's new exhibition, visit the Craft lab and make your own button!

Keeley Haftner (b. 1985) is a Saskatchewanian-Canadian artist based in the Netherlands whose multidisciplinary practice centers waste as both material and metaphor. Through intimate acts of transformation, her work challenges extractive systems and prompts new ways of thinking about social and ecological relations. She holds a BFA from Mount Allison University (2011) and an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2016). Haftner’s work has been exhibited internationally at venues including the Ceramic Museum of the Netherlands and the Art Institute of Chicago. She has been long-listed for the Sobey Art Award, short-listed for the De Kei Prize, and is a two-time recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts Research and Creation Grant.

The subject matter curated into the ‘Flipping Normal’ program, presented as part of Saskatoon Nuit Blanche, will focus on human vulnerabilities, embracing diverse, non-binary, and empowering perspectives that challenge notions of normalcy. The films deal with aspects of depression, autism, face blindness, burnout, and pressures to perform, but in a ‘light-hearted’ manner. These circumstances are portrayed as integral aspects of life that individuals find their way through. In one way or another it is art that the protagonists turn to for their strength, be it painting, film making, music or designing cosplay.