OPEN STUDIO
to
the Gallery / art placement 238 3 Ave S, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan S7K 1L9
The Gallery/Art Placement, "Open Studio," 2022
This summer at art placement, the gallery becomes a workspace for artists to create, experiment, collaborate, learn from, and inspire each other. Watch the creative process unfold as the gallery plays host to nearly 30 artists between June 20th and July 16th! Each week, a different group of artists will share the space, using it as their temporary studio to make work.
The second week of OPEN STUDIO welcomes Jonathan Forrest, Jordan Danchilla, Karen Polowick, Lex Edmunds, Nancy Lowry, and Steph Krawchuk. Read on for more information about the participating artists.
open house: Saturday, July 2, 2-4 PM
You are invited to visit the gallery on Saturday, July 2nd, 2 - 4 PM to celebrate the end of the second week of OPEN STUDIO. Stop in to meet the artists and see what they have been up to during their time in the space.
the artists:
Jonathan Forrest is an abstract painter based in Canada. He divides his studio time between Vancouver Island and small town Saskatchewan. He studied at the University of Saskatchewan and has participated in numerous artists' workshops. His work has been shown in galleries across Canada and collected by numerous individuals, institutions, and corporations.
Jordan Danchilla is a Saskatoon-based artist who works in a variety of two-dimensional media including printmaking, drawing, and painting. His works spring from a diverse well of influences. His reduced, minimal aesthetic revolves around an exploration of texture, colour, and shape. Striking and graphic, idiosyncratic and increasingly referential, the resulting works are surprising and delightful.
Karen Polowick is an emerging artist working in drawing, analogue photography, and alternative darkroom printing and hand-processing techniques for film. She has recently begun exploring light sensitive emulsion and collage.
Lex Edmunds is an emerging artist based in Saskatoon. They are a multi-disciplinary artist reconnecting with their Coast Salish ancestry through art, with a particular focus on beadwork, revitalizing and showcasing the traditional medium from their contemporary perspective.
Nancy Lowry is a painter based in Saskatoon. After studying painting and drawing at the University of Saskatchewan she went on to complete her BFA at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 2003. She has participated in numerous workshops and residencies. Her paintings straddle the traditions of landscape and abstraction. Often small in scale, her paintings have impactful presence, with thickly textured surfaces, strong gestural marks, and vivid, unconventional colour.
Steph Krawchuk is a Canadian artist with a primary focus on abstract painting. Defying any strict stylistic lineage, her paintings are consistently fresh and unexpected. Lively, whimsical, colourful, and developed according to their own visual logic, Krawchuk's abstract paintings give a clear focus to the interplay of line, shape, colour and texture that have always been at the core of her artistic explorations.
The fourth week of OPEN STUDIO welcomes Amanda May, Carol Wylie, Jessica Morgun, JingLu Zhao, Kaleb Whittingstall, and Rowen Dinsmore. Read on for more information about the participating artists.
open house: Saturday, July 16, 2-4 PM
You are invited to visit the gallery on Saturday, July 16th, 2 - 4 PM to celebrate the end of the fourth and final week of OPEN STUDIO. Stop in to meet the artists and see what they have been up to during their time in the space.
the artists:
Amanda May is a mature student currently pursuing her BFA at the University of Saskatchewan. She enjoys exploring a range of mediums, with a primary focus on painting in oil and acrylic and drawing in graphite and charcoal. At this stage in her development, she is enjoying experimenting with different styles and formats, with a strong interest in colour.
Carol Wylie has maintained an active art practice for more than thirty years, with an exclusive focus on portraiture and the figure. She holds an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts, a BFA in studio art and BA in psychology from the University of Saskatchewan. She resides in Saskatoon, dividing her time between her personal painting practice and her role as an art educator .
Jessica Morgun explores the potency of objects and materiality though drawing, digital art, and ceramic sculpture. She is interested in the nature and meaning of the objects that populate our lives, their human and non-human atmospheres, and the role that memory and perception play in one's construction of the real. Meaningful public engagement is also central to her practice -- no matter the project, there is always an invitation to others to create their own work.
JingLu Zhao makes art that explores personal and collective identity and familial relationships. She works primarily in painting and drawing in a variety of media, including acrylics and oils. Her paintings and drawings often combine figuration and landscape, to consider and reflect upon her children's First Nations and Chinese heritage. SHe is interested in depicting a range of ideas and emotions through her work, and in being an active, professional artist in her community.
Kaleb Whittingstall is an emerging artist who is mostly self taught. He has explored drawing in both traditional and digital forms, but now focuses primarily on painting in oils. Despite being relatively new to art making, he has found himself to be intensely passionate about self expression through visual art. His style is still evolving, but portraiture is emerging as a dominant subject, touching on themes of identity, societal roles, and mental health.
Rowen Dinsmore is a recent graduate of the BFA Honours program at the University of Saskatchewan. Influenced by social media and art history, her self-portraiture considers her own subjectivity as a woman in the current cultural moment, often approaching topics of spectatorship and the gaze, and the feminine form. She is interested in critiquing while also embracing these aspects of the female experience in a post-internet world. Each work is a conceptual or representational self-portrait.