Kristopher Karklin, "Home," 2016
vinyl, 144" x 216", courtesy of the artist
It’s hard to overstate the value of biennials. These bastions of experimentation and fresh vision can catapult artists to new heights while offering the public snapshots of contemporary art from around the world. Biennials are to art what the Olympics are to sport.
The Alberta Biennial of Contemporary Art, while smaller and less encompassing than the 100 or so international events, is nonetheless highly anticipated. Over the last two decades, it has featured 222 regional artists. This 10th iteration, on view until Sept. 10, is titled For the Time Being. Two curators from the Banff Centre, Peta Rake, curator of the Walter Phillips Gallery, and Kristy Trinier, director of visual, digital and media arts, visited studios across Alberta. They invited 24 artists to a retreat last summer at the Banff Centre. Internationally acclaimed curators led workshops on themes such as the status of biennials and their regional and global impact. The resulting conversations helped structure the ideas this cohort of artists subsequently developed into the work featured at two sister exhibitions. The first opened May 27 at the Art Gallery of Alberta in Edmonton; the second opens June 24 at the Walter Phillips Gallery.
The results of this intriguing curatorial emphasis on collective engagement and discussions are mixed. Perhaps grounding the artists in the cultural impact and global significance of biennials prompted some amongst this relatively young cohort – at least half graduated after 2010 – to overreach.
For instance, Edmonton-based Devon Beggs, a 2010 graduate of Concordia University in Montreal, created a video, Echo’s Chorus, that features fast-paced, video-game-like fragments of largely abstract patterns that, according to his statement, “bring the viewer to a state of transcendence or spiritual ecstasy through a sensory overload of sound and imagery.”
Devon Beggs, "Echo's Chorus," 2017
video and performance, dimensions variable, collection of the artist
Around the corner is a wall-mounted graphic by Calgary-based Ashley Bedet, a 2014 graduate of NSCAD University in Halifax, that seems derived from excerpts of an astrophysics textbook. Her work, Selection occurs from the onset — Persistence in continuum. A soft moon turns hard, then turns to a planet. Its star collapses and a new formation persists, addresses the “cyclical evolution of energy in a galaxy’s life span.”
Ashley Bedet, "Selection occurs from the onset — Persistence in continuum. A soft moon turns hard, then turns to a planet. Its star collapses and a new formation persists," 2017
wall vinyl, 84" x 144", courtesy of the artist
Some of the show’s best works draw on the old admonishment to write what you know. A monumental vinyl mural, Home, by Kristopher Karklin, who earned a BFA from the Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary in 2007, addresses the dire housing situation facing millennials – a critical issue in Calgary where young job seekers often have trouble finding housing they can afford. Karklin depicts a young couple who stand, naked and vulnerable, in front of a suburban home they may never have the opportunity to own.
Another powerful work, Sublimation/Constellalchemy, by Marigold Santos, who holds a 2011 Master’s degree from Concordia, takes an intimate slant. Santos, who bases her work on stories from her Philippine heritage, depicts a levitating figure. Tiny objects covered with metallic leaf are pinned to the wall surrounding her painting. Like air, they become sparser as they ascend. Viewers are forced to look up, as if in a cathedral, at this intense personal mythology.
Marigold Santos, "Sublimation/Constellalchemy," 2016-2017
mixed media on canvas, epoxy putty, metallic leaf and metal pins, 156" x 108" canvas, sculpture dimensions variable, courtesy of the artist, made possible by funding from the Canada Council for the Arts
If there’s an overarching theme to this biennial it’s the movement away from pure aesthetics or the triviality of pop culture to a deeper reflection on the weighty truths of contemporary life. Such an undertaking is so monumental that perhaps only a few masterpieces ever adequately address them. So it’s not surprising that, with a few exceptions, such as the pieces by Karklin and Santos, the majority of works in this biennial confuse and confound more than they communicate. Still, these artists have most of their careers before them. Their high aspirations are, perhaps, the most auspicious indicator for the future of Alberta art.
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Nicole Kelly Westman, "if you weren't there," 2017
video installation and artist book, dimensions variable, courtesy of the artist
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Parker Thiessen, "Midnight Oscillations (an excerpt)," 2017
audio and video installation, dimensions variable
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Megan Green, "What exactly were we supposed to have learned from the fire?," 2016
wood, plastic, rope, candle and nail, 84" x 48", courtesy of the artist
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Jay Mosher, "Pierrot," 2017
porcelain, neon and HD video with sound, dimensions variable, courtesy of the artist