Ken Hacke - Artist

09/16/2026

Zen Garden 2026 ✨

The Critters got one last Canadian show in before their big trip south! 🇨🇦

They’ve spent the summer touring the local festival scene, getting fully charged up on positivity, good vibes, and a little festival weirdness.

Now it’s time to clean them up and get them looking all proper and professional. They’re heading to Chicago to spend the winter at the Botanic Garden, where they can spread some of that love to our neighbours down south.

A big thanks to everyone who stopped to enjoy them, feed them, dress them, dance with them, and all the other strange and wonderful festival interactions this summer. You’ve sent them off fully charged with love and good vibes. ❤️

Now it’s Chicago’s turn. Go spread those good vibes, little Critters.

09/16/2026

Looks like the bunny had a wild night at Wicked Woods. 😂 I didn’t realize we had a few Van Gogh-style visitors passing through on this starry night. Here I thought it was just me.
Thanks to Lung Lui for catching the evidence. 📸✨

09/13/2026

The arch looked great at Zen Garden 2026
Big thanks to all the people that made it such a great event.

09/05/2026

The bunny is having a great rave in the woods ar Wicket Woods 2026. So fun to watching everyone interact and play with these creations.

09/04/2026

08/28/2026

Some objects in space feel almost strangely familiar.

The Helix Nebula has become famous for its remarkable resemblance to a giant human eye staring through space. But what looks like an iris is actually an enormous shell of gas and dust expelled by a dying Sun-like star. At its center sits the incredibly hot stellar remnant that will eventually become a white dwarf.

Located roughly 650 light-years away in the constellation Aquarius, the Helix is one of the closest planetary nebulae to Earth. Its bright main ring alone stretches nearly three light-years across, an almost unimaginable scale compared with the tiny human eye it happens to resemble.

Look closely and the resemblance becomes even more interesting. The nebula contains thousands of intricate comet-like knots, sculpted as fast, hot stellar winds collide with colder material previously thrown off by the dying star. Webb has now revealed these structures in extraordinary detail.

There is no biological connection, of course. Our brains are exceptionally good at finding familiar shapes in nature, a phenomenon known as pareidolia.

Still, there is something beautiful about seeing the same familiar geometry at two completely different scales: one allowing us to look out into the universe, and the other appearing to look right back at us.

08/26/2026

Laser and the arch, so good together

08/25/2026

The arch looked so good at WOMP this weekend ✨

It was really special to share this co-creation, made together with Contemporary Vice, and to see it take on a life of its own at the festival.

A big thank you to the wonderful world of magical people that is WOMP 💫 Such a fun weekend, and already looking forward to next year!

FestivalArt PublicArt ArtInstallation CoCreation CalgaryArts

12/17/2025

EverBlue Gateway. A large-scale illuminated arch, currently installed at Calgary International Airport.

Where do you think it should go next?

12/05/2025

Yesterday was a huge day.

We completed the install of the EverBlue Gateway at Calgary International Airport. The piece is over 16 feet wide and 13 feet high with nearly 2,000 mapped, addressed, and interactive pixels. It was designed to look good during the day and at night while celebrating Calgary’s story. This feels like a real step toward long term public art. I love temporary festivals, but I have been pushing toward larger, lasting installations, and this is a move in that direction.

This piece is a collaboration with for RISE UP, celebrating the new Blue Sky branding. Huge thanks to the team at for bringing everything together.

Big thanks to:
Mason .bass for fabrication, welding, and installation
Hugh VanDyke for tech support
Addison for the final push
Brad Brickwell for the shop space
Everyone who helped on the harder days
And thank you Calgary for continuing to support the arts.

The piece will be at international arrivals all winter, welcoming travelers. While it is there, I will be looking for its next placement. I hope it travels, opens new doors, and leads to more opportunities. It has taken years of work to reach this point, and I am excited for what comes next.

More content soon. For now, I am off to the beach for a much needed break.