Exhibitions and Events
Back to the Land: early 20th century landscapes in the permanent collection
The works in this exhibition were all in one way or another associated with the period in which Canadian landscape painting came of age: the first half of the 20th century, when the Canadian Group of Seven and associated artists brought the raw, rugged beauty of the landscape into national consciousness, separating it for ever from the more "refined" European-influenced visions of the land that preceded them. Paintings and drawings by A.Y. Jackson, A.J. Casson, J.E.H.
Black Body: Race, Resistance, Response
Curator Pamela Edmonds brought together the diverse works of six contemporary black artists around the issue of the racialized body. Works ranged from the elegant photographic nudes of Toronto-based Michael Chambers to Halifax-based Chrystal Clements' poignant icons of domesticity and community. African oral traditions and visual sensibilities were evident in Gomo George's assemblages, while formal pyramidal structures and grids reinforced Rebecca Fiske's investigations of "colourism".
My Home and Native Land: Bobby Nock videos
Cape Breton-based artist Bobby Nock offered an affectionately ironic take on local culture in this exhibition of five videos grouped under the title My Home and Native Land: The Red Bush in Waycobah Series. The colour red, the primacy of the Group of Seven in Canadian art history, indigenous Mi'kmaq and imported Scots-Gaelic traditions, and a tourist's vision of scenic Nova Scotia became intertwined and then unravelled in Nock's dead-pan videomaking style.
Artists in a Floating World: The Marion McCain Atlantic Art Exhibition 2000
Curator Tom Smart describes the purpose of Artists in a Floating World as exploring "strange worlds and allusive meanings in the work of a selection of artists living in Atlantic Canada." Taking Alex Colville's painting Embarkation and Christopher Pratt's painting Big Cigarette as starting points, Smart selected artworks whose pictorial composition suggests other worlds -- "floating worlds" in which the sea itself often plays a determining role. A condensed version of this exhibition was organized for a cross-Canada tour by the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.
