2011 Exhibitions

Canada, Myth and History
Group of Seven Awkward Moments Series
by Diana Thorneycroft

The Great Hall
January 27 - March 27, 2011

Group of Seven Awkward Moments:  Winter on the Don

Group of Seven Awkward Moments:  Beavers and Woo at Tanoo

Winnipeg artist Diana Thorneycroft is known for creating provocative and controversial photographs that challenge her audience's viewing experience. Her seemingly comical images composed of innocent subjects--dolls and toy figurines--and set against the landscapes of the Group of Seven and their contemporaries reveal, upon a closer examination, a deeper and darker meaning. In the words of Thorneycroft, "Canadian history is full of awkward moments and that is more of a reality than this heroic landscape that the Group of Seven portrayed."

Through her dioramic compositions of everyday life and historical events unfolding against the majestic landscapes of the artists associated with the Group of Seven, Thorneycroft explores notions of national pride and cultural ideologies whilst deconstructing mythological narratives. Imbued with national motifs and everyday paraphernalia, her works uncover stories about Canadian life--past and present, real and fictive.

The exhibition is organized by McMichael Canadian Art Collection and is curated by Sharona Adamowicz-Clements, Assistant Curator, McMichael Canadian Art Collection.

Found Wanting
by Betty Spackman

The Great Hall
January 27 - March 27, 2011

One of 43 Relic Boxes, sheep skull in wood and felt box, 2010

As an artist and as storyteller I am caught somewhere between actual, real objects and the stories connected to them. The bones I have used in this work, which were found or given to me, are real and are mostly from domestic animals we consume as ‘meat' without thinking about them as ‘animals'. Though I believe all of creation is sacred and to be respected, these remains are not meant as fetishes of any kind. They are simply scavenged fragments - the evidence of death for the task of remembering life. My basic intent is to honour them and in so doing to acknowledge that, as a consumer, I have benefited from their demise. I am also implicated, as a consumer, in the mismanagement, poor stewardship and lack of care concerning the animals they represent. I have been drinking the milk and eating the eggs and wearing the skins and digesting the flesh of animals all my life. I use the bones and other animal remains in Found Wanting as a ‘reality check' against my ingratitude and to remind myself that there is never a feast without a sacrifice.

In the bones are embedded many stories, including my family history in the pioneer west of Canada with lifestyles that included, and still include for some of my family, sustenance hunting. My own childhood was a time of family farms and city milkmen, things that have almost completely been replaced by an agribusiness of giant factory farms, genetic engineering and fast food restaurants. The sorrow of personal loss along with a growing awareness of the ecological fragility of our planet and loss of animals due to ignorance, neglect and greed brought this project to life and, over the five years of working on it, I struggled to reconcile (or not) the many layers of often conflicting ideas about what is ‘animal' and what is ‘human' - about what is humane.

Age and self-awareness makes me face the fact that I am a greedy person, often wanting more than I need. So it is in the global dilemma of depleting resources. Our lust for more is never satisfied and in the end, despite any excuses we make about our behaviour, our greed eventually ‘eats up' the very things we depend on to live. We consume to fulfill our desires but find that we are empty handed, that we are ‘found wanting'.

Regardless of my personal manipulations and storytelling, each of the bones and all the remains of the animals that I use carry an inherent personal story of their own, a presence outside the various contexts of definition I give them. Found Wanting is about giving them a voice. It is about not only facing the brutal tenderness of their dying but regarding how much our own mortality is connected to theirs. I am grateful to be part of the manifold diversity and incredible design of creation and mourn the loss of our sense of wonder about it and connection to it as much as I mourn the endangerment of species. But the work is not a protest. It is a lament. It is a story, a song about grief, but a grief filled with hope - knowing if the right choices and the right sacrifices are made, the end of our stories can change. Betty Spackman, 2010

Everything But the Light

by Carly Bates

The Grotto and South Gallery
January 27 - March 27, 2011

Evening in Venice, oil on canvas, 2009

Carly Bates' paintings interpret light in multiple layers and explore its capacity for warmth and energy and how light triggers personal memories. The paintings that she creates contain an atmospheric feel to them that attempt to invoke a sense of familiarity and comfort of past experience but also suggest uncertainty of the present and future.

"To create the suggestion of light in my work, everything but the light itself is depicted. Objects are broken down into colour and paint is applied using several layers of glaze. The thin layers of different coloured glazes build upon each other allowing actual light to travel through and developing a similar radiance experienced in real light".

The subject matter of the paintings was developed as a result of Bates' recollection of light fixtures from the rooms where she grew up. These paintings offer the viewer an opportunity to interpret light in multiple layers and make reference to different layers of light that reveal a variety of emotional responses and feelings.

Our Communities:  Our Stories
A Day in Town

The Great Hall
January 27 - March 27, 2011

The Reach P12420

A Day in Town looks back at historic downtown Abbotsford; the businesses, services and shopkeepers that made it the heart of the community. Artefacts, photos and stories will recall the places to shop, stop and participate.

Betty Goodwin:
Darkness and Memory

The Great Hall
April 14 - May 29, 2011

Beyond Chaos No. 7, 1998
Collection Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
Photo: Richard-Max Tremblay

Organized and circulated by
the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal

A constant presence on the Montréal art scene since the late 1960s, Betty Goodwin (Montréal, 1923-2008) is recognized as one of the leading figures of contemporary Canadian art. In 2003 the Dalhousie Art Gallery presented The Prints of Betty Goodwin, organized by the National Gallery of Canada, which featured a rich selection of iconic prints by the artist.

This exhibition features more than thirty works by Goodwin drawn from the permanent collection of the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal. The Musée was an early patron of the artist, acquiring Goodwin's now iconic "vest" prints in 1973 and organizing her first major exhibition in 1976 - a survey of an already wide-ranging fifteen-year period of production.

In assembling this selection of prints, drawings, sculptures and monumental tarp pieces from its collection, the Musée draws attention once again to the originality and scope of Goodwin's multidisciplinary and deeply humanist practice by presenting the principal milestones within her unique trajectory.

The national tour of this exhibition has been made possible with the support of the Department of Canadian Heritage through its Museums Assistance Program.

Man Turned To Stone:  T'xwelatse

The Great Hall
April 14 - May 29, 2011

Photo: David Campion

Organized in collaboration with the Stó:lō Research and Resource Management Centre and the T'xwelatse Family.

Stone T'xwelatse, an ancestor of the Chilliwack (Ts'elxweyeqw) - one of the Stó:lō tribes, is a man who was born thousands of years ago and transformed into a four-foot-high granite statue as punishment for mistreating his wife. Through his transformation he was to give lessons to the people on how to live together in a good way. For the Stó:lō, Stone T'xwelatse is a beloved ancestor; a stone man with a living soul.

Over one hundred years ago, Stone T'xwelatse was taken from Stó:lō territory. He was more recently discovered in Seattle in the collection of the Burke Museum of Natural and Cultural History. After a 14-year campaign, Stone T'xwelatse was repatriated back to the Stó:lō in 2006. As part of the exhibition, local photographer, David Campion will present a large-scale photographic installation depicting the human and geographic context of Stone T'xwelatse.

This exhibition is supported by

Our Communities Our Stories:
Sikh Pioneers - 100 Years of Immigration, Integration and Identity

The Great Hall, The Grotto and South Gallery
April 14 - May 29, 2011

The Reach N294

Arriving more than a century ago, determined Sikh pioneers from Punjab, India came together against many odds to establish a community in Abbotsford, anchoring it with one of the first Sikh temples in North America - the Khalsa Diwan Society Sikh Temple (built 1908 - 1911) in Abbotsford, BC. This significant temple has been designated as a National Historic Site by the Canadian Government and is the only one of its kind in the Americas to be bestowed with this honour.

As the only early Sikh temple that has survived intact through the 1st century of settlement, the Gur Sikh Temple is imbued with historic cultural symbolism. It signifies the Sikh pioneers' personal sacrifices, their perseverance against many odds and their resilience to carve out a place for themselves and their families in a very hostile environment. The temple is an important touchstone to their past; its restoration also represents one of the first steps in preserving the century plus long history of Sikhs in Canada.

Historic photos that document the establishment of Abbotsford's Sikh community, family artefacts that illustrate the stories told by pioneers and a glimpse into the Sikh faith provide a fascinating background for the community-wide temple Centennial celebrations.

This exhibition is organized in collaboration with the Khalsa Diwan Society and Centre for Indo Canadian Studies at the University of the Fraser Valley.

Presenting Sponsor

This exhibition is supported by

The Tree:
From the Sublime to the Social

The Great Hall
June 16 - October 9, 2011

Organized and circulated by the Vancouver Art Gallery

Emily Carr, Forest, 1931-1933, oil on canvas
Collection of the Vancouver Art Gallery
Emily Carr Trust
Photo: Trevor Mills, Vancouver Art Gallery

This exhibition considers the tree as a subject in art from the late nineteenth century to the present. The tree sometimes serves as a symbol for all of nature and its overwhelming, even terrifying beauty; it is a powerful symbol of Canada's national identity and a metaphor for the individual's struggle against the wilderness; it reminds us of our human place within and against the natural world and our current precarious ecological situation.

The exhibition begins with historical images of the forest that evoke the grandeur and power of the natural world and includes works by contemporary artists who use the tree as a device to consider abstraction and figuration, as well as to question humankind's relationship with the natural environment, especially the growing sense of alienation from the natural world. Representations of the forested landscape as rugged and powerful were instrumental in defining the Canadian national identity in the twentieth century, especially through the work of the Group of Seven and their contemporaries, who reacted against classical European depictions of groomed pastoral landscapes to create a distinctly Canadian school of painting. More recently, artists have begun to depict the tree in ways that challenge perceptions of the world around us.

Some artists depict trees as a resource for economic development and the devastating consequences of severe logging practices, while others present life-affirming projects that engage in both metaphorical and actual tree-planting projects. Both the iconic tree and landscapes full of trees have been the focus of plein air painters for over 100 years and this exhibition contains amazing examples of such works of art. More recently, artists have come to use the tree for a variety of investigations, as a formal device to consider abstraction and figuration, as well as to question our perceptions of the world around us.

British Columbian visual artists have long explored various representations of the tree, from Emily Carr's well-known interpretations of the West Coast forests, Gordon Smith's abstractions of the natural world, Rodney Graham's photographs of upside-down trees, Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun's politically charged art works which explore environmental devastation to Ian Wallace's photographs of mass protests against clear-cut logging of old growth forests. A growing sense of alienation from the natural world is explored by artists who expose our limited experiences of nature. Still other artists depict trees as an over-exploited resource for economic development, expressing the devastating consequences of severe logging practices. Optimistically, several artists in the exhibition consider life-affirming projects that revitalize the "dying" tree and engage in both metaphorical and real tree-planting projects. The diverse representations of the tree in this exhibition demonstrate its enduring power as a symbol, as well as our complex and changing relationship with our natural environment.

The Tree reveals a variety of different aesthetics and cultural perspectives of some of British Columbia's most important visual artists. It provides an opportunity for people to see original works by some of Vancouver's now internationally famous contemporary photographic artists, to see important art works from the collection of the Vancouver Art Gallery and also to explore contemporary environmental issues such as our relationship with nature and the image of the forest that has helped shape the imaginations of the people of British Columbia for generations.

This exhibition is organized and circulated by the Vancouver Art Gallery and curated by Daina Augaitis, Chief Curator/Associate Director, with Emmy Lee, Assistant Curator.

A juried exhibition celebrating regional visual art.

The Great Hall
June 16 - October 9, 2011

In collaboration with

Our Communities Our Stories:
You Look Marvelous!

The Great Hall
June 16 - October 9, 2011

Women's garments and accessories from the Permanent Collection.

The Reach P1447
Mrs. Oldershaw of Kilgard, c. 1890

Field 103W by Janet Bright

The Grotto and South Gallery
June 16 - October 9, 2011

Thur June 30
7:30pm
Artist's talk by Janet Bright

Flood

The paintings in this exhibit were created based on the self-defined theory of 'Memo Realism', a theory which acknowledges the importance of memory, recognition, connection and reflection in the creation of art intended to elicit emotion, reaction and a sense of satisfaction for an artist and inevitably the viewer of art. Bright's paintings acknowledge and express the imprecision, fuzziness and gaps of memory through the use of paint drippings, scrapings and intentional un-detailed brushwork and it is engaging then, for the viewer of these paintings to fill in the blanks expressed by these mechanisms, with their own thoughts, their own experiences, their own understanding.

Janet Bright was born and raised on the Canadian prairies and began her art & architectural education with travel and language study abroad. This was followed by Fine Arts and Architectural Design training at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Design construction, film and entrepreneurial experience have defined an interest in creative problem solving, its processes and the outcome of its successful implementation. Janet has been strongly focused on the creation of expressionistic and ‘memo realist' landscape paintings for the past three years while concurrently exploring expression in the fields of conceptual, commentary and video art.

Punjabi Visions

The Great Hall
October 27, 2011 - January 8, 2012

Participating Artists: Jeet Aulakh (Windsor, Ontario), Sarindar Dhaliwal (Toronto, Ontario), Shilpa  Gupta, (Mumbai, India), Ali Kazimi, (Toronto, Ontario), Manu Kaur Saluja, (New York, NY, USA), and Jarnail Singh & Baljit Kaur, (Surrey, British Columbia) and JitenThukral and Sumir Tagra (Thukral & Tagra) (New Delhi, India)

Manu Kaur Saluja, Maharajah Ranjit Singh, The Lion of Punjab, 2009, oil on canvas

The Reach Gallery Museum Abbotsford is presenting, the Contemporary Punjabi-Sikh exhibition in celebration of the 100^th anniversary of the Khalsa Diwan Society Sikh Temple in Abbotsford.This exhibition brings together regional, national and international artists who explore the social memories and cultural heritages of the Punjabi/Sikh communities. The artists in this exhibition employ various visual strategies revealing original and unconventional approaches that are characteristic of some of Canada's most divergent, rising visual artists.  These strategies include: exploration of spiritual, religious and mythological systems, exploration of symbols that are identity specific to the South Asian Diaspora, investigation of  themes including consumer culture, desire, security, militarism and human rights, the history of South Asian immigration to Canada, and intervention into colonial narratives about Punjabi/Sikh history.

Randall Steeves
Somatic Evidence

The Great Hall
October 27, 2011 - January 8, 2012

Soma (in Red), 2011, pigmented beeswax on canvas

Langley visual artist Randall Steeves' thickly painted, scratched and gouged paintings invite the viewer to reconsider the gesture of painting itself. The canvases explore the relationship between the photographic index and the painterly trace with a wry nod towards conceptual art practice. Steeves describes his paintings as "tactile things with a material presence that, through the exploitation of the basic properties of paint, attempt to preserve action in order to emulate or manifest the intricacy of something real."

This exhibition features multi-panel arrangements of paintings as well as individual single-panel paintings, all of which have been completed over the last two years. The subject of the canvases is, without exception, the fingerprint. Steeves had himself "processed" by the Vancouver Police Department in preparation for this work and the single-panel pieces are made up entirely of his own prints. The multi-panel works are comprised of prints from official sources, such as Scotland Yard and FBI procedural manuals. The paintings are all made from encaustic, a beeswax based paint that is heated and brushed onto the canvas where it hardens immediately. The process results in a complex surface that can be read as a chronology of the painting's construction and as a record of the painter's physical presence and actions. The physicality of the paintings is reinforced by the fingerprint imagery. For Steeves, the fingerprint is "a metaphor for painting... for what I'm doing when I'm making paintings, but it also has to do with what we're doing when we look at paintings. It's about the examination and categorization of human marks, of the traces we all leave behind. Painting can be thought of in similar terms."

Randall Steeves was born in Saint John, New Brunswick. He studied at Mount Allison University in Sackville, New Brunswick and received an MFA from the University of Victoria in Victoria, British Columbia. Since then he has been based in the Vancouver area. He has lectured and led workshops at art galleries, colleges and universities across Western Canada and has exhibited his work internationally.

Our Communities Our Stories:
Use it Up, Wear it Out,
Make it Do or Do Without

The Great Hall
October 27, 2011 - January 8, 2012

The former Royal Canadian Legion building travels along Essendene Avenue from Montvue Avenue to a new site on the northeast corner of Jubilee Park.  Relocated and with the addition of a second storey the building became the new Village of Abbotsford office and Village Fire Hall. April 1953. The Reach P373

A sentiment relevant to the contemporary issues of sustainability and conservation was coined in response to wartime shortages and speaks to pioneer values of frugality and economy.
The exhibition of permanent collection artefacts will demonstrate early successes at re-use, recycling and re-purposing from Tramp Art created from cigar boxes in contravention of Federal Excise laws and making and remaking quilts to ingenious repairs to extend the useful life of a valued possession.

Patrick Wood
Opstraction

The Grotto and South Gallery
October 27, 2011 - January 8, 2012

 
Patrick Wood-Opstraction # 1,  oil on canvas

Patrick Wood has been investigating the concept of Gestalt, abstraction, mathematics and patterning; all lend themselves to this poignant reference point. From prehistoric to modern times, civilizations have employed repetition and patterns as if conveying a secret language, mathematics or meaning. When investigating the microscopic world, the rituals of patterning reflect the hidden mathematic complexities of diamond, DNA, celluar, structures, and fractal geometry to name a few of the many example of patterns nature has to offer. This investigation of pattern, colour and mathematics were the starting points for this series of painting, Opstraction.

2010 Exhibitions

Beadwork - Radical Practices:

Beading Practices of Yukon First Nations (Canada) and the Ndebele (South Africa)

The Great Hall
January 21 - March 21, 2010

Beadwork - Radical Practices is an international exhibition which profiles historical and contemporary beading practices of Southern Yukon First Nations (Canada) and the Ndebele (South Africa). It consists of both historical and contemporary work from the Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa as well as historical work from the MacBride Museum and contemporary work from the Yukon Territorial Government Permanent Art Collection both located in Whitehorse, Yukon. Eighty objects and artworks from these institutions will be on display. Beadwork - Radical Practices offers another way of understanding indigenous communities through the intersections of historical context, life experiences and social and cultural transformations. The exhibition provides an opportunity to explore both historical and contemporary beadwork as means of trying to understand the stories of two diverse indigenous cultures.

Learn more - download our exhibition notes .

 

Fifteen Restless Nights
by Derek Besant

The Great Hall
January 21 - March 21, 2010

Fifteen Restless Nights is a multi-media installation that incorporates large digital photographs of rumpled motel-room beds accompanied by music and an original soundtrack. This exhibition explores Derek Besant's impressions of fifteen nights spent over the course of one year in different motel rooms in different cities. Each morning Besant would photograph the unmade beds and record the rumpled sheets and pillows in what he calls "metaphoric landscapes". The digital photos show rumpled sheets and pillows, but they represent the "distances of intimacy" between each of us.

The Unknown, Remembered Gate
by Sharon Huget

The Grotto & South Gallery
January 21 - March 21, 2010

Sharon Huget is a local contemporary painter who works in acrylics and mixed media. Huget is fascinated by those moments in life where an experience reaches beyond our sensory perception. This exhibition presents a series of compositions which are mainly semi-abstract exploring what is unknown and ambiguous through the use of colour and texture.

From Different Perspectives:
Photographs from the Agricultural Landscape

Participating Artists:  Craig Berggold, Elaine Brière, Carole Condé and Karl Beveridge

The Great Hall
April 8 - June 6, 2010

I would like to tell you a story - Craig Berggold

Salt of the Earth - Carole Condé and Karl Beveridge

R-E-S-P-E-T-O- Mexican Farmworkers in the Yakima Valley - Elaine Brière

Farmworkers are Canada's forgotten workers. They work in the fields and harvest the crops that feed us. They work in slave-like conditions for 12-14 hours a day and are paid piece rate. They travel in overcrowded buses to the fields or live in converted chicken coops. Many suffer chronic health problems because of exposure to pesticides during every working day." - Canadian Farmworkers Union spokesman Charan Gill, June, 1994.

From Different Perspectives: Photographs from the Agricultural Landscape tells three stories of forgotten workers whose struggles on the landscape have been forgotten or ignored and reveals a landscape of opposition where workers are both represented and see themselves represented in ways which will challenge dominant views of the agricultural landscape. Each of these artists uses their own visual vocabulary in the form of engaged social documentary to expose the realities of farmworkers in British Columbia, Ontario and Washington State. These artists have defined their art practice around the facilitation of dialogue among the diverse farmworker community and are exploring the concept of dialogue as a form of social engaged art practice. From Different Perspectives will be a catalyst for dialogue and collaboration with the public and explore how socially engaged art can connect with others and create community.

Craig Berggold's exhibition, I would like to tell you a story is a series of photographs accompanied by farmworkers' testimonies, newspaper articles and narration. Each photograph is a visual representation of an actual event where farmworkers and their children have been poisoned, injured or killed while at work. Carole Condé's and Karl Beveridge's work, Salt of the Earth, depicts the arrival of migrant workers, their exposure to chemicals and injury and their departures in Ontario. It is part of a larger project on the four elements that include The Fall of Water, Under Fire and a video AIRwav. Salt of the Earth was produced in collaboration with migrant farm workers in Southern Ontario. Elaine Brière's, R-E-S-P-E-T-O Mexican Farmworkers in the Yakima Valley is a striking series of photographs that document the lives of Mexican apple pickers in Washington State.

In conjunction with From Different Perspectives, The Reach will display photographs from our art collection of a series of photographs of farmworkers in the Fraser Valley that were taken in the early 1980s and artefacts from its permanent collection that tell the stories of farmworkers throughout the twentieth century. These images and artefacts explore our rich agricultural history and provide an historical context for the From Different Perspectives exhibition.

Glow:  Nature's Exploration with Light Sculpture
by Sylvie Roussel-Janssens

The Grotto and South Gallery
April 8 - June 6, 2010

Glow is an exhibition of light sculptures inspired by old botanical illustrations. Sylvie Roussel-Janssens developed her own techniques. Using a soldering iron, she burns small holes in synthetic fabric and sews photocopies of found images. The integrated lighting reveals complex images of flowers and gardens. Sylvie has always been interested in the strong design of traditional cultures from all over the world. West coast first nation carvings, Australian Aborigine sand painting, Japanese paper cutting and Celtic designs are a few of her sources of inspiration. The natural world, from the microscopic to the infinitely large offers an endless number of patterns. Using organic forms such as trees and flowers Sylvie explores the dynamic relationship between the positive and negative space. In this exhibition, Sylvie has focused on the decorative aspect of her work. By extensively researching the use of pattern, Sylvie has created her own language. Influenced by design traditions, Sylvie has created vibrant light sculptures with a sense of magic.

Challenging Traditions: Contemporary First Nations Art of the Northwest Coast

Guest Curator, Ian M. Thom

The Great Hall
June 24 - October 3, 2010

Beau Dick, Dzunuk'wa Transformation Mask, 2007, red cedar, abalone shell, horsehair, acrylic, Coastal Peoples Fine Arts Gallery, Vancouver

Organized by the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario, the exhibition features contemporary works of art created by some of the most talented First Nations artists living on the Northwest Coast.

Organized by the McMichael Canadian Art Collection

Abbotsford Collects:
Selected Works from Local Collectors

The Great Hall
June 24 - October 3, 2010

Jack Shadbolt, Energy Flux, 1965, oil and lucite on canvas, Private Collection

This exhibition examines a selection of visual art collections from Abbotsford and the Fraser Valley. The show explores the passions and personal tastes that motivate collectors to follow a specific genre of art or the work of a particular artist.

Photography Is...
by the Abbotsford Photo Arts Club

South Gallery
June 24 - October 3, 2010

Going Green by Darryl Hoope

The exhibition features the work of individual members of APAC and shows a variety of photographic styles and subjects in both colour and black-and-white formats.  Included in the show are landscapes, portraits, wildlife and graphic interpretations. For over 35 years, APAC has been helping its members develop their photographic skills. 

The Abbotsford Photo Arts Club grew from the desire of a handful of people to continue to share their experiences and improve their photography. Besides fulfilling a social function, the club's main objective has always been to help amateur photographers develop and improve their proficiency, filling a gap between the knowledge they acquire from a course in basic photography and the experience they need to operate independently as fulfilled amateur photographers.

Essential Information
by Christopher Friesen

The Grotto
June 24 - October 3, 2010

Boy on the Bank, 2005, acrylic on canvas

The pixel is the language of our times. The grid is the logical structure for that language. We have daily encounters with this pairing, from our computer screens, to our televisions, to the newspaper on our doorstep. Essential Information is an exhibition set up to examine the fundamentals about imagery and how we get it to work. George Seurat was an artist that used science to try to answer similar questions about imagery. Formally, Seurat was about the science of painting, essentially creating a style of art that could be theoretically done by anyone. Seurat made extensive notes about how to achieve the right effects, the right colours. He was obsessed with perfecting this pointillist technique. I have revisited the structure of his work to address some of the same concerns but through a contemporary lens. The pixel is an obvious reference to technology and by using Seurat's imagery, we can see a different way to use optical blending to achieve a similar result. My use of the grid also references its historical importance in painting from the organization of imagery on the surface, to a minimalistic reference, to a structure that references the colour chart paintings of Ellsworth Kelly and Gerhard Richter.

Seurat's pointillism is essentially the language of our modern technology, it works the same way the human eye does, through optical blending. "How would he have done it today?" That question began my foray into the investigation of the works of Seurat and solidified my belief that paintings must be experienced to be understood. It is when you let yourself look twice in the same direction that you might see something for the first time.

Vistas:  Artists on the Canadian Pacific Railway
Guest Curator, Roger Boulet

The Great Hall
October 21, 2010 - January 9, 2011

Robert F. Gagen, Evening in the Selkirks
ca. 1900-1910
Collection of Glenbow Museum

Vistas features over 90 visual art works and historical photographs from the Glenbow Museum collection and from public and private collections in Canada and the United States. The exhibition is organized by the Glenbow Museum, Calgary and is curated by Roger Boulet who is a specialist in Canadian historical art and photography.

Organized & Circulated by

Our Communities: Our Stories

Railroad Paintings by Max Jacquiard, Coquitlam and
A Selection of Railway Artefacts
From Private and Museum Collections

The Great Hall
October 21, 2010 - January 9, 2011

Our Communities: Our Stories uses an amazing video map to show the changes settlement, decades of logging and the impact of Abbotsford's agricultural economy have had on the landscape in which we live. Through photos and artefacts we'll share the colourful stories of the people, communities and industries that make Abbotsford what it is today.

A Meet at Hector, Max Jacquiard
From the Collection of Henry Braun

Showtime: 40 Years On Stage

South Gallery
October 21, 2010 - January 9, 2011

photo by Jean Konda-Witte

Fraser Valley Stage celebrates 40 years of performances with an exhibition of historical posters, photographs and stage props.

Vintage Toys by Miles Van Yperen

The Grotto
October 21, 2010 - January 9, 2011

This exhibition consists of photographic compositions from science fiction magazines and a series of vintage toys.