Exhibition Openings

Join us in celebrating the opening of three exhibits at the Art Gallery of Guelph!

Qautamaat is an exhibition of photography curated by Taqralik Partridge, who will also be our literary guest for Friday night’s lecture. Leslie McCue will be exhibiting recent work in her show titled Bagiskaagewin. We’ve also teamed up with Ed Video to co-present an exhibit of Nathalie Bujold’s video and sculptural work spanning almost 30 years. Médiatique is curated by Scott McGovern of Ed Video Media Arts Centre and is presented by the Art Gallery of Guelph and ELLEPHANT in conjunction with the ArtsEverywhere Festival.

Qautamaat | Every day / everyday

Curated by Taqralik Partridge

Tarralik Duffy, 3/4 mile marker (2019)

Elisapie Attagootak, Laisa Audlaluk-Watsko, Tarralik Duffy, Betsy Etidloie, Mary Gordon, Siasi Iqaluk, Eenah Lidstone, Barry Pottle, Ida Saunders, Nina Segalowitz, Jarvis Usuitauyok, Laakkuluk Williamson-Bathory

Drawn from images circulated on social networks, Qautamaat brings together the photography of Inuit community members and artists living in Inuit Nunangat and in urban centres further South. Documenting places and phenomena of daily life, they offer a visual map and memory of the lived environment.

Among the most significant means of personal expression in the public sphere today, curator Taqralik Partridge is interested in how such images capture acutely intimate Inuit sensibilities. These may be photographs taken within the context of artistic practice, or snapshots taken as matter-of-fact witness to the everyday. Sometimes registering the most mundane and marginal sites and scenes, they extend a tradition of craft and attentiveness to detail in a contemporary context. Documenting and sharing personal experiences, they also offer a vivid picture of a collective geography that spans a large part of the circumpolar world and encompasses the ties of Inuit communities outside the North.

Bagiskaagewin

The work of leslie mccue, curated by Elwood Jimmy

Bagiskaagewin (Letting Go)—exploring grief, dying and loss.

Sparked out of grief, Bagiskaagewin celebrates life and takes a look into a personal journey of healing, strength and memories.

Bagiskaagewin incorporates projection, sound and structures created by leslie and participants of community workshops. Red fabric ties will be offered to all who encounter the exhibition, with an invitation to share a message that they have been holding on to surrounding death, dying and grieving. Red fabric is often used when offering tobacco, prayers and messages. People are then encouraged to tie their message to one of the boats within the space, with the hopes of creating a river of messages (for example, “I wish I could have said goodbye”).

The boats have been created within three Anishinaabeg community workshops and are symbolic offerings to let our grief drift away and shift our collective thinking, while dismantling western influences on how we encounter and process death.

The boat imagery emerged from years of travelling back and forth to leslie’s family cottage on an island with her papa, where he would spend most of his time. Since his passing, she has not had the strength to travel back to the island. This coming year, leslie will make the journey back.

“Let me watch my children grow to see what they become”

Qautamaat are Bagiskaagewin are presented by the Art Gallery of Guelph in partnership with Musagetes and with the support of the Ontario Arts Council and Canada Council for the Arts.

Médiatique

Curated by Scott McGovern

Image detail: Nathalie Bujold, Aller retour dans l’inconnu qui attend à pied d’oeuvre, 2018, HD video, 10:41 mins

Médiatique features video projects and sculptures spanning Nathalie Bujold’s career of almost 30 years of artistic production. Presented together in one room as a video environment, analog and digital artworks highlight Bujold’s formalist ability to both dissect and expand her subjects. The traditional expectations of the purpose of video – technically, conceptually, and psychologically – are reconfigured throughout, highlighting a constantly renewed hybridization. Similar to many traditional arts and crafts, Bujold’s techniques require precision, repetition, and commitment. The result is a glimpse into her distinctive enigmatic, bold, and sometimes funny universe, through artworks that demonstrate the potential of video to create new ways to express time, form, and space.

Médiatique is organized by the Art Gallery of Guelph and ELLEPHANT in conjunction with the ArtsEverywhere Festival. The exhibition is presented with the support of the Ontario Arts Council and Canada Council for the Arts.