Category: Exhibitions 2022 – 2023

Nevan

A collection of things thought and seen between November and January documented on 86 drypoint prints creating a preciousness out of ideas that would have otherwise came and went, unnoticed.

Erin Grant & Gabriel Evans-Cook

Erin Grant is an interdisciplinary artist who often explores distorted boundaries, while also considering the constructions of relationships in a world conforming to society. Her work is often influenced by strangers of Guelph’s nightlife, capturing people’s raw perceptions and emotions within a given moment. By collecting various images/ texts from randomly selected participants, she is able to create new meanings and interpretations within her paintings/drawings.

Gabriel Evans-Cook is an artist primarily interested in photography. His work has revolved around looking outwards into his interpersonal relations and juxtaposing those experiences against a nagging and ever-continuous introspection. His work presents vignettes that reflect lived experiences frozen in time combined with observations deduced from an attempt at self-awareness. His findings are presented through an unpolished and stylized lens.

Both exhibiting artists have been Guelph residents for over half a decade. Each of which relies on the city (or its absence) to evoke their next subject of creation. The walls of What Are You Lookin’ At? hold documentarian styled photography by Gabriel Evans-Cook in combination with mixed media drawings by Erin Grant. Erin and Gabriel incorporated an element of performance in the process behind What Are You Lookin’ At? as the two artists went out into the streets of Guelph, searching for community participation to collect quotes to interpret, drawings to appropriate, and portraits to capture.

Tierna Filman, Melyssa MacDonald & Samantha Pickard

“A Girl’s Childhood” transports viewers to a world of colour and magic by using bright colours and playful mediums. Individual cultures, upbringings, spirituality, and passion for art harmonize into a body of work that is full of childhood fantasies, memories, and a sense of growing-up. Subject matter such as body image, spirituality and menstruation illustrate a developmental connection to femininity, and the use of textile and soft sculpture mediums allude to the historical connection between women and craft. “A Girl’s Childhood” aims to curate a space of wonder that sparks connections to the viewer’s own childhood stories or memories, while also exploring what it is like to be a girl through the retrospective lens of three adult female artists.

Specialized Studio – Fall ’22

Painting III – Fall ’22

Emma Lippert

Album1_Track1.mp3 is a journey through life using music as the guide. This collection of self-portraits represents the artist’s emotional reactions to seven significant songs from their life. Each song is tied to a moment in time that, for whatever reason, has shaped who they have become today. For many, music is the thread that weaves its way through time connecting memories. It can carry the residue of good and bad times, of seemingly unimportant events, and of life-changing ones. The artist invites you to explore each image and reflect on which songs accompany you through your life.

Emma Lippert works in many media, but primarily photography. She enjoys challenging herself with self-portraiture and has recently taken an interest in the ethereal qualities of certain photographic techniques. She explores themes of identity, memory, and human experience through her work. She strives to make work that can move you, that can make you reflect on who you are and what you carry with you.

Jude Akrey

“I was called upon in the 3^rd grade class,

I gave my answer and it caused a fuss, 

I’m not the same as ev’ryone else

And times were hard for people like us

Well now

What good is freedom?

God laughs at people like us

I see it coming

Like a light coming down from above”

Isabella De Tullio

I often meditate on the personal sentiment and suffering that are inseparable from reality. 

I believe that all beings are products of many intricate narratives. Yet, the objective truth of such narratives is fragmented by emotion and an ever-developing perspective. I am attentive to the influences which shape individuals, but I often question how objective experiences can inform subjective personhoods. The relationship between individuals and their worlds is richly complex;  everything that one may witness or experience accumulates within and holds the potential to profoundly inspire and generate meaningful influence on the developing perspective and identity. As I investigate such accumulations, I contemplate the proliferating significances of such perspectives concerning the occupants themselves, as well as within an objective reality. The boundaries between self and truth fascinate me endlessly. Their relationship appears contradictory and competitive, yet reciprocal and symbiotic. My practice is dedicated to the exploration of these boundaries. Using my personal history as the primary informant for my work, I reflect on my present perception of the external world through the assessment of clarity and delusion, intending to achieve a broadened sense of self-awareness. As my investigation unfolds, it seems to me that through deciphering the relevance of my own prominent experiences, I am simultaneously nurturing myself, and honouring what is true. Parallel to representing the evolution of my own unique perspective, I also seek to emphasize the commonalities that liken differing perspectives. Through the deliberate use of universal signifiers, such as natural and domestic imagery, I hope that my work might resonate with others, and evoke their own personal sentiments. My pursuit to understand perspective is an ongoing process, and I invite others to reflect on how they are present, and what is present within them. 

MacKenzie Anderson

Memory Work addresses ideas of nostalgia, ephemera, and the delicate growth of a child as they become an adult. The transcendent feeling of reflection on childhood speaks through mediums reminiscent of play and those of structure. This exploration of emotional development reaches across the individual differences of the viewer and speaks a universal language.

Symbolic drawings of nondescript character(s) bring forth a connection between playful imagery and melancholic feeling. The longing to reconstruct memories manipulated by time becomes a process of acceptance of the past and its effects on the present.

Gestural expressions of comic scenes and performance video both analyze the comfort in the mundane aspects of childhood and juxtapose the fragility of those moments in the human mind. 

Anderson’s practice traverses through personal and fictional time-based concepts to evoke instinctive emotions, both positive and negative. Her multidisciplinary practice emphasizes how mark making can be meditation in internal work of the mind and the creation of objects allows for storage of nostalgic weight. 

This is Memory Work.

Neluka Ameresekere and Emma Lippert

FRAGMENTS explores the nuances of human memory, the inherent triggers associated with it, and the importance of seemingly random events in our everyday lives. This exhibition was created from a collection of memories submitted anonymously by community members that held special and visceral significance to them. We asked participants for the triggers of their memories and explanations of what each sound, smell, taste, or object brought to mind. The beauty in the variety of answers is what fuelled this project and helped create an incredibly unique, yet universally relevant, collection of moments. FRAGMENTS moves the viewer through each type of memory from the wall exploring sounds that may provoke certain memories, to the still life containing significant objects, to the poem created from entries that were somewhat intangible yet beautifully written. We encourage the viewer to take time with each piece, appreciate the intimate memories that were shared for its creation, and reflect on what memories the work might prompt within themselves. 

Emma Lippert is an artist who dabbles in many media, most specifically photography. She has been pulled into the world of experimental art and text-based art, and she enjoyed the challenges and triumphs of this project. 

Neluka Ameresekere is an artist who specializes in photography, but has also explored other mediums such as experimental, and interactive art. This project serves as a canvas for her to utilize the many mediums she has learned to create a unique visual and auditory experience.