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Hello from Hi Art, the CBC Arts weekly newsletter!
Every Sunday, we feature Canadian art that’s grabbed our attention. This is a roundup of recent highlights.
Installation view of Gillian King: Mammatus at de Montigny Contemporary in Ottawa. (Artwork: Gillian King; Photo: de Montigny Contemporary)
Artist: Gillian King
Location: Ottawa
Hard times call for comfort, right? Winnipeg’s Gillian King had climate anxiety on her mind when she was creating Mammatus, a series of paintings filled with pillow stuffing, now appearing at de Montigny Contemporary in Ottawa. Climate anxiety, political tension, motherhood and just the generally awful experience of living through uncertainty — the work’s meant to reflect the range of emotional states those challenges might stir up in a person, and Gillian named the project after a weather phenomenon that signals the beginning — and end — of a severe storm. “I think about these formations as atmospheric and psychological states suspended between tension, release, anticipation and aftermath,” she writes.
Roadside Mountains by Ella Morton. (Ella Morton)
Artist: Ella Morton
Location: Cambridge, Ont.
If this summer of extreme weather has left you feeling as though the fabric of reality is being ripped apart, an exhibition at Cambridge Art Galleries in Ontario might just hit you in the gut. For the Residue of Starlight, artist Ella Morton photographed desert landscapes in three locales threatened by drought and wildfire: northern Chile, New Mexico and the Australian outback. “All are also home to cultures that have a distinct connection to the sky, stars and universe,” she writes. “In these places, the mythology of the sky is as central as that of the land.” Ella creates her psychedelic visuals with a variety of analog film techniques, including soaking colour negatives in acidic solutions. The show is on view until Aug. 8.
Click/Snap by Matthew Walton. (Artwork: Matthew Walton; Photo: the New Other)
Artist: Matthew Walton
Location: Toronto
I feel as if it’s time to let off some steam. For Matthew Walton, the club is the place to do it. The artist has a solo exhibition (Congregation) at the New Other in Toronto — a show inspired by the queer joy he finds on the dance floor. “The shapes, characters, drama and specific cadences, expressed through body and movement, make up a distinct language all its own,” he writes on Instagram. “My work in this show attempts to emblematize this language, to distill into shape and colour some of its magic.”
Installation view of Hors-d’oeuvre by Amélie Jodoin. (Amélie Jodoin)
Artist: Amélie Jodoin
Location: Montreal
Who doesn’t love a picnic? Or a Pique-Nique! That’s the name of Amélie Jodoin’s playful outdoor exhibition at the Parc de l’esplanade de la Pointe-Nord in Montreal. You can see six reproductions of Amélie’s food-inspired landscape paintings there until early October. “I actually never thought of it as a series until now, but I guess it is — I’ve been exploring this theme since 2021,” Amélie writes. “I thought the title Pique-Nique would be perfect for this show as the theme is food, it’s an outdoor exhibition, and it’s summer (and I have a lot of green in my paintings!).”
Cycle by Jazz Keillor. (Jazz Keillor)
Artist: Jazz Keillor
Location: Prince George, B.C.
Halifax artist Jazz Keillor is part of an exhibition at the Two Rivers Gallery in Prince George, B.C. This surreal stationary-bike vignette (Cycle) is from her Biomes series. As Jazz tells me, the project has a lot in common with her past work. People tend to romanticize nature, she says, and that intrigues her. “Cycle, specifically, points to the irony and tensions inherent in our expectation of beauty, peace and replenishment in wild spaces, and our desire to hold onto the comforts and conveniences of home, while maintaining our fantasy of ‘the great outdoors.’”
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