MEMBERS
EXHIBITION
2021
ONLINE X WINDOW EXHIBITION
Feminisms evolve constantly. Each evolution incites us to reinvent ourselves. While the incentive for these evolutions may be difficult to confront, their result is adaptation, innovation, and, eventually, a complete metamorphosis. The Members Committee invited La Centrale’s membership to explore their inner revolutions and observe the perpetual movements of the world around them. flux constant flux comprises their responses to this invitation.
Each of the selected artists explore the theme in a particular way, revealing the complex ways in which evolutions take place. From ageism to isolation, and from grief to resistance, despite the diversity of their responses, the artists are unified in their use of artistic creation as a stabilizing and regenerative force.
As an artist-run centre, La Centrale is driven by the commitment and energy of our members. The Members Exhibition, organized by the Members Committee, celebrates our membership and highlights the crucial role that La Centrale’s members have in supporting our mission and defining our next evolutions.
flux constant flux features works by ten of La Centrale’s members: Laurence Beaudoin Morin, Kristin Bjornerud, Sophia Borowska, Cécilia Bracmort, Stéphanie Chabot, Frances Enyedy, Maryam Izadifard, Fany Rodrigue, Tammy Salzl, and Elyse St-Amour.
ELYSE ST-AMOUR
TRIPTYQUE
This triptych of photographic collage transports us into an intimate universe where the passage of time transforms the female body and the way others look at it. Through self-portraits, collages and photographs of significant objects, Elyse St-Amour positions herself in a fight against female ageism. “Ageism confronts the impossibility of matching what is experienced with the image that Others have of us. There is then a fundamental contradiction between the intimate evidence which guarantees our permanence and the objective certainty of our metamorphosis." KIMURA BYOL
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FRANCES ENYEDY
PROVERBIAL POWER
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Frances’ illustrations are emotive, visceral, and at times grotesque. Queering traditional norms of femininity, she is unafraid to take up space with her work. Proverbial Power showcases an emotional transformation first and foremost, capturing a literal moment of charged battle cry from a femme person on a hilltop, surrounded by familiars and flowers. The work is a gut reaction and figurative take on connections between social crises and ecological collapse, and the individual and collective belief systems enabling them. SARAH MOHAMMED
Hi Hongyu! Nice to meet you. Thanks for the interest in my work and the questions. I think I will answer the one about anger.
The work is definitely channeling a recognizable expression of anger in an embodied form. I'm a cartoonist at heart and am attracted to drawing anger and other emotions through the comic medium. I feel it approaches the misogynistic taboos around anger and womxn in a sort of funny way, and relieves some of the discomfort around this emotion specifically, that I sometimes feel in myself and also see present in the larger culture. Anger, as a potent transformative emotion, connects to the theme of metamorphosis. You are witness to this person's wild, erotic, somewhat erratic moment of transformation, held in ritual space by the ever grounded, ever honest presence of animals, flowers and soil. It is also maybe an angry reclamation of lost (but not forgotten) initiation rites that our modern, industrial, colonial culture distanced itself from long ago in a forward facing "march toward progress" - a process that has generally ignored and demeaned nature's cycles, animals and womxn.
STÉPHANIE CHABOT
MON MEILLEUR
Mon meilleur is a playful work made of found objects. While the sculpture’s body, a wooden crutch, suggests an inherent vulnerability, this assumption is challenged by two protruding hands giving a thumbs up. Clad in bright red gloves (reminiscent of a clown’s nose) these comical fixtures distract from the symbol of weakness and pain to which they are attached. Perpetually positioned to insist that “everything is alright,” it is clear that regardless of the question, Mon meilleur will always respond with the same answer. Rather than burden it with a sympathetic or pitiful gaze, Mon meilleur invites us to join the joke and laugh along with it. MATTIA ZYLAK
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LAURENCE BEAUDOIN MORIN
PLANK PIECE
Based on unique social experiences, experimentation, and knowledge sharing within a specific space-time, Laurence Beaudoin Morin realizes, through performative action and participation, a reflection on the practice of gathering by emphasizing the creation of new solidarities. For this project, influenced by the current situation of confinement, the artist works within this change that was forced upon daily life to explore themes of care in a community and the reorganization and creation of new connections through social networks. CRISTEL SILVA
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CÉCILIA BRACMORT REMINISCENCES SERIES
Through this collection of photographs of Caribbean monuments, Cécilia Bracmort combines historical memory and imagination by presenting ghostly silhouettes, as the performative traces in an invisible history. The artist highlights the monuments and historical territories of Caribbean culture as the only archives of an ever-present heritage. "... Reminiscences reflects my inner quest to connect with these silenced stories, to create an alternative narrative that highlights the questions Afro-descendants have about their identities and their fragmented histories." SARAH MOHAMMED
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MARYAM IZADIFARD
PRISON-DENTÈLLE (I, II, III), INTIME DÉVOILEMENT, L’OMBRE DU VENT
Maryam Izadrifrad's interdisciplinary work incorporates mixed mediums such as print arts, drawing, photography, video, and projection. Her approach addresses questions of identity about the changes of scenery, migratory movements, the exploration of space, and the condition of women. Time is also an important notion in the artist’s journey, its passage transforming both the private and public sphere to bring about imperceptible metamorphoses in the body and in the city. CRISTEL SILVA
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TAMMY SALZL
WAITING, DAPHNE SET FREE, DANGER, BONES FOR EGON
Her unforgiving look and pencil stroke make Tammy Salzl a staple in the representation of diverse bodies. A revisiting of Egon Schiele, staging classic poses for a modernity of the invisibles. Through her collection of watercolor portraits, Salzl is especially interested in gendered and embodied identities and their relationship to individual and collective desires and fears. Her work, recognized in Canada and internationally, is driven by these questions: What truths do we ascribe to the bodies we look upon? What scars do the gazes we bare leave? What stories exist within the depths of our eyes, the lines on our skin, and the simplest of human gestures? KIMURA BYOL
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FANY RODRIGUE
U-TAURUS OU CHARGE MENTALE, DELIVERY
Fany Rodrigue stands out for her ingenuity and the strength of the subject conveyed by her works. Focusing on interactive works that appeal to all the senses of the spectators, she addresses the links between hormonal cycles, biology, gender identity, and anger in U-Taurus ou Charge mentale, a feminist reinterpretation of the sculpture Bull’s Head by Picasso.
DELIVERY testifies to Fany’s particular interest in human skin, which she defines as "the border that exists between the sphere of intimacy and social representation". The sculpture is an imprint of her mother's skin. Fany’s mother was always uncomfortable in her skin and cultivated control over her body through anorexia and the use of plastic surgery. The title, Delivery, is not meant to symbolize childbirth but rather deliverance. In a way, Fany frees her mother from the prison which is her body. Her skin, withered and wrinkled on the ground, is a testament to her passage. CAMILLE PAQUIN
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U-Taurus: A reinterpretation and transformation of a traditionally masculin object is very interesting, how did you come up with this idea?
The original idea came from a screenprinting project. Graphically, I wanted to juxtapose the image of a bull with that of a uterus. I wanted to subvert this symbol of virility and turn it into a symbol of strength associated with women, women’s reproductive power, women’s power, full stop. Graphically, this figure is very strong and works well as a vehicle of empowerment. It was during the height of the #METOO movement and women were challenging men in positions of power.
It seemed important to take this work a step further by reinterpreting Picasso’s Bull’s Head (1942). My goal was to make a work that was menacing, imbued with meaning, and to dethrone the Master, who had rather obviously but cleverly assembled a saddle and a bicycle’s handlebar to illustrate a bull, from his status as a Genius. Basically, I wanted to compete with him. So, I gathered an iron (a household item that can be extremely dangerous) and other uncomfortable items excluded from the male experience (including stirrups for gynecological examinations, abortions, and sometimes deliveries).
The first version of U-Taurus was a plugged in iron that heated up and emitted steam when viewer pulled on a handle. It was a little too dangerous in an exhibition setting. The douche is an important addition to the project. On its own, the douche conveys myths and false beliefs about feminine hygiene and it embodies the weight of contraception imposed on women and also, it allows the fluid circulation without the danger of burns. By pressing on the siphon, you risk having dishwater spat in your face by the beast. I feel like I won my bet.
SOPHIA BOROWSKA ANNEAUX
Anneaux is a site specific sculpture made of objects and second-hand textiles cast in cement. Over the course of two days, Sophia worked in La Centrale’s empty gallery paying close attention to the details that otherwise go unnoticed when the space is occupied by art objects or people. The installation convenes around the blemishes and cracks that have become part of the gallery over time. Part of a body of work that began in the aftermath of the death of a close childhood friend, Sophia slowly and methodically developed the forms in response to these structural flaws, a process reminiscent of the ways in which experiencing loss forces us to confront the scars that we hope to keep hidden. MATTIA ZYLAK
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KRISTIN BJORNERUD
SISU, AN OATH
Inspired by mythology and folk tales, Kristin Bjornerud transports us to a timeless universe, similar to dreams. Her artist residency in Haukijärvi, Finland in the winter of 2017 inspired her to create this collection, set in a devastated icy birch forest at dawn. She presents mythical women who, through traditional craftswomanship, transform, repair, and poetically mend their environment. JESSICA CÔTÉ
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There seems to be a link between your work and the theme of ecofeminism, is it the case?
Yes, I think that’s true. Empathy towards the non-human is at the heart of my political stance and part of the concept framework that guides my work. I think that empathy is what grounds a philosophy of non-domination and is a core principle of ecofeminism in all its manifestations. With my watercolours I aim to create open-ended poetic narratives that reflect on our complicated relationships to each other and the natural world. Intertwining metaphor with realism, my work concentrates on the female figure as a way of exploring concepts of identity, memory, and landscape. In a very basic sense my paintings are a way of contending with the very real unease I have with my ability to affect actual change in a world fraught with a myriad of interconnected crisis and rapid, catastrophic climate disruption, an attempt at grappling with the grief that comes with an honest acceptance of this very uncertain future we all share.
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