Current Exhibitions

Here & Now - Michael Leeb

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Michael Leeb's artwork, Creature from the Depths, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artwork

Creature from the Depths, is a mixed media ledger drawing made using a variety of media and paper ephemera as collage.

This artwork is included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired this artwork through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

The following is an excerpt of Michael Leeb's artist statement. Read the full statement.

Creature from the Depths is a mythical storm creature conjured from an imaginative act of drawing and collage inspired by artistic pareidolia and the use of a vintage nautical map of the pacific Westcoast. This piece is intended to be a metaphorical allusion to colonialism and transformation as depicted by the storm creature devouring a tall ship.

About the artist

Michael J. Leeb is a métis visual artist, writer, and poet (Chippewa Cree/German). Michael is a printmaker (drypoint copper etchings), a papermaker, and creates mixed media drawings/ink paintings and artist books.

His work is included in the collections of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, the Bruce Peel Special Collections Library of the University of Alberta, Medalta Potteries, and the Ino-Cho Paper Museum (Japan).

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Michael Leeb's artwork, Creature from the Depths, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Michael Leeb's artwork, Creature from the Depths, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Michael Leeb
Creature from the Depths
2020
Ink and collage on paper

Here & Now - Claudia Jimenez Chagoya

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Claudia Jimenez Chagoya's artwork, Dama Charra con Traje de Gran Gala, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artwork

This Dama Charra represents the typical attire known as “Gran Gala” (Grand Gala), characterized by the fine and ornate traditional garments. In the competitive Charreria events, there are nine activities for men and just one for women.

This artwork is included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired this artwork through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

The following is an excerpt of Claudia Jimenez Chagoya's artist statement. Read the full statement

Damas Charras is a body of work that represents the cow folk culture in Mexico called Charrería and focuses specifically on women horse riders. The sculptures explore the rich traditions and guidelines that the Damas Charras need to follow for official social events, as well as executing tricks on horses during competitions. This series aims to showcase and elevate the role of these female figures in a male dominated environment.

About the artist

Claudia Chagoya is a Mexican interdisciplinary artist born in Zacatecas, Mexico, and based in Calgary, Canada. She holds an MFA degree from the University of Calgary, and a BFA from Instituto Allende in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.  

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Claudia Jimenez Chagoya's artwork, Dama Charra con Traje de Gran Gala, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Claudia Jimenez Chagoya's artwork, Dama Charra con Traje de Gran Gala, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Claudia Jimenez Chagoya
Dama Charra con Traje de Gran Gala
2021
Recycled cardboard boxes on acrylic base
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Here & Now - Wei Li

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Wei Li's artworks, Chilli Sauce and Spout Cup, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artworks

Wei Li's artworks, Chilli Sauce and Spout Cup are part of a digital series, Vessels which explores the complex intersectionality of hybrid identity. (Click arrows above on either side of the image to see each work.)

These artworks are included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired these two artworks through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

The following is an excerpt of Wei Li's artist statement Read the full statement.

In my digital series, I look for a representational possibility that combines digital aesthetics with traditional art-making sensibilities. By replacing parts of ordinary objects with the human body/skin, I create grotesque anthropomorphic hybrid containers which trigger the viewer’s visceral and emotional responses. The gestures in my works are symbolic and metaphoric. I use the body/skin as material to activate social commentary on identity, diaspora, femininity, motherhood, and popular culture.

Artist profile

Get to know Wei as she shares the stories behind her new digital series, Vessels, and a bit about herself in her AFA Artist Spotlight.

Wei Li is a Calgary-based emerging Chinese Canadian visual artist, whose experience of being a new immigrant to Canada, provides her with crucial inspiration in her artistic practice. Her dual cultural background challenges her to integrate different cultural perspectives in her works and creates tensions through the contradictions inherent in forming a new hybrid cultural identity.

Li graduated in 2017 with BFA in Painting (with Distinction) from the University of Alberta and has participated in several exhibitions and artistic residencies across Canada and the United States of America, including the Sam and Adele Golden Foundation Artist Residency in 2021. Her first major solo exhibition, Curious Things was featured in August of 2017 in the Art Incubator Gallery at Harcourt House Artist Run Centre in Edmonton.

Li was a finalist in the 2017 RBC Canadian Painting Competition with her works showcased at the National Art Gallery in Ottawa. Recently, Wei has expanded her practice to the digital medium. She was the recipient of the prestigious Emerging Digital Artist Award in 2022, and her digital works were acquired as part of the EQ Bank’s digital art collection and were presented at the Trinity Square Video in Toronto.

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Wei Li's artworks, Chilli Sauce and Spout Cup, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Wei Li's artworks, Chilli Sauce and Spout Cup, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Chilli Sauce
2023
Digital print on paper
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Spout Cup
2023
Digital print on paper
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Here & Now - Lisa Brawn

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Lisa Brawn is represented with three artworks featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artworks

The three artworks are carved and painted woodcuts on curved oak chair backs salvaged from the renovation of the Martha Cohen Theatre in Calgary. (Click arrows above on either side of the image to see each work.)

These artworks are included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired these three artworks through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

Lisa Brawn is represented in the exhibition by three works. Excerpts from the artist statement for each work are below. 

Black Lagoon P.R. Reputation Laundering

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Black Lagoon P.R. pays homage to bottom feeder opportunists who are able to spin outrageously heinous actions into victimization and even saintliness. We can buy a team of lawyers and communications specialists to re-characterize our ruthless pillaging and carpet bombing as innocuous oatmeal cookies and daisy garlands. Maximalist Public Relation absurdities are an integral component of a dystopian mediascape, and low hanging fruit for parody. 

HELLO, my name is: Fact-based Reality

Read the full statement.

With each of us in our bespoke algorithm-funnelled information silos, the concept of fact-based reality feels like a quaint relic. So elusive yet plausible, it could only be represented as a mythical beast. Is it real? Was it ever real? Once upon a time? Only in Paradise? 

Risk Management for Introverts

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Here is a viable coping mechanism as demonstrated by The Invisible Man ca. 1933. This one is personal. I have to devise elaborate workarounds to present myself non-anonymously in public. I am predisposed to introversion, and the world is particularly unsafe for LGBTQ2, which I discovered personally by coming out in high school in the 80s. 

 

About the artist

Lisa Brawn is a Calgary based artist specializing in painted woodcut blocks. Her work is in public collections such as The Alberta Foundation for the Arts, Calgary Civic Art Collection, and The University of Lethbridge collection, as well as in private collections across Canada, Europe, and the United States. Her work has been featured on banners for Calgary Bridges, Calgary Parks, and Fort Calgary, and there is a large scale permanent installation of her woodblocks at Inglewood’s Festival Hall.

A major component of Lisa’s art practice has been exploring the possibilities for alternative art venues and project spaces. Starting in 2001, her artmobile in a 1935 vintage travel trailer was followed by an art salon in Calgary’s Grain Exchange building. Lisa then collaborated with Milo Dlouhy and Angela Inglis to transform a downtown warehouse into an artist-run gallery and Museum of Oddities.

In 2007, Brawn, Dlouhy, and Inglis collaborated on a storefront museum in Art Central, and in 2009 and 2010, Brawn and Inglis collaborated with Jane Grace on an interdisciplinary project space in a hundred year old cottage. In 2009 Brawn transformed a 1962 Airstream into a second mobile gallery, The Bambi Media Machine, which was featured in the film “I Liked You Better Before” directed by Michal Lavi. From 2007 to 2012, Lisa curated a window gallery with Inglis and Grace, known as La Fenêtre.

In her twenty year career as a professional artist, Lisa has been featured in 25 solo exhibitions and participated in more than 40 group exhibitions from Victoria, Seattle and Los Angeles, to Halifax, Chicago and New Orleans. She received international attention for her large scale interactive, solar-powered sculptural installation, Helios, at the Leighton Art Centre, which was featured on CBC’s As It Happens, and picked up by media outlets from Canada to Brazil.

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Lisa Brawn is represented with three artworks featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Lisa Brawn
Black Lagoon P.R. Reputation Laundering
2022
Acrylic on carved wood
Lisa Brawn
HELLO, my name is: Fact-based Reality
2022
Acrylic on carved wood
Lisa Brawn
Risk Management for Introverts
2022
Acrylic on carved wood

Here & Now - Raeann Kit-Yee Cheung

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Raeann Kit-Yee Cheung's artwork, If We Could Meet Again, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artwork

If We Could Meet Again is an appropriation consisting of three exposures onto one medium-format frame. The resulting silver gelatin print was subsequently painted with yellow water colour.

This artwork is included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired this artwork through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

The following is an excerpt of Raeann Kit-Yee Cheung's artist statement. Read the full statement.

The people in the image are Mr. Wong Quai Lun and his wife in the centre, their son, Calvin, and their daughter, Debbie. When Mr. Wong first arrived in Canada in 1921, he worked in the CPR camps. He also worked as a bus boy before he opened his own general store in Royalties, Alberta. The notion of the yellow steam on the image illustrates Mr. Wong's involvement with the CPR and how he never revealed his early immigrant experiences to his children. The recreation of the family portrait is a way to imagine what Mr. Wong might say to his children today, now that they are both adults.

About the artist

Born in Hong Kong and raised in Canada, Raeann Kit-Yee Cheung is a photographer who leans on a dual heritage to create work that is both personal and universal. Having immigrated almost five decades ago, Raeann has come to accept she is neither Chinese nor Canadian, but rather someone who embodies a rich ambiguity that helps her confront melded identities to resolve inner complexities.

Raeann holds a MA in contemporary photography (2021) and resides in the traditional territories of the Treaty 7 region in Southern Alberta, which includes the Blackfoot Confederacy as well as the Tsuut’ina First Nation, and the Stoney Nakoda.

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Raeann Kit-Yee Cheung's artwork, If We Could Meet Again, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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If We Could Meet Again
2022
Digital print on paper
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Alberta Artist Profile | Allison Tunis

Get to know an Alberta artist! There are more than 1,700 Alberta artists included in the AFA collection, and many of them are new or emerging contemporary artists. We're taking an opportunity to highlight some artists from the collection whose artwork is currently on exhibition or on tour.  

By: Kimberly Van Nieuvenhuyse, Writer/Social Media Officer

Meet Alberta artist Allison Tunis

Allison has a life-long love for art going back to when she was a young child. She started embroidery and cross-stitching in her early teens as a hobby. When she was in her last year of her Fine Arts degree, she starting to combine the conceptual work she was doing with the cross-stitch embroidery she had loved for years.  

I had a chance to chat with Allison to find out more about her practice, what it’s like to work as an artist in Alberta and who her favourite Alberta artist is (hint: it’s our province’s first Artist in Residence!).

Alberta Foundation for the Arts:  Tell me about your practice.

Allison Tunis: I have two ways of working really, as I have two very different mediums that I work in. My embroidery practice is something that I have honed over the last 20 years, and while it is always improving still, it is a healing process for me and is designed to be a comfortable practice. I work in a big squishy armchair in my living room, with tea on hand, and I spend a lot of hours just sitting and stitching, with a bit of computer design and digital planning in the beginning stages.

However, I am also currently the artist-in-residence at Harcourt House, an artist-run centre, and my studio practice is quite a bit different. For this residency, I am developing a series of large-scale mixed-media paintings that involve gel photo transfers, text and embroidery, as well as an interactive installation to explore themes about our society’s use of language towards and about fatness and its effects on people, such as myself. This is a much more expressive practice for me, although this particular residency involves a fair amount of research and repetitive data entry in the beginning stages.

AFA: What’s it like being an artist in Alberta?

AT: Being an artist in Alberta is very exciting in my opinion. While we may not have the same reputation as some of the larger cities such as Vancouver and Toronto, the support artists get in Edmonton and Alberta is fabulous. I have been privileged to be offered some unique opportunities to have my work travel around Alberta, including with the TREX program, and bring my concepts and techniques to venues outside of large cities and to audiences that may not normally engage with art is an amazing feeling.

AFA: What inspires you?

AT:  I’m inspired by communities that form out of hardship and the resilience of people. The work I do is heavily influenced by real individuals in our (larger) communities and the need for diverse and authentic representation in art and media. The abilities of human beings to persevere and create positive change out of trauma and hurt is amazing, and I strive to use my art to heal, acknowledge and share from my own experiences.

Image Credit: Allison Tunis, Sam, embroidery on cloth, 2017. Collection of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts. 

AFA: How do you want people to feel about your art?

AT: I don’t have a certain way I want people to feel about my art, but I do hope that my art challenges people to think about some of the ways our media and art has regulated what we consider to be beautiful, what we consider to be valuable, what we consider to be important. My work is asking questions, but not necessarily giving answers, and it’s up to viewers to decide how they feel and what they believe. I also hope that viewers that live in marginalized bodies are able to see themselves represented and validated in my works through literal visual representation and/or connections to broader human experiences and concepts.

AFA: What is your favourite part of the art-making process?

AT: My favourite part of the art-making process is the last hour of an embroidery piece. The sense of accomplishment after dozens (if not hundreds) of hours of work is wonderful, but also the details really only appear when you have all the stitches in place so it’s a beautiful moment of getting to finally see the whole picture of weeks and months of staring at blotches of colours.

AFA: Your work is in the AFA’s art collection. How does that make you feel knowing your work is part of an art collection that belongs to all Albertans? Note: Allison’s work came into the AFA collection through the Art Acquisitions by Application program.

AT: The fact that two of my pieces are in the AFA collection is almost surreal to me. I am so passionate about the work I create, and the fact that my province and home feel that my work is of the calibre that they would like to own it and show it to our communities is an honour. It’s also very exciting to think that these traditional techniques are still valued and can be used in ways to communicate new and impactful technology and concepts to Albertans and beyond.
 

Image Credit: Allison Tunis, Little Bear, embroidery on cloth, 2017. Collection of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts.

AFA: Who is your favourite Alberta artist?

AT: That’s a tough one! One of my favourites is Lauren Crazybull, the first Artist-in-Residence for Alberta. I’ve been familiar with her art practice and her work in the community for a while, and I am so excited to see that she has been selected for this new opportunity.

AFA: Tell us a fun fact about yourself.

AT: I was an abstract color-field painter for three out of four years of my Fine Art degree. I abruptly changed paths in my last year to focus on more conceptual works about bodies, sexuality and social issues.

AFA: Thank you for taking the time answer my questions, Allison!

AT: You’re welcome.

Allison has a BFA (2008) from the University of Alberta, with a focus on painting and drawing and also a Graduate Diploma from the Vancouver Art Therapy Institute (2014). In addition to her artistic practice, Allison also runs a Queer Youth Art Club for LGBTQIA2S+ youths twice a month. It’s a free space for young people ages 14-24 run out of the Alberta Sex Positive Education & Community Centre, where they can explore different art themes and materials, whilst building safe(r) communities.

Allison’s work from the AFA art collection can been seen in two Travelling Exhibition Program (TREX) exhibitions, including Real Women, developed by the Art Gallery of Alberta and curated by Shane Golby. It will travel Alberta from now until August 2020. She is also has a new exhibition at Harcourt House that is on view until November 23, 2019.

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Get to know Alberta artist Allison Tunis! Learn more about Alberta artists included in the AFA art collection.

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Here & Now - Michael Magnussen

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Michael Magnussen's artwork, Flaming Helmet, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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About the artwork

The work is an inkjet print from a series and was created to allow the work to be shown without the physical mask.

This artwork is included in the Here & Now exhibition at the Royal Alberta Museum until September 29, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition.

The AFA acquired this artwork through its Art Acquisition by Application program in 2023. This program is designed to acquire contemporary works of art by any eligible Alberta artist.

Artist statement

The following is an excerpt of Michael Magnussen's artist statement. Read the full statement

This is part of an ongoing match series where I use the material of matches to speak to my identity as a flamboyant or flaming Queer person, often lighting the ornamental work while wearing it. This piece takes the same material but is inspired by a meme I saw during the pandemic. The work is an extension of that meme, and speaks a bit to vulnerability I was experiencing while also trying to express how threatening the virus felt to me at the time.

The work is open to interpretation though the hope is that people get a push and pull sense that there is a struggle between been protected and in danger at the same time.

Artist profile

Michael Magnussen is an artist/curator from rural Saskatchewan, who is based out of Edmonton, Alberta. They hold a Master of Fine Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies at OCAD University, and a BFA from Concordia University in Studio Arts.

They have exhibited their work across Canada and internationally, notable exhibitions include, “Every. Now.Then: Reframing Nationhood” at the Art Gallery of Ontario, “An Index” at the Museum of Contemporary Art, “Wild” at the Textile Museum of Canada, and “Show. 17” at the Idea Exchange.

Michael is a collective member and co-founder of YTB Gallery based out of Toronto, Ontario.

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Michael Magnussen's artwork, Flaming Helmet, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Michael Magnussen's artwork, Flaming Helmet, is featured in the 2024 AFA exhibition Here & Now at the Royal Alberta Museum.

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Michael Magnussen
Flaming Helmet
2022
Digital photograph on paper
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Work of the Week showcases Harry Kiyooka

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The AFA has loaned 8 artworks to be included in The Nickle Galleries exhibition of Harry Kiyooka, curated by Mary-Beth Laviolette.

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This week’s Work of the Week spotlights the exhibition HARRY MITSUO KIYOOKA – Artist. Educator. Activist., on now at the Nickle Galleries in Calgary. 

A 70-year retrospective of abstract art, portraiture and early abstract landscapes!
 

The AFA has loaned eight artworks to the gallery for inclusion in the exhibition. The exhibition is curated by Mary-Beth Laviolette and runs until April 27, 2024.

Learn more about the exhibition: nickle.ucalgary.ca/exhibition/harry-mitsuo-kiyooka/

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The AFA has loaned 8 artworks to be included in The Nickle Galleries exhibition of Harry Kiyooka, curated by Mary-Beth Laviolette.

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The AFA has loaned 8 artworks to be included in The Nickle Galleries exhibition of Harry Kiyooka, curated by Mary-Beth Laviolette.

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Title
Red Contiguous
Year
1972
Medium
acrylic on canvas
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Harry Kiyooka
H K Self Portrait
2019
oil on board
Harry Kiyooka
High Yellow
n.d.
silkscreen on paper
Harry Kiyooka
Red Contiguous
1972
acrylic on canvas
Tuscania
c.1962-1966
oil on canvas

Prairie Interlace: Weaving, Modernisms and the Expanded Frame

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Our Work of the Week features selected images loaned to for this touring exhibition travelling from Alberta to Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

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Prairie Interlace: Weaving, Modernisms and the Expanded Frame examines the explosion of textile art from the Canadian Prairies during the last century.
 

This touring exhibition featured sixty artworks by forty-eight artists. The AFA was pleased to loan nine artworks through our exhibition loans program, four of which can be viewed above. 

  • this exhibition was hosted by Nickle Galleries in Calgary, from September 9 to December 17, 2022.

The exhibition toured across the prairies until February 2024.

For more information about the artists and artworks included in this exhibition, visit prairieinterlace.ca

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Our Work of the Week features selected images loaned to for this touring exhibition travelling from Alberta to Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

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Our Work of the Week features selected images loaned to for this touring exhibition travelling from Alberta to Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

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Eva Heller
Heat
1983
wool, cotton tapestry on cotton board
Cindy Baker
I KNOW PEOPLE ARE STEALING MY THINGS RUG
1998
atch-hook, acrylic yarn, wool yarn, cotton canvas backing on canvas
Amy Loewan
A MANDALA "THE CIRCLE AND THE SQUARE"
1996
rice paper weave, Chinese ink, charcoal, printout on paper
Hazel Gladys Evelyn Schwass
UNTITLED
1974
wool, sheep fleece tapestry, wool, bones, wooden beads

DataLog : Art Encoded - An Emerging Curator Exhibition

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DataLog : Art Encoded fully embraces and uses the resources of the digital realm to exhibit selected artworks from the AFA Collection

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DataLog: Art Encoded is curated by Jane Edmundson, and generously funded through the Alberta Foundation for the Arts Emerging Curator Fellowship. Click through the images in the exhibition above, then scroll down to learn more about the pieces.
 

Explore this exhibition on Google Arts & Culture.
 

The medium is the message.”

-Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, 1964

Our online experiences are mediated by streams of code that most of us never see. This invisible data facilitates all of our technological interactions and enables work, entertainment, education, and creation. The off/on, negative/positive Boolean patterning of binary computing code is a contemporary cousin to the printing press, Pierre Jaquet-Droz’s 18th century automatons, and the Jacquard Loom. The relationship between technology and creative production is visible today in Photoshop hobbyists,Maker Faires, and the coded meanings of conceptual art.

The ability to instantly access a wide variety of information and platforms for an enriched, interactive experience is one not easily achieved by an exhibition in a conventional, physical art gallery space. DataLog : Art Encoded fully embraces and uses the resources of the digital realm to exhibit selected artworks from the AFA Collection while discussing the existence of art inside the technological landscape. The selected artworks employ patterning, code, negative/positive space, layering and pixelation to deliver messages to the viewer that are further influenced by the online platform that gives us access to them. The interdependent relationship between information and the technologies that facilitate its spread was predicted by Marshall McLuhan in pre-internet 1964, when he argued that the structure of a medium influences the way the messages it delivers are perceived. McLuhan believed that the information we receive is altered by the type of platform that delivers it to us; that knowledge consumed via book, radio, television, or computer, will be remembered and used differently.

DataLog : Art Encoded is organized into three thematic sections – ‘01100001 01110010 01110100’, ‘[re]generation of the image’, and ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Digital Reproduction’ – that explore concepts applicable to the worlds of both art and technology, including coded meaning, absence/presence, Pointillism, obsolescence and the evolution of visual media. Walter Benjamin’s influential 1935 essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” is re-examined within the context of digital creative methods and held up as a mirror to current discussions around artistic authenticity in a technologically-mediated age. Hyperlinks to related articles, YouTube videos, artist websites, interactive portals and streaming apps situate the selected artworks within the diversified multimedia of contemporary life, where our browsers (and brains) regularly have countless tabs open simultaneously.

Artwork Descriptions

01100001 01110010 01110100

Jane Molnar, Hoola Hoopers, 1979, photo-engraving on paper, 1981.068.001
Molnar’s repeating clusters of figures holding hula hoops are reduced to the bare contrasts of greyscale in this optical-illusory print. The white spaces of arms, legs, and hoops blend together against the black and grey shadows as the figures become exponentially tinier, disappearing into the perspectival plane of the image. As the viewer’s eye travels into the image’s depth, the figures give way to abstraction, creating a pattern of positive and negative space.

Marion Nicoll, The Audience, 1973, ink on paper, 1981.155.218
Nicoll is most known for her hard-edge abstractions, but the repetition of curving lines and circles in The Audience communicate the essential, stylized features of faces. The shapes are further anthropomorphized by gestural strokes added beneath the “noses,” breathing personality into a highly simplified and stripped-down composition that ties this drawing back to Nicoll’s large-scale abstract paintings.

John Will, Sads and Happy,1994, lithograph on paper, 1999.118.016
The binary opposition created by Will in this lithograph stacks his American-bred happiness against the frowns of 21 international faces. Will’s art practice is tongue-in-cheek and often uses autobiography as source material. Despite his statement that much of his work is “about nothing”, Will frequently draws on philosophical thought, art history, and politics, punctuating headier concepts with absurd excerpts from daily conversation. As a sort of self-portrait, Sads and Happy positions the artist as the literal “one” amongst emotional zeroes.

Mary Kavanagh, Tarnish: Silver Drawings, 2005, linen napkins, silver polish residue, tags, 2009.056.001
Tarnish is the conceptual twin to Kavanagh’s polish, where a long table of 1000 silver-plated household objects were displayed in the gallery space. The items were collected by the artist over a three-year period from prairie flea markets and antique shops, and painstakingly classified and labeled with identification tags. A linen napkin was assigned to each object and over the course of exhibition in four venues, the silverware was polished clean. The traces of the performances are made visible in tarnish, where the dark remnants of domestic, repetitive action stand out against the stark white napkins. Kavanagh sewed the cloths together to form a tapestry that brings to mind a quilt, or the clean tablecloth that the objects were initially displayed on.

Eric Cameron, Thin Painting: Chris’s Thread and Needle, 2007, acrylic gesso, spool of thread, needle, 2009.041.001
Cameron has been creating a body of work he calls “thick paintings” since 1979. Everyday objects are covered in hundreds of layers of gesso that he applies on a daily basis, brushstroke by brushstroke. Each coat of acrylic marks the passage of time, and contributes to the evolution of a pair of shoes, a rose, a head of lettuce (or in this case, a needle and spool of thread) into mysterious and amorphous sculptures. The object at the core of the sculpture ceases to exist in its original form, translated by its shroud of paint and requiring a new language to be read.

[re]generation of the image

C. Bryn Pinchin, Pieced of an Image, 1988, woven wool, linen, 1989.106.001.V&R
Pinchin’s weaving predates the computerized manipulation of images that we have grown accustomed to in media, advertising, art, and our personal snapshots, but still captures the hard-edged patterning of pixelation associated with digital files. The textile is designed to be viewed from both sides, creating a positive/negative, inverted spectrum mirror. The interlocking threads of black and white wool make a gridded image that brings to mind both analog newspaper printing techniques and our contemporary computer screens and smartphones.

David Garneau, Lac Ste Anne, 2008, acrylic on canvas, 2009.021.001
Garneau draws on a 19th century optical painting technique to capture a dreamlike atmosphere in Lac Ste Anne, named after the pilgrimage of great spiritual significance to the Cree and Métis peoples of Central Alberta. Pointillism harnesses the human eye’s ability to blend distinct dots of contrasting colours into tonal planes, creating gradients of light and shadow that can be perceived as depth. The same principles are used in CMYK printing and RGB television and computer monitors. Garneau builds this image by overlaying a swirling pattern of dots in neutral tones over simplified shapes painted in a warm palette, communicating the memory of a fleeting moment of family bonding and sacred healing.

Elliot Engley, Walterdale Bridge, 2008, acrylic on canvas, 2010.011.001
Rendered in an autumnal palette and thick, horizontal brushstrokes, Engley’s Waterdale Bridge brings to mind a TV channel half-lost to static, or a MagicEye autostereogram where the two-dimensional plane obscures a secret image of depth. When viewed up close, the architectural elements dissolve into an Impressionistic patchwork; at a distance, the image falls into focus, allowing the painting to serve as a record of the century-old thoroughfare that spans the North Saskatchewan River in Edmonton. The Impressionists aimed to capture temporary moments in time and space; similarly in Waterdale Bridge, Engley chooses to visually preserve an urban landmark that is scheduled for demolition in 2015/2016.

Chris Cran, Gold Woman 2, 2012, enamel, acrylic gel on board, 2013.004.001
Created as part of his recent Chorus series, Cran’s Gold Woman 2 is a hybrid of techniques and concepts the artist has been working with throughout his career. Cran has moved between photorealism, formalism, Op and Pop Art for over 30 years; his canvasses hover between representation and abstraction. Cran often uses blown-up imagery from the cartoons and advertising of the 1950s and 60s that were originally made with the Ben-Day dot analog printing process, regenerating these images to simultaneously form and dissolve in the eye of the viewer.

Megan Morman, Rita McKeough (Calgary), 2010, mixed-fibre yarn on plastic canvas, 2013.021.001
In her portraits of queer contemporary Canadian artists, Morman translates the pixelation of digital photographs into stitches of brightly-coloured yarn and fusible plastic beads. To immortalize Calgary-based art star and musician Rita McKeough, Morman used the gridded framework of “plastic canvas” needlepoint crafts (a common craft material for children of the 1980s). The resulting fuzzy edges and terraced gradients recall the graphics and animations of the early Internet, the work’s kitschy combination of craft and outdated tech triggering warm feelings of nostalgia.

The Work of Art in the Age of Digital Reproduction

“... for contemporary man the representation of reality by the film is incomparably more significant than that of the painter, since it offers, precisely because of the thoroughgoing permeation of reality with mechanical equipment, an aspect of reality which is free of all equipment. And that is what one is entitled to ask from a work of art.” – Walter Benjamin

David Hoffos, Nature Walk, 1995, colour photographs, nail on plywood, 1999.001.002
The collaged photographs that make up Nature Walk both capture a sense of place and document fleeting moments in time. The highly saturated colours transport the viewer back to a sunny day, but as the grid becomes imperfect across the rolling hills, the memory is fragmented. Hoffos’ combining of photographs shot in sequence predates current digital panoramic stitching software, while following the tradition of the painted panoramas and cycloramas of the 18th and 19th centuries. The “mechanical equipment” used by Hoffos is made plain by the individual snapshot size of the photographs, fabricating a hyperreality that, instead of being “free” of mechanism as Benjamin describes, makes the process of its creation clear.

“Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be. This unique existence of the work of art determined the history to which it was subject throughout the time of its existence...The presence of the original is the prerequisite to the concept of authenticity.” – Walter Benjamin

Faye HeavyShield, rock paper river, 2005, paper, digital photography, wax, 2009.141.002
rock paper river challenges Benjamin’s statement that reproduced images lack the capacity to embody authenticity and presence, as in this case (and in much of HeavyShield’s artistic practice) the “original” is made of many reproductions of digital photographs. HeavyShield often incorporates geographical elements into her work to reflect on her personal history and the cultural lineage of the Kainai Nation. References to the connection between land and body are visible in her most recent installations, where monochromatic photographs of skin, earth, and water are printed onto paper that is then folded or cut into multiplying, minimalist forms. The spatial relationships she creates between the viewer and the objects in these environments foster the “unique existence” Benjamin advocates; an authentic presence enabled, rather than prevented, by the reproduction and multiplication of the “original” image.

“Distance is the opposite of closeness. The essentially distant object is the unapproachable one. Unapproachability is indeed a major quality of the cult image. True to its nature, it remains "distant, however close it may be." The closeness which one may gain from its subject matter does not impair the distance which it retains in its appearance.” – Walter Benjamin

Geoffrey Hunter, Cloud Nine, 2014, acrylic on canvas, 2014.017.001
Benjamin refers to a philosophical distance between the viewer and the elevated, authentic work of art. Hunter’s Cloud Nine creates an optical distance with a layered screen of lines that partially covers the familiar image of a realistic cloudscape. Hunter achieves the illusion of depth in his paintings by applying and scraping away layers of paint in geometric patterns laid over top a source image, referencing both the history of Neoclassical art and contemporary digital image manipulation. The space between the viewer’s eye and the artwork compresses with the struggle between the representation of the sky in and among the abstraction of repeating vertical bars.

“A painting has always had an excellent chance to be viewed by one person or by a few. The simultaneous contemplation of paintings by a large public, such as developed in the nineteenth century, is an early symptom of the crisis of painting, a crisis which was by no means occasioned exclusively by photography but rather in a relatively independent manner by the appeal of art works to the masses.” – Walter Benjamin

Shelley Ouellet, Johnston Falls, 2012, plastic beads, plastic wrapped steel wire, 2014.030.001
Benjamin’s argument that the aura of painting was depleted once artworks began to be contemplated by a large public has interesting implications when applied to 19th century campaigns that used landscape paintings to promote Canada to a wide, international market. Picturesque nature scenes of unpeopled lands were made to sell the concept of a Canada ready for European consumption (despite the reality that many of the “empty” landscapes were already occupied by First Nations peoples). Johnston Falls is the follow-up to Ouellet’s Wish You Were Here… beaded curtain series that draws on historical paintings by artists Lucius O’Brien, Fredrick Edwin Church, and Frederic Marlett Bell-Smith. Ouellet replicates these icons of Canadiana on a grand, glittering scale to examine our relationships with constructed national identity, tourism, and an idealized natural world. She has employed computer mapping in the planning and assembly stages of her work since the mid-1990s, breaking source images into gridded components based on colour palette and then constructing the reproduction out of diverse, mass-produced materials including activist ribbons, plastic bugs, sequins, and Lite-Brite pegs.

“Mass reproduction is aided especially by the reproduction of masses. In big parades and monster rallies, in sports events, and in war, all of which nowadays are captured by camera and sound recording, the masses are brought face to face with themselves. Thls process, whose significance need not be stressed, is intimately connected with the development of the techniques of reproduction and photography. Mass movements are usually discerned more clearly by a camera than by the naked eye....This means that mass movements, including war, constitute a form of human behavior which particularly favors mechanical equipment.” – Walter Benjamin


Jonathon Luckhurst, Mudbank V, 2010, silver gelatin fibre print, 2010.055.001
Luckhurst uses the mechanical equipment of film-based photography to communicate subtleties in human interaction and the divide between built and natural environments. His commitment to traditional photographic methods in the midst of the popularity of digital cameras and software has commonalties with Benjamin’s belief in the authenticity of classical artistic methods over technological reproductions. Ironically, Luckhurst remains faithful to film-based techniques that, in Benjamin’s time, were viewed as a threat to artistic authenticity – what was once new and considered dangerous to the lineage of fine art is now, in some circles, seen as protecting it from the invasion of Photoshop hobbyists. In Mudbank V, however, Luckhurst does depict the subject Benjamin argues is most suited to photography – the mass movement of human bodies. But unlike literal reproduction or stark documentation, Luckhurst aims to inspire an emotional response in the viewer by prompting the degradation of the image, where people in the crowd are rendered anonymous by blurring, grain, and interventions in the printing process.

 

 

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DataLog: Art Encoded - Emerging Curator Exhibition
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DataLog: Art Encoded - Emerging Curator Exhibition
Art discipline
Collections Database Image
Image
Artist
Megan Morman
Title
Rita McKeough
Year
2010
Medium
mixed-fibre yarn on plastic canvas
Collections Images Slideshow
Jane Molnar
Hoola Hoopers
1979
photo engraving on paper
Marion Nicoll
The Audience
1973
ink on paper
John Will
Sads and Happy
1994
lithograph on paper
Mary Kavanagh
Tarnish: Silver Drawings
2005
linen napkins, silver polish residue, tags
Eric Cameron
Thin Painting: Chris's Thread and Needle
2007
acrylic gesso, spool of thread, needle
C. Bryn Pinchin
Pieced of an Image
1988
woven wool, linen
C. Bryn Pinchin
Pieced of an Image
1988
woven wool, linen
David Garneau
Lac Ste Anne
2008
acrylic on canvas
Walterdale Bridge
Elliot Engley
2008
acrylic on canvas
Chris Cran
Gold Woman
2012
enamel, acrylic gel on board
Megan Morman
Rita McKeough (Calgary)
2010
mixed-fibre yarn on plastic canvas
David Hoffos
Nature Walk
1995
colour phographs, nail on plywood
Faye HeavyShield
rock paper river
2005
paper, digital photograph
Geoffrey Hunter
Cloud Nine
2014
acrylic on canvas
Shelley Ouellet
Johnston Falls
2012
plastic beads, plastic wrapped steel wire
Jonathan Luckhurst
Mudbank
2010
silver gelatin fibre print on paper