Sandra Sawatzky
Grew up on the prairies and has lived in Alberta for over forty years. After two decades of working in the collaborative field of film, as a writer, producer and director, Sawatzky started over embarking on a path as a visual artist in order to create The Black Gold Tapestry. The 67 meter long “film on cloth” took nine years to research, design and hand-embroider and tells a social history of fossil fuels that is a deep reflection on climate change and transition. The first exhibition of her exceptional solo work took place 2017-2018 at Glenbow Museum in Calgary, Alberta. The Calgary Herald newspaper named Sawatzky a rising star in 2018.
Her new body of work The Age of Uncertainty was unveiled at The Nickle Galleries in Calgary, Alberta in February 2022. In it Sawatzky takes on human nature’s rampant appetite for novelty, power and status and the energy expended to acquire these. She does this with satire, wit and her embroidery needle.
In November 2022, she received the Doug & Lois Mitchell Outstanding Calgary Artist Award at the Cultural Leaders Legacy Arts Awards.