Current Exhibits
RAISON D'être 2024
At Ground Control
140 Graves Trail
Bozeman, MT 59718
Thursday, May 9, 6:30-8:30pm
Raison D'être Dance Project has created a contemporary dance piece inspired by Blair Speed’s photography and writing installed in their new gallery space at Ground Control. The dance performance, photography, and writing will be celebrated at this special event. Purchase tickets here.
Past Exhibits
Stampede Heart 2022
At Essential Photo
959 E 900 S
Salt Lake City, UT 84105
Opening Reception August 19th, 2022 as part of the Salt Lake City Art Walk.
Stampede Heart 2022
At The Comma-Q Studio
109 North Rouse Avenue
Bozeman, MT 59715
Opening: February 11th, 2022 | 5:00-8:00pm
Up through March
Can you hear the heart beat of Montana?
Stampede Heart includes 12 photographs printed on Optica One Matte Fine Art paper, 300g/sm, that honor the heart beat of Montana.
Stampede Heart
Can you hear the heartbeat of Montana?
She has to beat strong to be heard across all this s p a c e.
lub dub
Her heart is the siren’s call. We listened. We heard. We came.
She moves us.
Changes us.
Strengthens us.
I hope.
Can you hear the heartbeat of Montana?
It radiates through our ribcages lub dub when we turn our chins upward, look to the top of a peak, to climb or hike or stand in awe of - our heartbeats blend.
Montana offers us her spine to climb along- the ridgelines of this land. An offering.
Our hearts quicken. lub dub.
In unison. They beat harder. Stronger. LUB DUB.
Her heart is based in strength, to wade the tides of seasons.
Harsh cold. Wind. Heat. Wildfires. Love. And, loss. What can she teach us?
Are we listening? Are we learning?
I feel the deepest chamber of my heart when I leave indoors, walk out, run out, breathe out, and find myself in all this s p a c e.
Because, sometimes. Inside. Heart constricted.
And sometimes. Always. Outside. Runny egg yolk heart dripping down my ribcage.
We ask Montana to grant us the freedom to feel our own hearts. To run up mountains and feel
the zest and struggle of life, which are never that far apart. To grant us passage for our efforts. Efforts that become accomplishments. Pride. Strength. We ask Montana to teach our children. To hold our lovers. Gift our families. Protect our homes. To fill the backdrop of our lives and of our internet presence. We ask Montana to help us expand into the lives we desire, into the people we wish to become. We ask Montana for space and heart and care. Will we give the same to her?
I hope we honor the sacred siren beats that brought us out here. Lub dub.
I hope we don’t eat all of this space.
I hope our story is not one only of acquisition. Mine. Me. Mine.
I hope our story is one of giving back to the Siren.
Will we listen? Will we learn?
Do our hearts stampede to take or will they run to make an offering?
What can I give? What can I give?
I hope we honor this special place.
I hope we listen to her heart.
I hope we can always hear.
Lub dub.
Each image selected for Stampede Heart represents a part of the heart of Montana and includes those that listen and give back to her.
LIMINAL SPACE 2020
At Tin Works
Photographs printed on dibond
Variable dimensions
Blair Speed’s contribution to Tinworks 2020 comprises six photographs on Dibond that explore the idea of thresholds or transitional states. As Speed writes “Liminal Space is the in-between -- we aren’t what we were, we’re not what we will be.” In 2019 Speed’s husband, “died when a part of a mountain he was standing on broke off last July. He was 33 years old. He was, he is, my universe. We spent 10 years in physical form next to one another. He died. And, then, we all walked into a global pandemic.”
Each black-and-white image is shot in a landscape format, though Speed’s subject matter ranges from skyscapes to figure studies and still lifes. Together, they create a somber and mysterious horizon line that is at once reassuringly familiar and unsettlingly opaque. She writes, “My photography, like my life, has become groundless and now floats within the spectrums of light and dark. These images in transition, my life in transition, our world in transition: Liminal Space. This series holds the space for contradictions: the seen and the unseen, infinite love and infinite loss, light and dark, learning and unlearning, the split within the veils. These images of liminality hold moments in transition, transmogrification, and reflection; a hand on a horse, a best friend, who will die in a week, but the connection remains. A chair alone in a home that once was and now is going back to the earth, as we all will.”
TINWORKS ART IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.
Liminal Space is the in-between, we aren’t what we were, we’re not what we will be. We’re not standing in what was, we’re not standing in what will be. We lay in the fire of the Earth’s equivocal language; we try to listen. We lay in the fire of the Heart’s equivocal language; we try to listen. Our past self on one side of the flames, a new self, for now, on the other. I called my husband my Golden Heart of Rage, the internal waves of light and dark held within him, my greatest love, muse, curiosity, and excitement. He died when a part of a mountain he was standing on broke off last July, he was 33 years old. He was, he is, my universe. We spent 10 years in physical form next to one another. He died. And, then, we all walked into a Global Pandemic.
My photography, like my life, has become groundless and now floats within the spectrums of light and dark. These images in transition, my life in transition, our world in transition: Liminal Space. This series holds the space for contradictions: the seen and the unseen, infinite love and infinite loss, light and dark, learning and unlearning, the split within the veils. These images of liminality hold moments in transition, transmogrification, and reflection; a hand on a horse, a best friend, who will die in a week, but the connection remains. A chair alone in a home that once was and now is going back to the Earth, as we all will. The light and dark that reflect over and within a Soul Pod, over and within each of our Soul Pods, over each of our lifetimes. The lens of my heart, the lens of my camera, listens, witnesses, and then holds the infinite space of duality and contradictions. This space is always changing and ever expanding, this is the space where love and loss, light and dark become a formed and formless braid. My Golden Heart of Rage helps me hold and witness the light strands and the dark strands simultaneously, and then, walk through the fires holding both. This is Liminal Space; more flames are coming.
