Hand Made @ MNBAQ

Hand Made is currently running at the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec, until September 3, 2018. I always enjoy shows that celebrate the mastery of materials, and how craftsmanship can be employed to address provocative issues.

Guillaume Lachapelle, Untitled
nylon and paint

Here's an introduction to the show from the MNBAQ's website:

"Handicrafts, know-how and folklore come to the fore in contemporary art in this exhibition that dismantles the principles of hierarchy in art. Fait main / Hand Made presents these practices by exploring not only popular art, raw art and Pop Surrealism but also technology. More than 40 Canadian artists from Vancouver to Halifax have been assembled in this sweeping exhibition. Fait main / Hand Made promises a brilliant overview of a significant segment of contemporary output in Canada.

"The exhibition will encompass a broad range of practices, from wood carving to quilts, not to mention ceramics and embroidery. It includes a chair sculpted from newspaper, objects covered in knitting, textile videos and 3D printing.  The craft-based processes used will highlight the mastery of matter. The event ultimately examines the transformation of work, politics, labour and leisure."

Gilles Mihalcean, Wormhole
wood and stain
Can you see the figure of the man, caught upside down
in a passage through the fragments of chairs?

Gilles Mihalcean, Wormhole (detail)
wood and stain

The gallery notes for Wormhole read, in part, "Milhacean's sculptures are made up of pieces of wooden chairs that have been piled up into monolithic masses shot through with numerous openings and gaps. Simultaneously dynamic and precarious, these structures allude to a state of constant transformation."

Cal Lane, Gutter Snipes I

Cal Lane, Gutter Snipes I (detail)
note cast shadow on wall above sculpture

Cal Lane's Gutter Snipes I is the first piece the visitor sees on entering the exhibition, making for a bold introduction. Lane uses a plasma cutter to transform a section of sewer pipe into complex, lace-like tracery. I first saw Lane's work at Stewart Hall in Pointe Claire, and posted about it. The artist typically takes pieces of metal (old oil cans, shovels, a munitions box, the hood of a car) that reek of industry or war, and changes them into something "pretty", playing with our tropes of masculine and feminine.

Michael Patten, Native Beating
baseball bat and glass beads

Michael Patten, Native Beating (detail)
baseball bat and glass beads

Again, from the museum's posted label:

"The economy of means employed by Michael Patten in creating Native Beating gives a disarming simplicity to a baseball bat covered in rocaille beads. Patten camouflaged this emblem of American sports culture using the traditional indigenous technique of beadwork. A closer look shows that the red beads representing bloodshed at the tip of the bat also form the map of Canada. This unmistakably political work underscores the systemic violence done to peoples who were assimilated on behalf of a hegemonic colonialist identity."

Guillaume Lachapelle, Book
plaster and epoxy

Guy Laramée, Good-bye,
altered Encyclopedia Britannica, archival pigments and ink

When I was a child, defacing a book was considered to be a sacrilege. Now, "altered books" are an entire subsection of art. Are books no longer precious? Or are they more precious than ever, now that we are faced with their imminent replacement by digital media? I find both works above to be challenging explorations of these questions and others.

Paryse Martin, The Wrinkled Universe
paper, cardboard, fibreglass and wood

Paryse Martin, The Wrinkled Universe (detail)
paper, cardboard, fibreglass and wood

Anna Torma, Metamorphosis
mixed media on canvas

Anna Torma, Metamorphosis (detail)
mixed media on canvas

A number of works in the show explored themes using fibre and stitch. Three large pieces by Anna Torma were included. The show's notes read,

"Torma's eclectic imagery unfolds across the fibre surface in a complex patchwork of hand-stitched embroidery and layered or stamped fabric. The artist has used her skill to create an entire world of formal elements and signs that recall the iconographic imagery of the medieval period, as well as outsider art. Fascinated by the symbolic heritage of fibre in material culture, Torma uses it as a vector for reflection on identity and other sociopolitical issues."