Grenfell Art Gallery, Corner Brook, NF
Entrance to the Grenfell Campus School of Fine Arts, featuring the mural caribou coat continuum by alumna Melissa Tremblett (photo: Lori Lee Pike)
The Canadian art landscape is ever-changing. Places + Spaces keeps you informed of established and up-and-coming exhibition venues across the country including museums, galleries, artist-run centres, and more. This month, we hear from Jane Walker, Director of the Grenfell Art Gallery in Corner Brook, NF.
What is the history and mandate of your gallery?
Founding faculty member Kent Jones speaks at the opening reception of Hard Westerlies: Visual Arts Practice and Pedagogy at Grenfell Campus in November 2025 (photo: Kurtis Walsh)
The Grenfell Art Gallery was established in 1988 with the opening of the School of Fine Arts and Visual Arts program, part of what was known as Sir Wilfred Grenfell College, and is now known as Memorial University’s Grenfell Campus. Establishing an art gallery within the School of Fine Arts was a critical piece of the visual arts program – building infrastructure for visual art experiences for students, faculty, and the region. Corner Brook is a seven hour drive from the province’s capital of St. John’s, where the Art Gallery of Newfoundland and Labrador, which has since been absorbed within The Rooms, is located. The Grenfell Art Gallery not only served as a teaching and learning resource for the visual arts program, but is and has always been a public art gallery. We are proud to be the public art gallery in Western Newfoundland for contemporary visual art practices.
Over the years, the gallery has collaborated with community partners and institutions across Canada to develop a wide range of programming, including festivals, residencies, publications, touring exhibitions, artist talks, and public art commissions. Located in a relatively remote region where travel costs can be high, the gallery works closely with the visual arts sector in Newfoundland and Labrador to share resources and create more opportunities for artists visiting the province.
Today, the Grenfell Art Gallery serves all of Memorial University when it comes to the visual arts. We work with colleagues across the university to facilitate visual art experiences including artwork placements, donations, public art projects, and residencies, including Bonne Bay Aquarium and Research Station, Labrador Campus, Botanical Garden, Signal Hill Campus, Marine Institute, and the main St. John’s campus.
What’s a highlight of the neighbourhood where the gallery is located?
Participants gather around the foraging table during the Foray & Frolic at Barachois Pond Provincial Park with artist guides Diane Borsato and Denika Kelly as part of the Saltbox Contemporary Arts Festival, October 2025, curated by D’Arcy Wilson and Jane Walker (photo: Joey Snow)
Corner Brook is a vibrant small city, nestled within Elmastukwek (the Bay of Islands) with a wider area population of about 30,000. We are gifted with 3.5 magical seasons: long snowy winters for skiing, snowshoeing and boil-ups in the woods; a quick melt of spring; hot summers, and brilliantly coloured falls. We are only an hour and a half drive from incredible hiking and camping in Gros Morne National Park, and countless beautiful hiking trails around Elamstukwek. It’s an amazing place to spend time outdoors, no matter what time of year.
For me, Corner Brook hits the sweet spot of being a small city immersed in nature, with a community that values that balance. We are a gallery in an art school with forested nature trails mere steps away – what more could you ask for?
What’s your favourite part of running an art gallery?
Glenn Gear, tillitâk | pulse, July-September 2025, solo exhibition (photo: Kurtis Walsh)
I really love my job – most aspects of it feel like a dream. Before becoming an arts administrator and curator, I was, and still am, a visual artist. I still carry that perspective with me in how I work with artists and students, valuing the artistic process of creating exhibitions. What I value most are the relationships I build with artists, visiting curators, and my student support team. There’s something deeply fulfilling about helping an artist realize their vision, problem-solving alongside studio technicians, and showing students how the magic comes together behind the scenes. Every exhibition or project is different, so the learning never stops. I feel incredibly grateful to work within an art school environment, surrounded by colleagues whose creativity and ideas continually inspire me.
How do you find out about new artists?
Performance view of so we took the bus, a durational bus-tour performance by Jerry Ropson. Part of the Saltbox Contemporary Arts Festival, October 2025, curated by D’Arcy Wilson and Jane Walker (photo: Kurtis Walsh)
Grenfell Art Gallery is part of a catalogue exchange program with a number of galleries across Canada. I love receiving the catalogs and notices of upcoming exhibitions, even if I can’t visit them. I’ve long been a reader of Visual Arts News, and over the years it has introduced me to a wide range of visual arts practices from across Atlantic Canada. I keep an eye on various longlists, such as the ArtsNL awards, VANL-CARFAC EVA awards, Scotiabank New Generation Awards, and The William and Meredith Saunderson Prize for Emerging Visual Artists, among many others. I also keep an eye out for artists who are travelling to Newfoundland for opportunities at Union House Arts, St. Michael’s Printshop, The Rooms, Bonavista Biennale, Fogo Island Arts, and Eastern Edge. While it’s lovely to welcome artists to Newfoundland for the first time in Corner Brook, it’s also great to work with artists who have previously visited or exhibited on the island, as that can lead to ideas or further local research.
Lastly, it’s a small world and I know a lot of artists! And I’m lucky to meet more every year. Sometimes I find out about artists when they collaborate or exhibit with artists who I know or follow on social media.
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Nelson White: Mimajimk (Living/Vivre), a trilingual monograph on the work of Nelson White, featuring texts by Lisa Moore, David Garneau, and Shannon Webb-Campbell, and an interview between Nelson White and Jordan Bennett. Designed by Mark Bennett and published by the Grenfell Art Gallery.
I’m coming up on two years in this role, and it’s an exciting time to initiate new projects and deepen existing relationships and concepts. We have recently been developing more public art opportunities across Memorial University campuses, and this is something I’d like to see grow. I’d also like to see more interdisciplinary projects at the university led by or co-facilitated by the gallery.
This year we published two artist publications: Nelson White: Mimajimk (Living/Vivre) and Daze Jefferies: pleasuremonger. I have really loved the process of building artist publications. It’s something the gallery had taken a break from in recent years. Moving away from the fleeting digital, I feel a refreshed energy towards printed exhibition materials, and I’m excited to explore that more in the years to come.
We also recently collaborated with Grenfell Campus’ Bonne Bay Aquarium and Research Station to pilot the Art & Science Residency, an opportunity for artists to live in residence at the station alongside primarily science-based researchers. We are working on an exhibition at the station and publication that will share the outputs of this program. Participating artists in the first season of this program were: Janet Davis, Luanne Dominix, Tanja Geis, Linda-Marlena Ross, Julie Sperling, and Karen Stentaford. These sorts of cross-discipline opportunities are an added bonus from working within a university.
What excites you about your upcoming exhibitions?
Visitors at the 2025 BFA graduate exhibition, between / the lines (photo: Kurtis Walsh)
Our next two exhibitions are our annual student exhibitions: the BFA Visual Arts graduating exhibition and the MFA graduating cohort exhibition. Each year, these exhibitions are remarkably diverse, reflecting the wide range of creative practices emerging from the school. Grenfell Campus has long embraced an interdisciplinary approach, where students are not required to declare a specific discipline. This openness often results in innovative, interdisciplinary projects and research.
Coming up this summer after the graduate exhibitions, we are excited to be a receiving institution for Farheen Haq: میں اپنی ماں کی بیٹی ہوں | I am my mother’s daughter, circulated by the Campbell River Art Gallery and curated by Haema Sivanesan and Jenelle M. Pasiechnik. The exhibition will be on view between August 1 and September 26. Concurrently, we will have an exhibition in the project room by Megan Samms and Nasim Makaremi Nia, including new collaborative drawing works emerging from their joint residency at the Banff Centre in 2025.