Alternator exhibition essays respond to the artworks presented through our Main Gallery exhibition series, and add another layer of interpretation to the exhibitions on view. These essays take a variety of forms: formal essays, Q&As with the artist, interpretive responses, and other types of creative writing pieces.
Read the essay supporting our current exhibition below, or review the essay archive going back to 2019.
Interested in writing for us? Learn how to join our roster of writers here.
“There can be no repetition,” wrote Gertrude Stein, “because the essence of that expression is insistence, and if you insist you must each time use emphasis and if you use emphasis it is not possible while anybody is alive that they should use exactly the same emphasis.” Here, in Figure as Index, images repeat.
Read MoreOur current archeological record suggests that the earliest human-made mirrors were created approximately 8,000 years ago in southern Anatolia, or what is now south-central Turkey. These Neolithic mirrors, unearthed in the settlement of Çatalhöyük, are round or ovoid, approximately palm-sized, and were painstakingly crafted from obsidian, a deep black volcanic glass, with very finely polished, slightly convex surfaces.
Read MoreJust as in life, art is a perpetual unfolding of that which came before. My painting exhibition at the end of 2021 at the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art was titled, This is a Love Story, and I have recorded a series of walks that are an extension of that; the search for meaning, and the decision to rest in the space of Love during the present time when it often feels easier to choose fear.
Read More“Construction and infrastructure development is our most impactful human activity. We must learn to alter our approach so that we ‘Design for Life, not Machines’.”
Teresa Cody reflects on the exhibition This is a Love Story, by artist Lindsay Kirker.
It is essential to the understanding of S.C. Jean’s work to acknowledge that she is a self-taught artist. This is to say, that she did not go to art school or university to study art, but instead picked it up independently and found her own way to create. Because of this, she has developed a unique language, and consequently, her work may not tick every box of what you expect to see from a “schooled” painter. Yet if you are willing to spend time with her paintings, you find that they stand on their own merits and offer a rewarding viewing experience. I would go on to say that it is precisely through this lack of training that she has developed a distinct voice that transcends many of the derivative works that have been spawned by the academy.
Read MoreLevi Glass’s Legroom for Daydreaming invites curiosity and encourages enquiry. This intriguing assortment of visual puzzles and strange devices stirs our desire to investigate what we see. Here, ordinary materials and mundane, domestic items gain the capacity to inspire, awe, and delight.
Read MoreCities have always been centres of growth. However, in what scholars refer to as late liberalism, urban life is dominated by neoliberal ideology, or what the political philosopher Wendy Brown (2015, 17) calls “a peculiar form of reason that configures all aspects of existence in economic terms.” Evan Berg’s Growth Machine is a tongue-in-cheek critique of the urbanization of Kelowna, as well as the nature of neoliberal urbanism.
Read MoreA perfect machine produces no waste. In the ideal scenario, all energy put into a machine would be efficiently converted into work, and an equal quantity of material that enters the machine would exit as a product. This, as we know, is impossible; all machines emit waste. Machines discharge heat, exhaust, various unpleasant liquids, and excess material as a matter of course. Design theorist and craftsperson David Pye described this fourth kind of waste as a technique—“wasting technique,” he writes in The Nature and Aesthetics of Design, is the “carving away [of] a piece of material until the shape you want remains.”
Read MoreBy the time we reach adulthood, the written word has long since stopped holding any mystery for us. We are so accustomed to the tiny black shapes arranged in their tidy lines across the page that our minds jump immediately to their message, forgetting to look at the spaces they occupy. Occasionally, something will challenge this easy ritual: we learn a new language and we remember the magic of discovering new meaning where before there was none; we struggle with a word puzzle that ruptures the distinction between a word’s shape and its meaning; and, sometimes, we learn that we have been using a word incorrectly and are stunned and maybe a little embarrassed when it unveils its true self. But, for the most part, in our day-to-day lives, language is a seamless conduit for the sense and meaning we seek, and we entirely take for granted that it will accomplish its given task.
Read More“What are we looking at in Signal chains: images or visuals, the representation of reality or the reality of representation? Do they refer to an Other or are they just to be conceived of as self-referential? … Instead of seeking answers solely within the works displayed in Signal chains (i.e., the objects in isolation), it would be much less tedious to explore the trajectory of Steven Cottingham’s recent image-based works, from which Signal chains seems to have come about (i.e., the objects-in-relation).”
Read More“Audie Murray’s work first came to my attention in the form of a circulated Instagram image of a pair of sports socks with a beaded sole, Pair of Socks (2017). I immediately was drawn to thinking about these works, what it means to walk on these beads, to feel them on the feet- their potential to break- and how they relate to historic works of moccasins with beaded soles.”
Through the use of humour, materials and technical skills, Audie Murray combines contemporary Indigenous art with pop culture.
Read More“Since 2015 I have been collaborating with a contact, Bagalwa Baliahamwabo, in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). To be straightforward, I am outsourcing beadwork to his family…Each swatch is 128 by 128 beads and is woven on a bead loom for a wage of one US cent per bead ($163.84/swatch). I estimate this works out to $1.50-$3.00/hour. For comparison, a plantation worker in the DRC makes about $2.00 a day.”
Author and artist Paul Robert exclaims how his collaboration with beader Bagalwa Baliahamwabo aims to bring up the complexities involved with so-called “feel goods” and the nuanced nature behind consumer activism.
Why are some holes in the body coveted, and some considered shameful? Gazing into another’s eyes is a romantic act of love, while gazing into a butthole, another’s or one’s own, is an awkward proposition. It is safe to assume that the initial reactions to Christopher Lacroix’s artwork, There is a Minimum to Operate Properly will range from disgust, titillation, curiosity, desire and a variety of other states, perturbed and pleasing. This project requires multiple lenses to consider its subtle production of meanings, beyond initial visceral responses.
Read MoreArtist Holly Ward makes work that has run a course through a retro optimism towards a darker, more anxious meditation on our collective future. Ward’s pieces are constructed across mediums, using sculpture, multi-media installation, architecture, video and drawing.
Read MoreLike the sacred trickster coyote of Indigenous plateau lore, the pieces that RYAN! Feddersen makes us feel empathy While modelling to us our missteps, so that we may choose better for ourselves. RYAN! Feddersen (b. 1984, Wenatchee, Washington) is a mixed-media installation artist who conceives large-scale, site-specific pieces which use interactivity to create opportunities for personal introspection and discovery in the local community. RYAN! is an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, and a descendant of the Okanagan and Arrow Lakes peoples.
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