Exhibitions:Current - Upcoming - Past (2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007,2006, 2005,2004)

Past Exhibitions: 2003 To view a complete list of past exhibitions, click here.

 

 

Memories & Testimonies November 20, 2003 - January 10, 2004

Liliana Berezowsky, Marcel Braitstein, Eva Brandl, Caroline Dukes, Georges Dyens, Werner David Feist, Angela Grossmann, Sadko Hadzihasnović, Natalka Husar, Gershon Iskowitz, Graham Metson.   Curated by Loren Lerner. Circulated by the Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Concordia University.   Memories and Testimonies looks at the experience of human displacement as it echoes though Canadian history. The exhibition presents the work of eleven artists who immigrated to Canada since the Second World War: artists whose personal histories have been marked by disruption, who give powerful expression to the fragility and universality of human experience. The exhibition is a valuable document of a chapter in Canadian history when our cultural identity changed to encompass the cultures of new citizens. This period in our history was a catalyst for Canadian altered consciousness. The artists explore their experience of exile or displacement, as immigrants arriving in Canada or as the children of immigrants. Their work documents the horrors of war, concentration camps, torture and death; issues of discrimination; their collective and individual memory of another culture, or the difficult process of assimilation within a new society.

Natalka Husar, Odessa's Tears, oil on canvas, 224 x 137 cm, 1995.

Memories and Testimonies is organized and circulated by the Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery and curated by Dr. Loren Lerner, art historian and Associate Professor at Concordia University. Dr. Lerner has assembled an important collection of contemporary Canadian art drawn from a variety of disciplines, such as photography, works on paper, painting, sculpture and multi-media installation. The earliest works in the exhibition are the photographs of Werner David Feist from his student days at the Bauhaus, the innovative art and design school in 1920s Dessau, Germany. When the Nazis took power, Feist was a politically active art director in Prague, helping to print pamphlets that were smuggled into Germany. Forced to flee, he went first to Poland, then escaped to England where he worked for British Army Intelligence during the war. Graham Metson’s Growing up in Wartime (1980-2000) is a series of mixed-media works that recall what it was to live in East London during the war, when he was a child. Marcel Braitstein was a hidden child, protected from the concentration camps by a Belgian family. His art has a fossilized quality, evoking a civilization half-buried, half-forgotten, layered-over. Caroline Dukes was confined to a ghetto in Budapest towards the end of the war. In Music School (1996), she reveals the violence originating from a Munich building, now a music school that had been Hitler’s headquarters.

Angela Grossmann knows little of her own family’s German history, because they were killed in the Holocaust. In her essay on the exhibition, Dr. Lerner said, “In her Looking Back series (2000-2002), she creates images of women from the 1930s and invites us to contribute to her fictitious narrative.” Natalka Husar recently returned to visit the Ukraine. In the painting Pandora’s Parcel to Ukraine (1993) she suggests the lingering corruption of the Soviet era and the tragedy of children affected by the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl. For Eva Brandl, who was born in Stuttgart, Germany, and also came to Canada as a child, the objects and materials of Valse (les trous du ciel) (2000) stimulate thoughts and feelings of another place and time. The youngest artist in the exhibition, Sadko Hadzihasanović, is a recent arrival from Bosnia. Me, Me, Me in Light Boxes (2002), Dr. Lerner notes, “are self-portraits of gentle humour and serious content that question identity and autobiography.”   The gallery will host an opening reception on November 20 from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. The curator and Montreal sculptor Eva Brandl will attend. During the reception, Dr. Lerner will lead a tour of the exhibition and discuss her curatorial thesis.     You can also read the online version of the Gallery newsletter associated with this show.

Eva Brandl, Valse (les trous du  ciel), perforated brushed aluminum, printed cloth, 200 x 122 x 56 cm, 2000. Caroline Dukes, Music School, acrylic, encaustic, colour xerox, feathers, beer coasters, ticket stubs and music sheet on canvas, 244 x 335 cm, 1996.

 

 

Symposium: Conflict, Culture & Memory November 21, 2003

Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery will host a one-day symposium entitled Conflict, Culture and Memory on Friday, November 21, 2003 to discuss issues raised by the exhibition Memories and Testimonies. Dr. Loren Lerner, exhibition curator and art historian from Concordia University, will present the keynote address. Guest speaker will be Eva Brandl, Montreal sculptor. There will also be session presentations by Grenfell College historians Dr. Rainer Baehre and Dr. Olaf Janzen, art historian Gerard Curtis, social scientists Dr. Doreen Klassen and Dr. Ivan Emke, and panel presentations by regional artists and community contributors. Loren Lerner's address will be titled The Holocaust in Contemporary Canadian Art: The Incongruities of Narrative Reasoning and Traumatic Memory. "People often organize their experiences in the form of narrative stories," she explains. "The reason for telling a story is often to explain what went wrong, how people responded and to provide a corrective to the situation. This presentation looks at the Holocaust in recent Canadian art as an unresolved narrative that shares the characteristics of traumatic memory. Some questions to be addressed are the audience's reactions to these works and the relation of the Holocaust to personal, family and national histories."

Liliana Berezowsky, Karena, steel, concrete, 196 x 196 x 138 cm, 1992.

Marcel Braitstein, Fossil 885, hydrocal, 75 x 40 cm.

 

 

For Those in Peril on the Sea and First Son: Portraits by C.D. Hoy September 25 to November 8th, 2003
For Those in Peril on the Sea An installation by The/La Commission GEDEON Commission aka Pierre N. LeBlanc   Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery is pleased to present an installation by The/La Commission GEDEON Commission aka Pierre N. LeBlanc. For Those in Peril on the Sea is the culmination of a body of work that has evolved over the past 10 years. 63 silver gelatin prints in sizes ranging from 8 x 10 inches to 20 x 24 inches are organized in a wall-mounted installation independently lit by a system integral to the work. The lighting is active, controlled by a timer. The installation is augmented by two independently-run soundtracks. The first is the sound of a 16mm film camera filming in short bursts, as in stop-motion photography. The second is the sound of a musical recording of "For Those in Peril on the Sea" by the group Camberwell Now, a piece which consists of the layering of an old mariner's complaint and recorded ship-to-shore short-wave weather transmissions.  Pierre LeBlanc, L'Escargot, 1997-2003, gelatin silver print. Primarily lens-based, LeBlanc's arts practice involves a number of concurrent long-term projects created under the umbrella of The/La Commission GEDEON Commission, which he established in 1991. The Commission incorporates photography, digital imaging exhibited on an interactive Web site and multi-media gallery installations. LeBlanc's concern with both photography and digital imaging is the way in which information is transmitted to an audience. The images he uses in For Those in Peril on the Sea are landscapes combined with photographs of human flesh scarred by temporary marks. LeBlanc looks at landscape as being in a state of reclamation, marked as the body is marked in his photographs. The combinations of sensorial information within the images of land and body create a visual rhythm, seen apart or together.   The project began with LeBlanc's rediscovery of the landscape surrounding his home in New Brunswick when he returned after a three-year sojourn in Montreal. The fascination he derived from the notion of "home" grew from the idea of errance, of wandering, that has been a traditional part of Acadian culture. This aspect of Acadian history, the sense that the Acadian people have never had a homeland, is referenced in the texts of present-day Acadian writers such as Gérald LeBlanc and Daniel Dugas. For Those in Peril on the Sea presents "home" not as a specific place but more like a relationship with many places. For LeBlanc, "It is a landscape; it is a relationship to the land. It is not the heart-warming comfort described in so many romanticized representations. It is not even near the homestead. It is an assemblage of spaces and ideas that intermingle with a real or imagined presence within it."   The gallery will host an opening reception for the artist on September 25 from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. During the reception, Pierre LeBlanc will talk about his work and his installation For Those in Peril on the Sea. All are welcome.                       A Swan Hitting a Mercury Driven by a Certain Madamme Buick, gelatin silver print, 1996-2003, Click above for The/La Commission GEDEON Commission web page, or to visit one of Pierre LeBlanc's current web-pieces		First Son: Portraits by C.D. Hoy. Circulated by Presentation House Gallery Curator: Faith Moosang   First Son is an extraordinary collection of photographs by C.D. Hoy (1883-1973), a Chinese-Canadian photographer whose evocative portraits of First Nations, Chinese and Caucasian subjects in small-town British Columbia, taken between 1909 and 1920, form an important historical and cultural document about the roots of "otherness" in Canada. Born in the province of Guangdong in China, Chow Dong Hoy held the honourable position of being his parents' first-born son. Financial difficulties forced his father to send him to Vancouver, Canada, in 1902. He moved to the central interior of British Columbia to earn his living as a gold miner, among other trades, and learned photography as a means to augment his income. Hoy became the first town photographer in Quesnel. Initially his subjects were Chinese men, but they grew to include Caucasians and First Nations people, after Hoy learned to speak their languages.  As one of the few non-white photographers of his time, Hoy’s contribution to the demographic record is unique. The portraits elucidate not only the faces but the clothes, the work, and the rough-hewn materials of the frontier. In Hoy’s photographs the subjects sit front and centre with their own stories with their own vitality. Hoy’s camera captured the enduring presence of the interior native people and the dignity of the Chinese immigrants. The portraits are personal records meant for a private audience, and as such they lack the pretence of many historical photographs that were taken of the exotic “other.” Hoy's photographic aesthetic was driven by the spirit of invention. He was not a simple portraitist; his work was deliberate and informed, often including elaborate and precisely-positioned backgrounds. Taken as a collection, these moving and exquisite images depict a multiracial community frozen in time, and are as rich, varied and vital as the people they portray.  The exhibition presents 81 black and white images including a number of self-portraits. First Son: Portraits by C. D. Hoy is curated by Faith Moosang and organized and circulated by Presentation House Art Gallery. The exhibition photographs were made by Henri Robideau. It is supported by the Government of British Columbia through the British Columbia Heritage Trust, Barkerville Historic Town and the Friends of Barkerville, the Hamber Foundation, the School of Media Arts at Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design and the Canada Council for the Arts.   C.D. Hoy, Untitled, gelatin silver print, c. 1910s   C.D. Hoy, "Untitled. Gelatin silver print, c. 1910s.

 

 

Visual Artists of Newfoundland & Labrador: celebration EXHIBITION & BOOK LAUNCH JUNE 19 - SEPTEMBER 13, 2003

Sylvia Bendzsa, Grant Boland, Luben Boykov, Tara Bryan, Andrea Cooper, Michael Coyne, Tina Dolter, Peter Drysdale, Audrey Feltham, Don Foulds, Susan Furneaux, Will Gill, Corey Gorman, Helen Gregory, Kent Jones, Kathleen Knowling, Bonnie Leyton, Marlene MacCallum, Jim Maunder, Catherine McCausland, Brenda McClellan, James Miller, David Morrish, Undrea Norris, Beth Oberholtzer, Robin Smith Peck, Elena Popova, Christopher Pratt, Mary Pratt, Dave Sheppard, Reed Weir. Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery is pleased to present Visual Artists of Newfoundland and Labrador: a Celebration - an exciting, timely exhibition of visual that celebrates contemporary arts in the province. Interdisciplinary in focus, the exhibition explores thematic relationships between 31emerging and established artists working in the mediums of painting, printmaking, collage, sculpture, artists' books, textiles and multi-media installation. Works in the exhibition reflect the continued strength and development of printmaking in the province, generated through artists' residencies in the long-established print shops at St. Michael's and Grenfell College. The exhibition includes new prints, photogravure and artist's books created in the private print shops and letterpress studios of Audrey Feltham's Atelier West, Tara Bryan's Walking Bird Press, David Morrish's DeadCat Press and Marlene McCallum's Persnickety Press. Landscape painting, high realism and narrative painting continue to flourish and develop in the region, informed and challenged by a productive cross fertilization of ideas and the mentor/teacher relationship between emerging and established artists such as Grant Boland and Mary Pratt, Corey Gorman and Michael Coyne. Students and graduates of the visual arts programs at Grenfell College, the College of the North Atlantic and the Anna Templeton Centre have spread their energy and fresh vision throughout the province, gravitating in numbers to St. John's. There, work in textiles is emerging as a strong practice, forged in traditional techniques, shaped by contemporary vision. Sculpture is a relatively new medium to the island of Newfoundland. The recent establishment of Luben Boykov's environmentally friendly foundry in Flat Bay supports the production of bronze sculpture. Sculptor Don Foulds has had a significant influence on younger sculptors through his own practice and the program he delivers through Grenfell College. Peter Drysdale and Will Gill bring wit to the medium through found objects and a quirky juxtaposition of materials. Organized by Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery and curator Gail Tuttle, Visual Artists of Newfoundland and Labrador: a Celebration draws on a rich tradition of regional visual art interpreted in a fresh, vibrant exhibition. Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery will host an opening reception for the artists on June 19 from 7 to 9 p.m.    Book Launch In partnership with the provincial arts organization Visual Artists Newfoundland and Labrador, the gallery will host the official launch of VANL's book project Visual Artists of Newfoundland and Labrador: an Exhibition in Print during the public exhibition opening and reception on June 19 at 7 p.m. Brenda McClennan, chair of the book project for VANL, will attend and speak about the project. The provincial organization serves artists by fostering awareness and understanding of the arts, by lobbying on behalf of visual artists and by disseminating relevant through its quarterly newsletter. VANL is a registered not-for-profit organization that has been in operation since 1995. The organization grew out of Canadian Artists Representation Newfoundland and Labrador and today remains an affiliate of the national organization Canadian Artists Rerpresentation/le front des artistes canadiens. In 1998 VANL organized the juried exhibition Art Invites Your Company at the Art Gallery of Newfoundland and Labrador. It contacted several sponsors to award purchase prizes as a fundraiser. The exhibition and an award from CEDA generated enough funds to proceed with the Artists of Newfoundland and Labrador book project, published in February 2003. The book is a juried exhibition in print of work in the traditional mediums of printmaking, sculpture and painting by 43 contemporary artists. The three jurors for the book were Susan Woods, an artist and curator from Halifax; Ed Bartram, artist and educator from Ontario; and Gloria Hickey, a local writer and curator. This handsome publication includes artist's statements, an introduction by Kevin Major, and juror's notes. The book itself will be distributed to schools and libraries across the province, public galleries across the country, and to Canadian embassies.		Beth Oberholtzer, "View of Seed". Installation, mixed media, 2000.
		Elena Popova, "Me and Above Me", Monotype, 22" x 36", 1999.

 

 

 

between

arsphenamine and artifact

2003 Fourth-Year Graduation Exhibit April 28th - June 7th, 2003. between arsphenamine and artifact is an exhibition of new multi-disciplinary work by 21 fourth-year students of the visual arts program at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College. The visual arts program offers the only BFA (visual arts) degree in Newfoundland. It is a professional program intended to educate and train students in the history, theory and practice of the visual arts. The four-year BFA (visual arts) is an intensive studio program incorporating a balanced mix of theory and practice. In the early stages of the program students work in a variety of media to express artistic ideas and personal vision. As their skills develop, an increasing emphasis is put on conceptual and theoretical issues. The Fourth-Year Student Exhibition is a valuable opportunity for students to exhibit their work in a professional gallery space and to benefit from public exposure. Artworks in the exhibition include photography, video, painting, textile installation, sculpture, digital media, printmaking and book works. The artists' conceptual concerns reflect the variety and scope of current interests in contemporary art. The artists exhibiting in between arsphenamine and artifact are: Heidi Anderson, Sharon Ash, Jennifer Barrett, Claire Bourgeois, Karen Channing, Abbie Collins, Vicki Collins, Baden Canning, David Gale, Shirley Greer, Scott Keating, Patrick Kennedy, Laura King, Melissa Martin, Craig Morrison, April Norman, Amanda Powell, Phillip Robbins, Ryan Thomas Sheppard, Curtis Slade and Paul Tucker.   Bathroom with protruding counter. 2003. Karen Channing 100" x 50

Apil Norman, malevich chair, 211.2" x 50" x 211.2", 2003.

Baden Cunning, Untitled, 50" x 30" x 20", 2003.

Bill Rose: In Absurdum - Paintings March 12th - April 13th, 2003. Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery exhibited Bill Rose: In Absurdum - Paintings - The exhibit was a solo exhibition of the work of Newfoundland and Labrador artist Bill Rose. Circulated by the Art Gallery of Newfoundland and Labrador, the show surveyed the artist's work over the last decade or so, concentrating on his oils on canvas. Many of Rose's paintings combine words and images in thought-provoking and often humorous commentaries on a broad spectrum of socio-political topics, including environmentalism, patriotism, big business and the art world itself.

Bill Rose, "If Only...".

 

 

Martyr's Murder  Diane Thorneycroft January 21 - March 1st. 2003. Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery exhibited Martyr's Murder - a new series of photographs and installation work by artist Diana Thorneycroft, which examines mechanisms that lead to public acceptance of violence and cruelty. Old Master paintings of martyrdoms of various saints act as templates for Thorneycroft's photographs, in which she recreates the grisly scenes using dolls as stand-ins. Thorneycroft's premise is that the artists would have had first-hand knowledge of the executions in order to produce the intimate detail of the paintings. The actual images in the paintings are gruesome, yet, generally, they provoke no public outcry. Like these paintings, Thorneycroft's photographs are realized in rich and sensuous colour. In fact, using dolls as stand-ins lends a certain black humour to the photographs. This element is undercut by displays of 'forensic evidence' - photographs of injuries, a blood-soaked dress, and murder weapons in order to reconnect the viewer with the actual meaning of the imagery. Never easy, Thorneycroft's work is always thought-provoking.

Diana Thorneycroft, The Martyrdom of John the Evangelist, Case No.100-1508, C-print, 26" x 33", 2002.