https://www.sadmag.ca/blog/2026/4/15/lessons-of-lichen-fei-disbrows-photo-sculptures
Quietly Palpable, a Featured Exhibition of Capture Photo Festival
On view at Gallery Jones, April 2 - May 2, 2026
Opening reception: Saturday, April 4, 2026, 2 - 4pm
Q & A with Pennylane Shen: April 16, 2026, 5:30pm
In Fei Disbrow’s artistic practice, the materials used are in support of the exploration of texture and shape. The artist’s rigorous composition is the syntax by which this relationship is expressed. Previously, Disbrow has used fabrics such as cotton, wool, felt, and mylar to add dimensionality to two-dimensional work. Some of the fabrics evoke a subtle symbolism, such as Oxford cotton, or present an incongruent relationship, such as Tyvek stitched over linen, but the considered and meaningful placement of form, colour, and line is the connective tissue that unifies the object.
Working with photography is no different for Disbrow. The various textures come from photographs of cryptogam, a classification of organisms that includes mosses, lichens, and algae. By printing directly onto metal that Disbrow cuts and shapes, she can make work that is both representative of the organisms and something entirely different, creating an in-between space: a familiar form and texture that seems to have mutated or gone astray.
That photography is the main tool for image-making in these works might be perceived as ironic, given that the subject matter is like an abstract painting that covers a significant portion of the Earth’s surface. But to be out in the world contemplating the ground covering is precisely the quiet experience that Disbrow was seeking and is now communicating. It is significant that the supporting structure of these artworks is photography, very slow photography, as this measured approach echoes the exploratory nature of Disbrow’s artistic practice.
Fei Disbrow: The Familiar Unfamiliar
On view at the West Vancouver Art Museum, Jan 14 - Feb 28, 2026
Opening reception: Tuesday, January 13, 2026, 6 - 8pm
A new body of work exploring the vast world of cryptogamic covers using photography as a drawing tool to capture intricate textures. Eschewing the traditional rectilinear frame for one that the subject instead evokes, she has printed her images direct to metal substrates, in some cases folding them, to share her wonder of these organisms.
https://westvancouverartmuseum.ca/exhibitions/fei-disbrow-familiar-unfamiliar
In November 2025, at the invitation of Konstepidemin in Gotenburg, Sweden, I will be an artist in residence for the month. The buildings at Konstepidemin were originally used as Gothenburg’s Epidemical Hospital from 1886 until 1970. Konstepidemin is now used as an artist run art center, a central meeting place as well as a cultural platform, offering an extensive public program of visual and performing art events, exhibitions, seminars, workshops and more.
In September 2024, I will be attending an artist residency in the remote village of Tjørnuvík in the Faroe Islands, hosted by Listafólkasamband (LISA), the council of Faroese Artists and Sunda Municipality.
Galleries West’s Mark Mushet video on my work from my 2020 solo exhibition, "Catalogue of Stitches" at Gallery Jones
Sunshine Frere's reflections on my collage work, published in SAD magazine in 2017.