The Robert McLaughlin Gallery: Fall 2021 Exhibitions + Programming

Vanessa Dion Fletcher, Relative Gradient, Porcupine Quills, Natural Dye, Thread, Paper, 2020. Courtesy of the artist.

Undeliverable

Vanessa Dion Fletcher, Jessica Karuhanga, Chandra Melting Tallow, Carmen Papalia with Heather Kai Smith, jes sachse, Aislinn Thomas

Curated by: Carmen Papalia
Co-presented by Tangled Art + Disability and The Robert McLaughlin Gallery

RMG: September 18, 2021 to February 13, 2022
Tangled Art + Disability: September 17 to October 29, 2021

Opening soon! Curated by artist Carmen Papalia and co-presented by Tangled Art + Disability and The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Undeliverable envisions curation as a form of care. Bringing together six artists from the Mad, Deaf and disability community, Vanessa Dion Fletcher, Chandra Melting Tallow, Jessica Karuhanga, jes sachse, Aislinn Thomas, and Carmen Papalia with Heather Kai-Smith, this exhibition re-envisions the museum around the demands and desires of the disabled body/mind and features ambitious new work that challenges institutional structures and centres mutual accountability.

Kindly note that both the RMG and Tangled Art + Disability are scent free spaces. In order to remain respectful of individuals who may have sensitivity to certain scents or smells, we would like to ask all visitors to help us in creating a fragrance free environment that everyone can enjoy.

Interested in learning more about sensitivity to scents and fragrances? Head over to our Instagram feed for a Takeover by artist Aislinn Thomas that shares more information about how you can help make public spaces more accessible and safe for all those who experience barriers from the toxicants that are in so many personal care, cleaning, building, and fragrance products.

Image Description: Relative Gradient by Vanessa Dion Fletcher. A large, thin circle is made of porcupine quills folded back and forth in a zigzag pattern. The colours of the quill embroidery form a gradient of warm reds, pinks, yellows, browns and whites.

Joi T. Arcand, ekawiya nepewisi (don’t be shy), 2017, neon channel sign. Photograph by Elyse Bouvier.

Taskoch pipon kona kah nipa muskoseya, nepin pesim eti pimachihew | Like the winter snow kills the grass, the summer sun revives it

Joi Arcand, Richelle Bear Hat, Susan Blight, Ts̱ēmā Igharas, Audie Murray, Michelle Sylliboy, Alberta Rose W./Ingniq

Curated by Missy LeBlanc and organized and circulated by TRUCK Contemporary Art

November 20, 2021 – April 17, 2022

Taskoch pipon kona kah nipa muskoseya, nepin pesim eti pimachihew | Like the winter snow kills the grass, the summer sun revives it features seven Indigenous artists who create work in an Indigenous language from each of the major geographic regions of what is now known as Canada—Anishinaabemowin, Komqwejwi’kasikl, Michif, nēhiyawēwin, Nitsiipowahsiin, Tāłtān, and Uummarmiutun. The exhibition celebrates and centres Indigenous language revitalization and ways of knowing. Taskoch pipon kona kah nipa muskoseya, nepin pesim eti pimachihew aims to address and initiate a discussion on how Indigenous languages intertwine with Indigenous epistemologies and how the dormancy and extinction of Indigenous languages leads to a hindrance of culture and knowledge. Bringing together emerging and established Indigenous artists based in so-called Canada, the exhibition gives space back to those artists whose practices deal with Indigenous languages in each of their visibilities, vulnerabilities, and regional voices.

Ron Eccles, Landscape (yellow), 2020, oil on canvas. Collection of the artist.

Primary Structures: Ron Eccles

Curated by Sonya Jones

August 03, 2021 – December 05, 2021

Bowmanville-based artist Ron Eccles’ abstract paintings draw inspiration from a deep sense of place. Rooted within this community, Eccles is inspired by his frequent drives along the shoreline of Lake Ontario from Bowmanville to Port Hope, enjoying the patterned farmland, weather changes, and seasonal colours. His reflections on time, geography, and light manifest in his geometric and structured abstract paintings.

With a prolific career spanning more than five decades, Primary Structures focuses on a series of recent work called “White Line Compositions” and includes additional works created within the last fifteen years. Eccles is trained as a printmaker, which informs his painting process and allows him to create simplicity from complex processes, skillfully building layers within his work.

Gallery A + The RBC artist incubator lab at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery

a fervid surfacing: Joy Wong

September 14 – October 24, 2021

Join Joy for an artist talk and workshop on October 2nd at 2 PM!

Across cultures, time, and geographic borders, people have used methods of fermentation to make foods more digestible, delicious, and longer lasting. As the RBC Emerging Artist in Residence at the RMG, Joy Wong has been preoccupied with fermentation. Their new work adopts these practices as a framework for critiquing society’s reverence for purity and fear of contamination, and for asserting that bodies, borders, and cultures are porous, rather than impenetrable.

The RBC Emerging Artist Residency Program is generously sponsored by the RBC Foundation and the RBC Emerging Artist Project.

The artist would like to thank the Ontario Arts Council for supporting this project.

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery is situated on the ancestral lands and treaty lands of the Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation and the traditional territory of the Mississauga Nation.

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery is a vibrant and engaging art gallery dedicated to sharing and protecting the stories of our communities through art, shared authority, education, and engagement. The Gallery is a meeting place for exploration and experimentation, a place where art, artists, and the community come together in conversation.

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery is an accessible venue. To learn more or request accommodations click here.

For more information or questions, please contact Ingrid Forster, Manager of Communications + Digital Engagement at iforster@rmg.on.ca

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery
72 Queen Street, Civic Centre, Oshawa, Ontario
905 576 3000 | rmg.on.ca

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