Group Exhibit Pays Homage to Nature

On July 3, 60 people enjoyed the opening of the latest exhibit of the Gatineau Valley’s abundant artistic creativity, curated by the 100 Mile Arts Network. The bright gallery walls on the second floor at 721 Riverside Dr., Wakefield, were adorned with works that cleaved to the exhibit’s title, ‘A Plea for the Earth’.

In all, eight artists had works on display artists from all over 100 Mile Art Network country: from Wakefield, there was Gary Hesketh, Kai (Chris) Hamilton and Martin Brooks; from Alcove, Darron Aucoin; from Sainte-Thérèse-de-la-Gatineau, Mary Ann McGee; from Luskville, David Perrett; from Masham, Kyle Drake; and from Kitigan Zibi, James Patrick O’Leary.

As part of the opening, local poet and activist Ilse Turnsen, for whom social activism and environmentalism go hand-in- hand, recited her poem, ‘I have a wise and graceful neighbour’ – the neighbour being an “Eastern hemlock, tall and majestic.”

Ten days after the opening, I visited the gallery just
as several 100 Mile volunteers were unloading equipment from the afternoon’s Art in the Park event. As I entered the gallery, the first thing that caught my eye were two tall ash tree trunks, hollowed out and bare of bark, part of Perrett’s “Timber’ series.

Rooted in a heavy, rounded base, this was art you can touch, nudging the trunk as though it were experiencing one of the many recent storms we’ve been having. Elsewhere in the room I could see a caribou, a fawn, embroidered leaves, a buffalo and multiple scenes from nature and one from the solar system, all created in homage to Earth’s beauty and bounty, and as a plea to be a companion of the ecosystem, not an enemy.

Two of the artists in the exhibition had gracefully come to the gallery to discuss with me their exhibits in ‘A Plea for the Earth’: sculptor Hamilton and visual artist Brooks.

Hamilton, who left a career in science writing to pursue art full time, has two pieces on display: ‘It’s for You’ and ‘Tea Time’. Both pieces – an owl perched above a telephone and a teapot with new life emerging from it are Hamilton’s response to the question, “What will evolve and flourish after humans have left our mark? And what will humanity become?

“The human species,” she said, “is the next meteor, and we are witnessing the next mass extinction on Earth. Yet, life is tenacious and finds its way back in new ways after the meteor has struck.”

I marvelled at the owl in particular, thinking it a piece of taxidermy, yet she had created it herself mostly from paper – in fact pages of the Low Down. It evokes both discomfort and a sense of beauty, and the craftsmanship is exquisite.

Brooks is a Wakefield-based artist whose work merges technology, mathematics and aesthetics to explore the complexity of the natural world. He explained to me that he has created a genre of art called ShapeVision, the result of his “long research journey into math and code to capture complexity in natural phenomena.”

He explained that, “My unique, original mathematical ShapeVision software transforms photographs into a fabric of colourful shapes at multiple levels of detail, as the starting point for artistic composition.”

The result, ‘Hidden Treasure’, which is based on the lyrics of the Traffic song of the same name, is vivid. As a writer, I spent a few minutes creating the story I could see in it. The song’s lyrics are, “Take a walk down by /take a walk down by the river/ There’s a lot that you / there’s a lot that you can learn.” And I suggest doing so before visiting the gallery, where you will find much to discuss with yourself.

The exhibit ‘A Plea for the Earth’ runs until Sunday, Aug. 31, at 100 Mile Arts Network’s gallery, on the second floor of 721 Riverside Dr., Wakefield. The entrance is at the back, and the gallery hours are 12 p.m. until 4 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday. There will be a closing reception on Aug. 31, between 2 and 4 p.m. Best to RSVP at 100milearts. net for a ticket as numbers are limited.