As part of Textile Month, two artists on very different journeys display their creations at Arbor Gallery.
Carl Stewart – WHOLECLOTH – Main Hall
Carl Stewart, renowned Ottawa-based weaver has exhibited throughout North America. His work hangs in the collections of the Ottawa Art Gallery, the City of Ottawa, the Canada Council Art Bank and the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art.
Stewart uses traditional hand-weaving techniques to explore the fundamental role textiles play in the crafting of queer culture and identity. As a cis-gender queer man creating within a perceived “feminine” practice, his work challenges heteronormative and gendered structures of power by celebrating, memorializing, documenting and commemorating the intimate, the fabulous, the egregious and the tragic.
WHOLECLOTH is based on a deep reflection about the memory of cloth. “What if that fabric is made from recycled or repurposed textiles? Does it retain any vestiges of its previous life? Does it resonate in the hand, to the touch? Does it remember?”, he wondered. It led to a thought-provoking exhibit that reuses thread from various textile items such as worn-out towels from a gym, discarded mattresses and army tents. Deconstructing the fabric, he weaves its thread back into new cloth, inviting viewers into a conversation about finding meaning.
“We are grateful to Carl Stewart for accepting our invitation,” states Sylvie Bouchard, Chair of the gallery board, “and we thank Champlain Township and Delta Bingo to help the gallery with their ongoing operations.” This exhibition is also possible thanks to grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and the City of Ottawa.
Brian Beavis – Neoplasticism: a textile exploration
England-born Brian Beavis loved art as a youth but it was not until later that he discovered acrylic and its vibrant colours. In 1971, a friend gifted him a book about Piet Mondrian’s work. “I knew I had found my way,” he exclaims. He painted on and off until 2018, when he started devoting more time to the De Stijl forms.
In parallel, he developed a love for macramé and playing with yarn and strings, started exploring new ways to create free forms. “One thing led to another and I began to get inspired and creative,” he recalls, “and I started using various things like shoelaces, or leftover macramé yarn.” However, it was only recently that, while looking at his paintings and his free forms side by side, Beavis observed a very perceptible influence of the hard-edge paintings carrying over clearly into his free form structures. It is this echoing of the styles that has led to building his exhibit for the Arbor Gallery; it speaks of his continuing journey of artistic inspiration and delight.
Until October 1, at Arbor Gallery, 36 Home Avenue, Vankleek Hill. Vernissage: Saturday, September 9, 1-3 pm.
