Brenda Mabel Reid: Lead Lines

Closing March 30, 2025

Brenda Mabel Reid, Piecing Together (Bonnie) (detail), 2025, paper, ink, thread. Photo by Jens Langen

Brenda Mabel Reid: Lead Lines

Curated by Sheila McMath
February 4 – March 30, 2025
Homer Watson House & Gallery, Kitchener

Leadline: a nautical surveying tool made of lead and rope used to measure water depth and collect floor samples.

Lead Lines is an installation of audio, print-based paper quilts and furniture that explores multigenerational family dynamics and intergenerational gifts, trauma, and memory. The project stems from the artist’s queer urge to know and love themself, specifically within complex family dynamics. Using the quilts made by the artist’s late grandmother as familial leadlines, the artist interviewed her five children about her life. This was an uncomfortable and, at times, devastating process of receiving oral histories within a family full of silence. It informed the artist as much about their grandma, Marion Reid, as it did about who they are: a non-binary artist who created an art practice with a quilted centre.

Lead Lines is an act of translation, transformation, and transfusion. The installation echoes these three parts in audio, translucent paper quilts, and furniture. The audio work explores the incomplete and sometimes contradictory memories tilled up within the family, while the quilts reflect versions of the grandmother as translated through two generations. Viewers are welcome to sit on the furniture to experience the work.

Brenda Mabel Reid, Lead Lines, 2025, installation. Photo by Toni Hafkenscheid

Pressing Seams
2025, multi-channel audio work, 00:25:07

The multi-channel audio piece presents an incomplete and contradictory auditory image of Marion. The artist created the script by combining interview fragments following her life as remembered by her children. The work is read in the artist’s voice.

Brenda Mabel Reid, Piecing Together, 2025, paper, ink, thread. Photo by Toni Hafkenscheid

Piecing Together
2025, quilts (5): paper, ink, thread (dim. variable)

The quilts interpret family interviews and the artist’s grandmother’s quilting practice. Constructed to Marion’s approximate height and made of translucent paper layers, the quilts feature hand-printed imagery representing her values and life. Each quilt reflects a version of Marion, as translated through two generations.

Thank you to the Canada Council for the Arts for their generous financial support.

Brenda Mabel Reid, Lead Lines, 2025, installation. Photo by Toni Hafkenscheid

Brenda Mabel Reid is an emerging non-binary visual artist with a social practice. Their work explores societal power imbalances. Their practice includes textile, print, sculpture, installation, audio, and animation. Brenda completed their Master of Architecture and Bachelor of Architectural Studies at the University of Waterloo. They have completed residencies in Kitchener, Hamilton, Guelph, and St. John’s. Brenda has received grants from the Canadian Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Region of Waterloo Arts Fund, and the City of Kitchener. They are based in the Haldimand Tract and reside in Kitchener, ON.

Artist’s Website: www.brendamabelreid.com
Arisit’s Instagram: @brendamabelreid

Homer Watson House & Gallery
1754 Old Mill Road
Kitchener, ON N2P 1H7
519-748-4377
www.homerwatson.on.ca

Instagram: @homerwatsonhouse
Facebook: @HomerRWatson

Hours
Tuesday – Saturday: 10am – 4pm
Sunday: 12pm – 4pm
Monday: Closed

Mobility
Fully Accessible – Main building and classroom studio
Partially Accessible – Garden studio and pottery studio
Please contact HWHG with any accessibility questions or concerns

Driving
Parking is in the small lot in front of the lawn, additional parking is available on the street.