NORTH BATTLEFORD — The Chapel Gallery has been holding a Gallery Member Exhibition since it opened, going back to the late 1980s. According to Leah Garven, curator for the gallery, they’ve had to move into a larger space.
“It’s our annual gallery members exhibition. In the past, they’ve been held down the Windows Gallery, but we’re getting bigger and more substantial pieces, and artists are developing a broader skillset, so we’ve moved it into a full space,” Garven said.
“It’s always a wonderful surprise to see what artists are making in solitude in their studios.”
Many of the artists displaying are Battlefords Art Club members, but some have never been inside the Chapel Gallery, sending their art to the gallery from the rural areas they live.
“It's a great chance for artists who might only have one or two pieces to show, and it’s always a wonderful surprise.”
Centred at the heart of the Chapel Gallery is a piece by Sherron Burns, Oriol Dancer, Holly Hildebrand, and Bridget Lessing when they were guest artists-in-residence at Ness Creek’s Bluegrass Festival, titled End of Time Collective Crankie.
“There is a group of us, we call ourselves The Dreamers. This was a big project we did at Ness Creek at the Bluegrass Festival this past summer, they brought us in as guest artists in residence to work in the forest with our piece,” Burns said.
The group of artists makes hand-cranked story boxes that often speak to the common interests around nature and create work that reflects the environment with their Dreamers Collective.
“We wanted to find the story of the forest by being in the forest, making the piece in the forest, from things from the forest.”
Taking a long piece of fabric, they dragged it through the forest. They would collect things for mark-making; some inks were made from plants in the forest, and some structural pieces were found in the forest.
“It tells the story (of the bluegrass area) in four parts, the boreal forest and the musicians that come every year. Starting with that mythical crone character that is spinning the whole story of the world, that’s the first one.”
Though the piece is not in its story box, walking counter-clockwise around it takes you through its story entirely.
The exhibition runs until Jan. 7, 2023, when the Chapel Gallery will have its floor waxed. After re-opening, the gallery’s next exhibition will feature two artists from the Biggar area working with acrylic, texture, and multimedia.
