Mackenzie Kelly-Frère

Associate Professor, Fibre

“As a maker of cloth, I am fascinated by the myriad ways in which weaving entangles cultures, histories and technologies. I weave cloth to connect with lineages of weavers who made (and make) for subsistence, for community and for expression. I weave to learn about cloth and to understand the people who have made cloth before me.

Weaving has led me to consider our co-evolution with plants and animals who provide the materials we use to make cloth; and the communities and relationships required to sustain this activity. Intersections between regenerative agriculture and making cloth by hand are an ongoing focus of my research in the studio. In my work I continue to untangle the potential for sympoetic reciprocity between fibre-bearing plants, animals and myself, the handweaver who hopes to reveal their innate materiality through collaboration, rather than transforming it through mastery.”

Mackenzie Kelly-Frère

Mackenzie Kelly-Frère is an artist, educator and academic. He has exhibited his work in Canada, China, Japan, Korea and the United States. Mackenzie has written texts for various publications including Prairie Interlace: Weaving, Modernisms and the Expanded Frame, Textile: The Journal of Cloth and Culture and VAV Magazine. Mackenzie lives in Mohkinstsis (Calgary), Canada with husband Kristofer and daughter Elizabeth.

Member of faculty since 2006

Education

MFA Textiles, Nova Scotia College of Art.

BFA Textiles, Alberta College of Art + Design. 

Selected Professional Activity

Drawn, Alberta Craft Council, Edmonton & Calgary Alberta, 2024/2025

Tendency, DNA Artspace, London, Canada, 2016

Interval / Duration, Evans Contemporary, Peterborough, Canada, 2016

Incidence, Trames Gallery, Montreal Centre for Contemporary Textiles, Montreal, Canada, 2016

Frequency, GalleryGallery, Kyoto, Japan,2014

Continuum, Alberta Craft Council Feature Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, 2014

In the Making, Illingworth Kerr Gallery, Calgary, Alberta, Canada, 2014

The News from Here: Alberta Biennial of Contemporary Art, Alberta Gallery of Art, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, 2013

Laurie Herrick: Weaving Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, Museum of Contemporary Craft, Portland, Oregon, USA. [travelling], 2011

Lieux de memoire, Maison de la Culture Marie-Uguay, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, 2010

(im)material beauty, MFA thesis exhibition, Anna Leonowens Gallery, Nova Scotia, Canada, 2005

Selected Publications

“Embracing Process: A weaver collaborates with the urban fabric”, VAV Scandinavian Weaving Magazine, No 1, Edited by Tina Ignel, VAV Magasinet, 2024

“Weaving at the Horizon: Encounters with Fibre Art on the Canadian Prairie”, in Prairie Interlace: Weaving Modernisms and the Expanded Frame, Edited by Michele Hardy, Julia Krueger & Timothy Long, University of Calgary Press, pp 123-145, 2024

“Marigold Zig-Zag: Weaving pattern & dye process”, VAV Scandinavian Weaving Magazine, No 2 & No 3, Edited by Tina Ignel, VAV Magasinet

“Weaving People,” essay for “Art in Ubiquity” exhibition at Alberta Craft Council Feature Gallery, edited by Kim McCollum, Edmonton Canada, 2019

“When the Studio Becomes Spectacle: a reluctant itinerant weaver talks about the weather in Alberta,” essay for “Crafting Community” in Textile: The Journal of Cloth and Culture, edited by Lisa Vinebaum & Kirsty Robertson, Taylor & Francis (Routledge), UK. Vol 14, Issue 1, pp 74-83, 2016

“Touching Absence”, exhibit text for Laura Vickerson‘s The Between at the Nickle Galleries, University of Calgary, January 29 to April 2, 2016 in Calgary, Alberta, 2016

“Tinctorium” exhibit text for Bill Morton’s exhibition Tinctorium, Stride Gallery, Calgary, AB, 2012

“(Im)material Beauty” (excerpt) Craft Perception & Practice, ed. Nisse Gustafson & Amy Gogarty, Ronsdale Press, pp 107-112, 2007

Selected Awards

ACAD Leadership Excellence Award Recipient, 2014

Connect

www.mackenziekellyfrere.com

mackenzie.kellyfrere@auarts.ca