Opening + Exhibition Tour

March 1st, 2019 as part of our RMG Fridays: To the Unseen Future event. James Kirkpatrick will be in attendance and will give an exhibition tour at 8:15pm. 

To The Unseen Future creates a space of spontaneity and discovery where social activity is unstructured yet unavoidable. Collapsing the boundary between artist, gallery and viewer, the exhibition will lead the visitor on a journey of discovery as one medium shifts and morphs into another. James Kirkpatrick’s work produces a space for social empathy to emerge, ignited by the intertwining of technological and human flaws, secrets and communication. He has gleaned his unique visual language through years of participation in the underground worlds of graffiti, hip-hop, noise music and surfing the Great Lakes.Kirkpatrick mixes vintage pop-culture imagery found in underground comics, retro video games, and outsider science fiction with symbolic references hidden in secret societies. He seamlessly integrates figuration and abstraction; painting and sculpture; drawing and sound; textiles and zines; performance and glitch. Weaving formal, alternate pop and historical elements into a very personal, visual narrative, Kirkpatrick delves into contemporary experiences while exploring archetypal questions.

Well known for his participation in the early Canadian graffiti movement and as avant-garde hip-hop artist Thesis Sahib, Kirkpatrick works in a variety of media including drawing, painting, sculpture, textiles, zines, mask-making and experimental sound improvisation. Most recently, he has incorporated kinetic and auditory elements into his work.

Curated by Lisa Daniels; organized and circulated by the Judith and Norman Alix Gallery in collaboration with The Robert McLaughlin Gallery

Reception: Sunday, October 14, 1pm

Oshawa born artist John Lander (1951-1992) created a body of work in prints, paintings, and wood cuts, that speaks to an intense encounter with life. From his earliest screen prints to his final paintings, Lander’s aesthetic combines high style, humour, saturated colour, and a kind of yearning.

Luminous John Lander includes work exhibited during Lander’s solo exhibition at the RMG in 1988, as well as prints and paintings never previously exhibited, from several private collections.
Curated by Terry Sefton.

A printmaking workshop led artist Angela Hennessey has been developed based on this exhibition and Lander’s work. Click here to learn more!

A hundred years ago, when World War I was winding down and peace was right around the corner, a new strain of influenza swept the world, killing more people than the Great War. The 1918 Spanish Influenza is considered the deadliest outbreak of infectious disease in recorded history. It killed between 50-100 million people worldwide, 30,000-50,000 in Canada. The discrepancy and mystery with the numbers is due to the fact that medical systems were overwhelmed and in short supply during the war, so many deaths were unreported. It’s often referred to as the “forgotten” epidemic due to its limited coverage in the war censored media at the time. Incorrectly thought to have started in Spain, the epidemic got its name because neutral Spanish newspapers frequently covered the devastating impact of the disease.

 

In Oshawa, young men who survived fighting overseas returned home only to succumb to the flu. The Spanish Influenza was unique in that the victims were predominantly young adults, aged 20-40, the same age group most impacted by the war. In response, the government set public gathering restrictions across Ontario, however, that did not stop the celebrations that took place in the streets when the war was over.

 

In Canada, a country still recovering from the effect of the Great War, the Spanish Influenza had a profound social and economic effect. It reduced the workforce, lowered life expectancy, and left many children without parents. This exhibition features historical images from various sources that shed light on the epidemic’s national impact.

Artist talk: October 21, 2pm

Randomly Connected, a group of eight female artists, was formed about 8 years ago. All of the group are members of the Oshawa Art Association and most of them met each other through the association. The idea to form the group came from a desire to stimulate their personal creativity and build connections of support and friendship with other artists. The group meets monthly for encouragement and inspiration. They usually choose a word randomly from the dictionary as a theme for the works of art which they will bring to the next meeting. Using topics such as “joss,” “sort” and “intercrop” challenges them to stretch beyond usual themes. The name of their group, “Randomly Connected,” sprang from their method of choosing themes.

The group uses a range of materials, methods and motivations in order to create. They employ acrylics, oils, ink, watercolours, drawing materials, printmaking, pastels and some three-dimensional and experimental media such as textiles and glass. Several of them try to capture the beauties of nature in landscapes, florals and still lifes, inspiring the viewer to value and conserve the earth. Another member enjoys creating humorous “nonsense” from everyday events, bringing a smile to the observer. Some use human subject matter to capture interactions, relationships and passages of life. Others sometimes work in abstracts.
The members of “Randomly Connected” are pleased to mount their first group show. For their theme they have chosen “Reflections,” and have created art based on ideas such as of the play of light on water and other surfaces, and the concept of introspection and memories of the past.

Sandra Collins
Art, crafts and biology were Sandra’s main interests throughout a grammar school education in Britain. While employed she participated in evening classes given by local artists. Since immigrating to Canada she continues to learn from the many talented artists in this community. Her theme for the show is “Reflection of Light and Life.” Daily reflections of everything she sees are stored in her memory, and may be captured in art and photography. When she reflects upon stored images they may fade as time passes while others remain clear and bright. These images inspire her to work in acrylic and mixed media.

Ruth Greenlaw
Ruth was born and grew up in Ontario and has returned after spending several years in other parts of Canada, most recently, Nova Scotia. She earned an Honours BA in Visual Arts from Western University. Since then, she has taken art courses and taught art to adults. A member of the Oshawa Art Association, Visual Arts Clarington, Whitby Station Gallery and Robert McLaughlin Gallery, she has won awards in juried shows. Favourite subject matter includes botanical studies of plants and trees, still lifes, landscapes and studies of people. Her love of color is expressed in watercolors and pastels while her enjoyment of line and graphic qualities can be found in her etchings and drawings. As she continues to explore various combinations of media and subject matter, she finds that creating art is full of new possibilities.

Anne Labelle Johnson
Anne was born in Toronto, but grew up on a farm in Green River and moved to Oshawa in 1968. A long time member of the Oshawa Art Association, she has studied watercolour with artists in Durham region, at Haliburton School of Fine Arts and in Palm Beach County, Florida.
Anne is a member of the Oshawa Art Association, the Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Whitby Station Gallery, and PineRidge Arts Council. In 1994 Anne and her husband Tony Johnson, also an artist, opened Blue Willow Studio in Oshawa, a combination gallery and studio which they call home.
In her watercolour paintings, Anne emulates the delicacy and gracefulness of the flowers she paints and her brush strokes give vitality to lush gardens and fresh plants and the strength of landscapes. Her paintings of flowers are colourful and alive, and represent all the joy, hope and promise in life.

Janet Blyth Powers
“There is a beauty often found in brokenness that takes your breath away.” In her work, Janet explores brokenness, trying to capture the human struggle. Woven into her work are the experiences of friends, sadness, joy, and shared journeys: an attempt to honour those she loves. Born in Montreal, Janet grew up in a culturally rich urban environment. It seemed everything she experienced needed to be expressed visually. It still does. She is not held to any one medium or style, but continually is in search of something that will convey emotion and the heart of a thing. Currently a member of the Oshawa Art Association, she studied at the Montreal Museum of Fine Art and Design, taught various courses throughout her career, and shared her work at grief seminars in recognition of the healing power of artistic expression. And so the journey continues.

Sharon Recalla
Sharon Recalla was born in Orillia, grew up in Fort Erie and finally made Oshawa her home in 1968. She is currently a member of the Oshawa Art Association, the Visual Arts Centre of Clarington and Station Gallery of Whitby. Primarily a self taught artist, she took the opportunity to refine her skills through juried art shows and recreational courses at Robert McLaughlin Gallery and Durham College. Her peers have described her offerings as naive with a contemporary flair that will leave you with a smile. Her quirky sense of humour is always reflected in each painting.

Marissa Sweet
Marissa is a landscape and cityscape painter who, in merging her creative background with her practise of feng shui metaphysics, creates work about conservation. She has won various awards in regional and local juried art shows. Through her work, Marissa aims to express the importance of our interconnectivity with our environment and that nature should be treated with kindness and respect. Marissa teaches in various private and public galleries, community centres and at her home studio. With a BA Economics degree from St. Louis University, Philippines, Marissa has studied with various art instructors at Ayala Museum Philippines and at the Toronto School of Art. Currently, Marissa is the Director/Newsletter Editor and Elected Member of the Society of Canadian Artists. She is also the Public Relations & Social Media administrator for the Oshawa Art Association.

Barbara Kueres
Barbara grew up in England where, as a child, she was always interested in art, and often, during grammar school years, could be found sketching when she should have been studying. Barbara soon realized that art was a subject that she wanted to focus on for life. She attended art school from 17 to 18 years of age and, though she eventually chose a career in nursing, art was never far from her thoughts.
Soon after immigrating to Canada in 1981, Barbara became involved in visual arts programs and workshops, where she was able to connect with other artists, and she spent time painting at home while her son was in elementary school. Following a move to Oshawa, Barbara joined the Oshawa Art Association, became Programs Chair for several years, and gradually grew more serious about her own aspirations in art. Barbara began to enter juried shows in the Durham region and OAA’s Spring and Fall Festivals, working in various media: watercolour, acrylic, pastel and charcoal.
Barbara states that being creative definitely feels like an essential connection with the visual and emotional world around her, and evokes in her the desire to recreate whatever has moved her profoundly. It also helps her to appreciate and comprehend things more clearly.

Sylvia Valentine
Watercolour is Sylvia’s preferred medium. Although she enjoys painting landscapes and old buildings, the miracle of flowers is her favourite subject. She has participated in shows in Cobourg, Port Hope, Oshawa, Whitby, Uxbridge, Markham, Stouffville, Port Perry and other areas, some of which were solo shows. She has conducted many workshops and weekly classes, helping novice painters learn to handle the amazing properties of watercolour pigments on wet and dry papers. Her paintings have travelled to collections across Canada, U.S.A., and Europe. Sylvia resides in Courtice.

“Sadly, although Sylvia was looking forward to participating in our show, she passed away at the end of March.  Her family has generously loaned us some of her paintings to hang with ours.  We miss her humour, enthusiasm and friendship very much.”
– Randomly Connected Artist Group

Water is often thought of as an accessible commodity in most Western cities. With global climate change, this expectation is becoming less certain. Draughts, contamination, and flooding in places like Cape Town, Los Angeles, Flint, and Manitoba have made obvious that a limitless supply of water does not exist.
Dark Waters is a series of images of water, clouds and deserts looking at our culpability in commodifying and altering nature. Using a laser cutter, Van Der Hout burns holes into the photograph, allowing certain portions of the image to remain and others to fall away. He is interested in how far he can destroy the physical structure of the photograph before it falls apart.

Reception: July 12, 7-10pm
Artist talk: July 26, 7-8pm

During his residency in the Art Lab, John Di Leonardo will be researching the nude theme within Canada’s artistic history, he’ll also be drawing to create a body of work that explores questions of the nude image as a contentious landscape whose tradition of object of desire and shame informs our social constructs, values and identity.

Drop-in Exhibition Insight tours are available every Thursday. Ask at the front desk.

This installation of the RMG’s permanent collection asks the question: Whose Home and Native Land? This takes into account not only the physical landscape, but those who have occupied it for thousands of years and those settlers whose traces can be measured in hundreds of years.

This has been a collaborative venture: along with RMG staff, we have met with three Indigenous community members whose responses to the collection have framed the exhibition’s content and its direction. The RMG’s collection is very Eurocentric, but also includes amazing examples of work by First Nations and Inuit artists and we continue to expand its base of work by racially diverse artists.

Produced in partnership with Reagan Kennedy, Dawn Lavell-Harvard, and Alex Ranger

The RMG is incredibly grateful to Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation for their support of this exhibition.

Reception: RMG Friday, June 1, 7-10PM
Artist Talk: May 26, 1-3PM

The installation Primavera in Sospeso (Spring on Hold) reexamines Botticelli’s Primavera, an iconic image that is often romanticized and commercialized, deconstructing and re-framing the late-Renaissance masterpiece and its ubiquitous postcard format within the artists’ personal perspectives.

Using materials often found in both Jennie Suddick and Anna Rose’s practices (including paper, plastic, wool, and synthetic hair), the two artists explode the familiar image. Connotations of beauty and ease are remixed to highlight the undercurrent of decadence and violence, present both in the allegory of potrayed in Botticelli’s work as well as in the contemporary culture’s constant exploitation and decontextualization of images. An initial sense of familiarity with the subject and the materials is destabilized, woven into an immersive environment to be navigated by the viewer.

While the two artists constructed the elements of this project remotely, beginning the process of unraveling and expanding the subject matter within the specific contexts of their different environments, the work will ultimately be built in conversation with the location over the residency period.

Primavera in Sospeso (Spring on Hold) was exhibited first at Come Up to My Room at the Gladstone Hotel, where it won the Design Offsite Festival Juror’s Choice Award (granted by Andrew Sardone, Editorial Director, Globe Style at The Globe and Mail).

Artist Bios

Anna Rose has lived and worked in Florence, Italy since 2004. She received her MFA from San Francisco Art Institute in 2014. Her work spans photography, video, costume and installation with a sensibility towards the relationship between body and environment, entering into conversation with historical, psychological, and cultural mythologies of place.

Jennie Suddick is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Toronto. She has exhibited in Canada, U.S.A., Europe and Asia. She earned her MFA from York University and holds both a BFA and Advanced Visual Studies Certificate from OCAD University. Her work deals with identity, place and meditated relationships to nature.

‘Where are the stars that show us to our love
inevitable’1

Where do we begin when it is considered radical for us to desire/love, to be joyful, in the first place. When we rarely engage our tender selves in public discourse, see our loving in popular media, or our ancestries honoured.
Thus, we look to the vastness of the night sky. We look within and towards each other.
This is where we begin.

Photographers Soko Negash and Leyla Jeyte document intimacy and loving between the lines in diasporic communities. Both explore themes of de-colonial love, loving as resistance, and radical intimacies in their work.

Jeyte’s photographic portrait series, Love – A Black Woman’s Definition (2016-18) features Black women spanning across the world from Nairobi to Los Angeles. Her portraits are accompanied by excerpts from each of the women photographed, imagining and reclaiming their love/life narratives in their own words. While traveling, living, and working in different countries, Jeyte began to ask the women she was photographing to define what love means to them.

Negash’s series of photographs, Have You Eaten? (2018) chronicles Chinese mothers and daughters expressing themselves and their love on their own terms in response to racialized stereotypes. This series is accompanied by an audio sculptural installation Have You Eaten? Phone Home (2018). Recreating furnishing and decor from her grandmother’s home, Negash has created a domestic setting to interact with audio excerpts from interviews with the mother-daughter pairs from the series.

‘How do we come to be here next to each other’2

The ways we love are deeply nuanced and as wondrous as the star formations that illuminate the darkness.

-Safia Siad, 2018

1 & 2 Poem for My Love (2005).

Artist Bios:

Soko Negash is a Toronto-born visual artist of Chinese-Eritrean descent. Her creativity is explored primarily through the realms of fashion design, documentary film production, and most recently, photography. She is inspired by the underbelly of a place, unspoken (mis)understandings, ancestral knowledge and trauma, and the messy parts of cultural identity.

Leyla Jeyte is a Somali born Toronto based photographer. Her artistic journey began in Cuba where she was inspired by the vibrancy and kindness of its people. Since then, Leyla has lived and worked in various countries including Colombia, Sweeden, and Kenya. She uses documentary photography and in-depth visual storytelling to portray the lives of women of colour with a focus on themes that capture authenticity, intimacy, healing, and love.

Safia Siad is an artist and curator. Born in Montreal, she is the daughter of a Somali father and Irish-French-Canadian mother. Themes of dislocation, love, exile and hope permeate her work. Having spent the last four years at the Banff Centre for Arts & Creativity, she is forging on a path that will allow her to work with and curate for women artists. She currently resides in Toronto.

Fear and disease go hand in hand.

News media and technology often spread hysteria and fear around disease. As fear swells, it plays various roles in how a disease is perceived and understood. While inciting fear can may cause precautions, it also divides the healthy from the unhealthy, those who are willing to help from those who are not, and often fact from fiction.

The work in Public Notice deal with disease and illness and its impact historically and racially, look at loss and misunderstanding, and contrast scientific facts to fiction. While fear often trumps empathy and understanding, the works in this exhibition refuse to let fear have the last word.