Mexico (Merida, Yucatan 2010),
St. Tomas Public Art Gallery (Ontario Canada 2011)
La Raza, Canada
Idea of North: Notes on the Process:
The series ‘Idea of North-Visual Variations’ is a collaborative project by 7 Canadian artists. It was first exhibited at the Provincial Peon Contreras Gallery in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico in 2010.
Geographically, the series references landscape elements drawn from the West Coast (pieces Haida Gwaii and Pacifica), to the British Columbia Interior (Cariboo), Central Canada (Prairies), and Southern Ontario (Winter Highway.) Aspects of the far north are extrapolated from explorers’ journals, while other fragments are drawn from various sources and books on the Canadian north. Pieces named Satellites, Northern Highway, Polar North and Dream Hunters make direct reference to the far north. Canoe #1, and Canoe #2 use this most Canadian iconic symbol as a vessel containing myths, legends and repositories of dreams.
By merging various styles and media, the pieces reveal personal stories surrounding the concept of North, while at the same time expressing La Raza’s collective spirit. Initially sparked by the CBC Radio program in the 1960’s hosted by Glenn Gould, Idea of North is an attempt to translate the underlying impulse of this audio piece into a mural-scaled suite, posing questions of our relationship to the land and its mythic presence in Canadian consciousness.
Media: The use of Mylar as the substrate, (a transparent vellum-like material), is a key element. It facilitates transportation of the works, as well as providing a versatile and receptive surface for collage, photographs, graphite drawing and acrylics.
First exhibited in Merida, Mexico in 2010, the show was remounted in St. Thomas Public Art Gallery in Ontario in 2011.
List of Works
Northern Highway
acrylic/print/charcoal on Mylar
731cm X 91 cm
The long trajectory of receding perspectives, linked with power lines, in a seemingly endless northern landscape
Coastal Series-Haida Gwaii #1
acrylic/print/stitching/charcoal/ Mylar
609 cm X 91cm
Haida Gwaii, the ancestral home of the Haida Nation, is a series of islands surrounded by the northern Pacific Ocean. They are culturally distinct, rich and alive. Raven is the mythical keeper of legends…
Coastal Series-Haida Gwaii #2
acrylic/ink/stitching/ on Mylar
487 cm X 102 cm
Humans, in Haida stories, were first discovered by the prankster/story teller Raven in a clam shell along a northern beach
Coastal Suite –Pacifica
acrylic/ink on Mylar
335 cm X 91 cm
An icon symbolic of the sea and abundance overlaid with the traditional place names and languages of Northwest Coastal people
Satellites
acrylic/charcoal/print on Mylar
304 cm X 107 cm
Communication systems, satellites like ears reaching to the void
Canoe #1-Migration
acrylic/charcoal/photos/print on Mylar
487 cm X 107 cm
The vessel as a repository of dreams and ambitions…
Canoe #2-Portage
acrylic/charcoal/print on Mylar
365 cm X 107 cm
The iconic canoe, the primary means of access through a dense wilderness
Polar North
acrylic/Charcoal/on Mylar
243 cm X 107 cm
An aerial view of the North Pole and the Northwest Passage, inspired in part by a recent attempt to reach the pole by solo woman explorer Rosie Stancer in 2007. She experienced temperatures from as low as -55C to dangerously warm levels of -2C, repeated storms and shifting ice…
Cariboo
acrylic/photo/print/graphite on Mylar
548 cm X 91 cm
Cycles of death and regeneration…a cow skull and bleached vertebrae, fire ravaged forest, and incursions of the pine beetle infestations that are presently decimating the interior of western Canada, brought on in part by global warming
Prairie
acrylic/print/charcoal/ on Mylar
1036 cm X 91 cm
Prairie horizons of fields and shifting skies, a traditional hunting ground that is a refuge in its vastness. The buffalo and cowboy appear as mirage-like presences in an expansive landscape
Winter Highway
acrylic/photo/charcoal/print on Mylar
426 cm X 107 cm
Black and white aerial perspective of the trans-Canadian highway over Ontario in winter, figures sprawling across miles of urban expansion
Transience
photographs/acrylic/print on Mylar
548 cm X 122 cm
Dancers merge like ghosts in a northern landscape, both earthbound and upwardly striving. Fragments of poetry interweave a red frieze ground
Dream Hunters
acrylic/charcoal/on mylar
420 cm X 122 cm
Traces of symbolic animals and tangled landscapes in the context of traditional hunters ‘dream catches,’ where an Indian hunter would first dream of a kill, then later on, find the trail and complete the actual kill
Project Images:
