AG's annual report 2009 - Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery

09
May 15, 2009 – July 5, 2009
Phil Irish: Watershed River Grand Chronicles #6
Elora based Phil Irish premiered a new series of paintings which explored turning points in people’s lives in relation
to their experiences along the Grand River. Irish incorporated hand-drawn maps created by a diverse group
of people, and visited and documented the physical sites described by the maps. During this process, he sometimes
noticed a discrepancy between his experience and the hand-drawn maps of his collaborators. These differing
points of view were manifest in a collision between representation and abstraction within a single work.
Susan Coolen: Grand Shadows River Grand Chronicles #7
This multimedia installation combined photographic light works, image projections and video works incorporating
imagery drawn from Coolen’s on-going expeditions to the Grand River during the four seasons. Much of
Coolen’s work begins with the act of collecting (and sometimes mummifying) specimens, found objects, flotsam
and other detritus of daily life. As an initial means of responding to these items, Coolen turned to her interests in
natural history, the museum and astronomy, and their links to the history of photography.
Catherine Paleczny: Sumus Quod Sumus
Though her practice is rooted in ceramics, Paleczny’s work often suggests the archeological remnants of past
civilizations, swarms and flocks of organisms. Using traditional hand-building techniques, Paleczny crafted each
object as an individual form before integrating them into a collective. The swarms in Sumus Quod Sumus spoke of
movement, repetition, spatial tension, and our constant search for order and belonging in the world around us.
Above image: Phil Irish, Contain and Release, 2009, oil on panel. Opposite from top: Catherine Paleczny, Untitled (detail), 2008, stoneware.
Susan Coolen, Grand Shadows Series No. 1, 2009, DVD projection. All images courtesy of the artist.