Adrian Cooke: The Devil’s Rope

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Adrian Cooke, "The Devil’s Rope," 2022

installation view

Opening with a presentation of contemporary music + dance performance: Friday, March 4, 2022 @ 7 PM

The Main Gallery features “The Devil’s Rope” – a multi-media presentation by Adrian Cooke, a Lethbridge-based sculptor and a multi-media artist. In general, Cooke’s project attempts to broaden our vision of time and place by alluding to how humans interact with and respond to their environment.

Barbed wire, also known as “the devil’s rope,” is a mid-19th century US invention designed to keep livestock within pasture lands that were once part of the “Open Range.” In the next century, barbed wire was used as a battlefield obstacle in the no man’s land of World War I, and later in prisoner-of-war camps and in Nazi concentration camps during the World War II. Today we know it as a marker of private (and sometimes government) property. Though Adrian Cooke is aware of barbed wire’s history, he seems to have a particular intertest in its formal elements. Working largely in sculpture and watercolour, Cooke presents a new body of work that emphasizes barbed wire’s variable patterns and textures relative to the Prairie region in which he lives. For Cooke, the imposition of barbed wire fencing on the natural landscape produces a range of narratives, from protection to encroachment. He has fashioned works that allude to the histories of these narratives as well as their potential consequences. The Flanagan Foundation is a Presenting Partner of this exhibition.

Opening + Music & Dance Performance

In the spirit of collaboration and support, Harcourt House has partnered with the Edmonton’s vibrant contemporary experimental music and dance community to inaugurate a collaborative project with the launch of this special performance. The exhibitions opening night features a presentation of music for solo violin by two internationally renowned Canadian contemporary composers: an Alberta-born and New York-based Erin Rogers and her composition “The Shape of Things” and Piotr Grella-Możejko (pron. Pyotr Grella-Mozheyko), an Edmonton-based Canadian-Polish composer and multi-media performer and his composition “Kristal-Traum III: Musik fur Alexandra B.”. Their compositions musically delineate the shapes and forms of the works in the exhibitions and perfectly align with the character of both shows. Both compositions for solo violin will be performed by Tatiana Warszynski, a Canadian-Polish violinist with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra and a former concertmaster of the Edmonton Chamber Players. Tatiana’s performance will be animated by a very impressive choreography/dance by Marynia Fekecz, a Polish-born and Edmonton-based choreographer, dancer, and educator.