Hello and welcome to my page, I am a Visual Artist
Based in Port Coquitlam, Amber is an independent Canadian artist with a versatile background in filmmaking, performance, production design, and traditional art. Holding a BFA in Film Production from Simon Fraser University's School for the Contemporary Arts, Amber’s academic involvement has provided a strong platform from which to grow her artistry. Amber's artistic involvement can be found across a diverse range of projects, where she lends her creativity as a production designer, art assistant, and a painter, providing custom work to productions. She works primarily as a production designer on music videos and short films, creating immersive environments and expressing narrative ideas through visual means. She has worked with such artists as DACEY, JEN Z, and Peach Pit. While film is her primary focus, Amber’s artistic ventures extend to traditional mediums. As a self-taught artist, she has found a voice with gouache and acrylic ink throughout her formative years. Through paint, she documents abandoned places around the Lower Mainland. Her work is available as prints, and she accepts custom commissions. She is a recipient of the Jon Driftmier Award, for outstanding artistic achievement in an academic setting. Her collaborative short film ‘Rollerbladies’ won The Whistler Film Festival’s Short Student Award, and is presently screening in the Langley Film Festival.
Contact Details
Nordstrand, Amber
https://www.ambernordstrand.com
Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada
Samples of my work
Artist Statement
For the last decade, I have used gouache and acrylic ink to capture the delicate moments throughout my life, with special interest in the crossover between portraiture, landscape, and houses, either occupied or unoccupied. Over time, my artistic journey has led me to delve deeper into the overlapping themes of modernization and nostalgia. I spent my adolescence photographing abandoned sites of BC's lower mainland and upper Washington, providing permanence to these subjects. Desperate for a more intimate tribute to these silent, forgotten structures, photography turned to painting, inviting myself and viewers to connect with these often overlooked subjects in an especially thoughtful manner. My architectural portraiture blurs realism with a painterly touch, honouring the stoicism of all things left behind and documenting the tangible decay of life quietly withering, reclaimed by nature. I find myself drawn to an exploration of the profound relationship between humanity and environment, freezing the inevitable effects of time through paint. Besides the more philosophical ideas behind a relentless time march and merciless nature, my work highlights the never-ending development, housing inflation, and displacement crisis that lingers over the West Coast. As I continue to document these liminal spaces on the edge of existence, my hope is to spark discussion of ecological, economical, and cultural change.