I am a Mexican artist based in the UK. I work as an associate lecturer in the Fine Art Department, at Sheffield Hallam University. In 2021 I began a practice-based PhD with a scholarship by the Culture and Creativity Research Institute. The study explores the spiritual aspect of femicide survivors and the nature of burials. Over a decade, I have investigated notions of loss connected to the landscape. I have worked with narrative, digital and analogue devices, film and performative work.
My short film, The Luminous Mysteries, won a Laurel from the Boden International Film Festival in Sweden. Presque Lune Editions published my experimental graphic novel Lulu la Sensationelle in France, achieving very good reviews. The film As Sure as the Rain, which I co-wrote and co-edited by artist Nick Stewart, won a Silver Laurel at the International Film Awards in Los Angeles, California.
Recent participations in art exhibitions include A Visual Theory of the Soul (2020) at VOMA Art Space, curated by Lee Cavaliere, former curator at TATE, The Soil Where Women Disappear (2021) at the Old Gallery, School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University, and The Luminous Mysteries in the show When Space Becomes the Screen (2021) at S1 Artspace.
Book chapters, papers and references about my work
Chapter “The absent body – Helen Blejerman’s Lulu la Sensationelle,” by Professor Véronique Sina, Institute for Theatre, Film and Media Studies at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, in the book Jewish Women: Borders and Bodies. Eds. Heike Bauer, Andrea Greenbaum and Sarah Lightman. Syracuse University Press, 2022.
Article “Unflattening Scholarship with (Auto) Graphic Research” by Maureen Burdock, University of California, Davis, 2022, Journal Alternative Francophone, 2022.
Conference paper “Helen Blejerman’s Lulu la Sensationnelle: Representations of Illness and Dis/Ability in Sequential Art,” June 2019. Keynote speaker Professor Véronique Sina, Institute for Theatre, Film and Media Studies at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, at the Popular Graphic Illness Narratives.
The book Creating Cultural Capital: Cultural Entrepreneurship, in Theory, Pedagogy and Practice ed. Eburon Academic Publishers, Netherlands. Series Pioneering Minds Worldwide. http://www.eburon.nl/creating_cultural_capital, 2015.
The Context for the Artist, UNESCO Cooperations, in the journal Acta Academiae Artium Vilnensis, by Professor Dr Elona Lubytė from the Vilnius Art Academy, in Lithuania. Dr Lubyté is the UNESCO Chair for Culture Management and Culture Policy. Issue 72, 2014.
SELECTED PUBLISHED WORK
Blejerman, H. (2021) Jewish Women Artists Under the Nazi Regime, Journal Literature and Belief, special edition by Professor Victoria Aarons, English Department, Trinity University, San Antonio Texas.
Blejerman, H. (2020) The Island, Route 57, the creative writing journal of the Centre for Poetry and Poetics, Sheffield University.
Blejerman, H. (2019) Does a Dog Know Art Can Disappear: Surrealism and Subsidence in Mexico City, The Guardian.
Blejerman, H. (2019) Synesthesia, Dostoyevsky Wannabe, anthology ‘Sheffield’, edited by Emma Bolland.
Blejerman, H. (2014) Lulu la Sensationnelle, Presque Lune Editions.
SELECTED ARTIST TALKS AND CONFERENCES
September 2022 – Method conference, Culture and Creativity Research Institute, Sheffield Hallam University.
February 2022 – Transmission series of artists’ talks, Sheffield Hallam University, Department of Fine Art.
October 2021 – Religion and Art Forum, Goldsmiths Fine Art Department.
September 2021 – Beastly Landscapes conference, Newcastle University, School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape.
March 2021 – Centre for Poetry and Poetics, Sheffield University.
November 2020 – Being Human Festival, writer and co-producer of ‘Who Lies Beneath’ an audio experience based on A Visual Theory of the Soul.
September 2020 – Castlefield Gallery, Manchester.
July 2020 – Post-Traumatic Landscapes conference, Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University of Sheffield.
March 2020 – Minor Literature[s] (interview).
June 2019 – School of Arts, Languages and Cultures, Manchester University.
October 2016 – Winchester School of Art.
March 2015 – Paris Book Fair (Salon du Livre de Paris).
January 2015 – Foyles, London.
April 2013 – Tynet 50+, Bastad, Sweden.
April 2013 – University College Cork, Ireland, School of Languages, Literatures and Cultures.
April 2013 – Instituto Cervantes, Dublin.
Helen Blejerman 