curated by Kate Irwin
This exhibition opens on Friday, June 6th, 7:00–9:00 PM
Exhibition runs through Sunday, June 29th, 2014
Gallery Hours:
Saturdays and Sundays, 12 to 4 pm
or by appointment.
Artist Talk — Sunday, June 29th, 2 pm
In her curatorial debut, Kate Irwin has assembled work by graduating artists that show innovative ways of self-exploration and expression through the use of various materials and processes. It is her intention to showcase not only the brilliant end results of these processes, but also to highlight the individuality of the artists’ hand and pure thought in each of the chosen works of art.
The selected artists and their work provoke the viewer to think beyond what is simply hung, displayed and installed before them. It encourages and allows the viewer to remove the blindfold of simply seeing, leaving them “Bare and Unleashed” to dive into the provocative, innovative and unknown, discovering what is and what could be.
“Within”, Kate Irwin
Artists’ Bios
Skye Macpherson
Skye Macpherson is a Canadian artist living in Victoria, BC. Her work shifts between performance, video, photography, and installation. Her primary interests are digital processes, absurdity and identity. Skye has recently graduated with a Bachelor in Fine Arts from the Visual Arts program at the University of Victoria.
Faolan Cole
Faolan Cole is a West Coast fine artist and illustrator. The main focus of her work is the body, both as a form of language and as a way to investigate the dichotomies of life/death and beautiful/grotesque. She has a strong sense of symbolism and an active interest in deep-seated emotions and the human psyche.
Ashley Opperman
Ashley Opperman was born in Victoria, BC and recently completed her Visual Arts Diploma at Camosun College. Her work is a balance between textiles and painting. She has found that people tend to value and critique meaning of textile design and painting quite differently. Her paintings try to challenge the viewer’s aesthetic expectations as well as the value they give to them. She is also interested in widening the art dialogue to include the general audience by making work that holds a type of innovation and unsettling beauty that people can understand and appreciate.
Jennifer Toivanen
Jennifer Toivanen was born in 1991 in Victoria, BC. She works in a variety of media. By choosing mainly formal solutions, Toivanen tries to develop forms that do not follow logical criteria, but are based on subjective associations and formal parallels that incite the viewer to make new personal associations.
Jessica Blue
Jessica Blue is a recent graduate from the University of Victoria with a combined degree in visual arts and computer science. As an artist, Blue is very interested in merging technology and art, both in subject and in practice. Her work often incorporates elements of design. Blue enjoys working in a variety of mediums from painting to sculpture, although her current focus is oil paintings on canvas.
Kate Irwin (curator)
Kate Irwin is a recent graduate of the Visual Arts program at Camosun College. Her main disciplines are film and photography, commonly exploring the vulnerability, fragility, and endurance of the human form and mind. She explores these concepts through various and provocative new ways of photography and video. Having a fascination with human behavior, Irwin commonly uses herself as her subject, thus acquiring a deeper understanding of her concepts and techniques.