Kate Wilson

English

Saint Mary's University, Halifax: Institutional Repository

Kate Wilson: Microbial Baroque Brandon Vickerd: Bionic Forest  Saint Mary’s University Art Gallery  12 January – 2 March 2008  Brandon Vickerd talk: Wednesday, 9 January 2008, 7:00 pm  (NSCAD Board Room) Kate Wilson talk: Friday, 11 January 2008, 7:00 pm Opening reception: Friday, 11 January 2008, 8:00 pm  PLEASE NOTE: The Gallery will be closed 16-24 February for the Kiwanis Music Festival.     The rooms are alive at Saint Mary's University Art Gallery, as two young artists work directly with the walls and spaces in the opening exhibitions of the winter season. In the Main Gallery, Kate Wilson: Microbial Baroque executes large, strangely organic drawings directly on the surface of the walls. Brandon Vickerd: Bionic Forest fills the Side Gallery with a thicket of steel trees whose branches twitch and turn in delicate robotic movements.   “My drawings float, careen and emboss the wall with a lexicon of plausible catastrophic imagery,” says Wilson: “dark yet stylish, serious yet wry: hybrids, looming signposts, rickety constructions and flashing beacons.” Wilson plans out her drawings in advance using a computer, then projects them and paints directly on the walls of the gallery using acrylic paint. Her images derive from a wide range of sources, from European Baroque painting and contemporary experimental architecture through graphic design and pop culture icons.   Vickerd’s seven steel trees “sway and rustle as if propelled by an invisible wind,” driven by timers and power couplings hidden from view.  Modeled on trees in Tom Thomson’s famous paintings of Northern Ontario, they reflect on Canadians’ identification with the landscape of the “great white North.” “As a kinetic sculptor,” says Vickerd, “my work has been primarily invested in emulating organic movement through mechanical means.” He renders organic forms in industrial materials “in order to engage a viewer in a dialogue around our mediated experiences with the natural world.”   Kate Wilson was educated at the Ontario College of Art and Design and York University and has had residencies at the Banff School of Fine Arts and the Canada Council artists’ studio at Cité international des arts in Paris. She has exhibited her work across Canada and the US and in Beijing, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands and Paris. Also active as a filmmaker and independent curator, Wilson is a member of Persona Volare, an eleven-member curatorial collective in Toronto that explores non-museum sites. She has received grants and awards from the Toronto Arts Council, the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts. Her work has appeared regularly in The Walrus magazine.   Brandon Vickerd received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from NSCAD University in 1998 and a Masters in Fine Art from the University of Victoria in 2001. He has exhibited across Canada and, in 2007, had a solo exhibition at Embassy Gallery in Edinburgh, Scotland. The recipient of grants and awards from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council, the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council, he currently teaches in the sculpture department of York University.   Both artists, who live in Toronto, will be present for the exhibitions’ opening. Kate Wilson will give a public talk and walk-through of her exhibition on Friday evening, 11 January 2008 at 7:00 pm, followed by an opening reception for both exhibitions at 8:00 pm.  Both events are free of charge and open to the public, at Saint Mary’s University Art Gallery in the Loyola Building, 5865 Gorsebrook Avenue. Refreshments will be served.    Brandon Vickerd will also give a public talk about his work on Wednesday evening, 9 January 2008, at 7:00 pm in the Board Room of NSCAD University.   Kate Wilson: Microbial Baroque and Brandon Vickerd: Bionic Forest are organised by Saint Mary's University Art Gallery and will appear at the Gallery,  12 January through 2 March 2008.  PLEASE NOTE: The Gallery will be closed 16-24 February for the Kiwanis Music Festival.   The Canada Council for the Arts provides significant programme support for all exhibitions and associated activities at Saint Mary's University Art Gallery.   -30 -   Contact: Robin Metcalfe, 902 420-5445 Email: gallery@smu.ca Website: www.smuartgallery.ca Digital images/slides/photos available  

Microbial Baroque

http://library2.smu.ca/xmlui/bitstream/01/21877/1/News%20Release%20-%20Kate%20and%20Vickerd%20-%202008.pdf

Microbial Baroque

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Saint Mary's University, Halifax: Institutional Repository