| ARTIST BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: | Howard Davidson spent his early childhood years in Los Angeles and studied Political Science and Economics at the University of California, Berkeley in the turbulent mid-1960s. He taught for a year in California and then fled to Canada as a war resister in 1967. On arrival, he taught special education with the Edmonton Public School Board for almost a decade. In 1976, he spent a year travelling the Middle East, during which time he noticed, particularly in museums, that the dolls and toys from ancient civilizations remained intact while larger artifacts or architectural sites had “long since bitten the dust.” In 1978, having returned to Canada and quit his teaching profession, Davidson established Hairy Hill Woodworks, named for the hamlet just east of Edmonton, where he heard woodwork was popular. Hairy Hill Woodworks produced toys based on designs from around the world, including Egypt, China, Belgium, and Canada’s Northwest Territories, which Davidson sold at Christmas and other craft and artisan markets.
While he was teaching in the early 1970s, Davidson also studied photography with Hubert Hohn through University of Alberta Extension. He uses the camera as a tool to understand and sense his own perception--his sense of reality--to concentrate on environments immediate to him, including his home and people he meets, to gain increased awareness of what he surrounds himself with. His primarily black and white photographs have been shown at the Art Gallery of Alberta (formerly the Edmonton Art Gallery) and the Edmonton Centennial Library, and are included in the collection of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts.
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