August 4 - September 24, 2023

Patricia Eschuk: Beyond the Rain

Beyond the Rain is comprised of several bodies of work that have been inspired by natural environments around Manitoba with which I have a deep reverence and love. The works reflect a scant sample of the boundless spirit of nature I have experienced in my excursions, yet it is my hope that they fill the viewer with the same sort of wonder and delight that I experience when I am outside immersed by the wilderness.

As a visual artist working mainly with paint and drawing mediums I seek to communicate through nonverbal language by creating physical objects transcribed with colour, expressive mark, texture, shape, and composition elements. These visual elements provide me with a broad method to communicate aspects of my own physicality, state of being, and experience of the world that I cannot convey in any other way. Manually manipulating these mediums allows for a direct, physical expression of my creative energy. Working in this way is a natural extension for me, after a career as a manual physical therapist.

Much of my work is inspired by nature, with which I have had a life long appreciation and reverence. I paint and draw to express not only what I see, but how I think, and am moved by what I am seeing and sensing. Thus my process is a mixture of both direct, intense observation of something I am looking at and intuition. I respond to the image that is emerging and like to work in layers. I allow myself to explore within the work as it shifts between construction and deconstruction with each new layer.

The finished product often transcends representational form or enters into a dialogue with it. I wish to invite the viewer to follow their own interpretations and perceptions. Thematically, at its roots, the work explores relationships. I believe nature, and visual art, can act as a mirrors through which we can enter into broader, healthier awareness of relationships with ourselves, others and the world in which we live.

Paulo Delgado: Memories

Visual artist Paulo Delgado’s captures memories and moments in his life, his art and the way he perceives the world. Paulo is intent in his pursuit of simplicity in our complicated contemporary lives of today. In his magical art, he uses technique and colour to express the concept of clarity in life. Through it, he mentally “travels” to different places and realities. With his work, he reveals his inner imagination, leaving space for viewers to experience his ideas and transport themselves to their own realities.

The strong colors in Paulo’s painting are lures that seduce the eye, like the beauty of verses in poetry. His paintings are intended to express the invisible through the visible and draw attention to ordinary things. We often pass by the beauty of the skies of Manitoba without really paying attention to the “dance” of blues, yellows, oranges and sometimes violets that complete the landscape, or when we travel in summer through the “sea” of yellows of the canola fields sprinkled sporadically by the green of a tree or the red of a barn.

His aim with this exhibition is to show the beauty of the simple things we experience throughout life without ever seeing them. “What is most real to me are the illusions I create with my painting."

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My colourful geometric style of painting is highly identifiable, unique, and distinctive. My paintings reflect my skills and knowledge acquired over 20 years in the profession of Graphic Design. I utilize my extensive experience in this area of expertise to create beautiful and unforgettable art. I have worked diligently over the years to perfect my technique in the medium of acrylic. I like the simplification of form and shapes created in a poster-like feeling. The face is the mirror of the soul and with it, we can understand the state of mind. The simplification of the face is done on purpose. It is incredibly challenging to use shapes and colour to transmit.

Some of my favourite themes include landscapes, and the Portuguese ethnography. The ethnography (traditions, customs, and behaviour of peoples) in areas of Portugal and Mozambique continue to captivate and humble me. I also enjoy exploring the colours of the Manitoba prairies. The light of the skies fascinates me and inspires me, especially sunsets. I incorporate geometric shapes in the background's contrasts with the main figures in the foreground as if it were a set of a play. The use of strong colours and different nuances is a constant in my work.

Rosalie Olson: Sky, No Limits

Rosalie Olson is a contemporary Canadian artist recognized for her expressive marks, harmonious colors, and sense of light. Inspired by immersing herself in the beauty of nature, camera in hand, her paintings evolve through an experimental process of transparent layers and harmonious colour combinations.  She intentionally invites a different emotional response viewing her work up close than from afar. Rosalie is passionately drawn to create art that reflects her awe of the beauty of nature. Living and working in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Rosalie has achieved Associate Signature member of the Federation of Canadian Artists (AFCA). Her work is finding its way into personal and corporate collections across Canada and the U.S.

Growing up and living on the prairies has given me a sense of intrigue about the sky. I am a firm believer an artist’s best work comes from painting what we know and love so this series, “Sky, No Limits,” is a natural outpouring of this fascination. I am drawn to the ever-changing expressions of light, colour and shadows. I love how gazing into the heavens makes me feel, contemplating its vastness. I am interested in capturing momentary beauty across my collections but in this series, I wanted to push the idea of change, being open to shift my process and technique to align with the tremendous variation of sky, not just in the moment but throughout the day and seasons. The sky truly offers no limits to my artistic inspiration. I find myself struck by a fleeting moment and begin with a simple question – “how can I paint that?”  I am drawn to the beautiful tensions that can be displayed between what look like hard edges and dissipating clouds, between intense colour changes as different weather systems meet and the array of reflected light patterns on the ground. The painting, “Soon it will be winter,” represents a special painting within this series and tribute to someone who knew the prairie sky and could offer deep insight to life change. The title is the tender words expressed in one of my final conversations with my father-in-law. The harvest had just finished, he seemed to be hanging on until he knew this work was done and then closed his eyes after a remarkable 100 years of life on the prairies.  It is my hope that my art invites thoughtful conversation and interest in my hand at work and how I intuitively gravitate to increasing abstraction. May these paintings evoke a fresh new wonder in gazing at the sky and heightened sensitivity to the beauty within change.

Callen Froese: The God Concept

Working with a diversity of materials, from clay, to yarn, to paper, to natural inks, Callen (she/they) aims to create artwork that is thought provoking and expressive of the current climate. She is committed to the wellbeing of other life forms and the integrity of the planet.

This exhibition aims to explore my own perception of God, particularly exploring Judeo-Christian ideas of divinity. I want to make space for female strength, gender fluidity, equality of all beings and the questioning of the written word. Through this body of works I have played with my own ideas of spirituality and wrestled with the negative impacts of organized religion.

It is time to acknowledge Mother Earth, and those who have been suppressed. Time to thank the creatures, plants, and fungi that we co-exist with. God is much larger than a collection of words written by men. That God is just one concept.

In the God Concept exhibition, the framed illustrations vary from tonal pencil drawings to collage and ink artworks. Within the collages there are a variety of papers, from milkweed paper from Ontario, washi from my mentor in Japan and cotton paper from India. I dyed some of the papers with natural pigments (black rice, avocado pits, onion skins, etc) as well as used the Japanese technique momigami to make strong “crumpled” paper which greatly resembles fabric.

Kerry Enns: Photography

I grew up on a farm near Springstein, Manitoba. I studied Theology, History, and English in university and have B. Th., B. Ed., and M. Ed. Degrees.

I’ve been fascinated with photography since January 1981 when I read a copy of Popular Photography Magazine. My family was on the way to visit a friend in the hospital and my dad bought me the magazine to keep me occupied while they visited. The photography featured in the magazine “flipped a switch” in my head and started my life-long quest to create the kind of beautiful, thought- provoking images that I saw. I spent the spring, summer, and autumn of 1981 in a tractor seat because my dad agreed to pay me $3/hour. I calculated I should have enough for a Nikon FE and a couple of lenses by winter, which I did.

In Grade 12 I was the school yearbook photographer, and I threw myself into the task with vengeance. It was a great education in working with people and in the art and science of photography. During my university years, I worked at Don’s Photo in Winnipeg. It was a great job working with great people and allowed me to meet some amazing Manitoba photographers. With some breaks for parenthood, photography has been a life-long passion for me.

Canadian photographer Freeman Patterson described photography as “the art of seeing.” When I find myself responding to a scene, I try to “see” what has triggered my feelings and imagination in order to reduce that element into the lines, shapes, textures, and colours that make a great photograph. At times, that means telling story by showing a subject in its context. Photographs like CPR Sunset, Wind Wheat, and Hydro Poles at Sunset, however, are examples of how I sometimes isolate my subjects to the threshold of abstraction. This collection of photographs represents scenes from my world – the Canadian Prairies. I hope that viewers resonate with how I’ve presented our shared environment and, hopefully, appreciate the designs of the prairies in a new way.

June 1 - July 29, 2023

Keeping Time: The Art & Heritage of Mennonite Clocks

Kroeger Clocks Heritage Foundation & Mennonite Heritage Vilalge

The Kroeger Clocks Heritage Foundation, in partnership with the Mennonite Heritage Village, presents a NEW exhibition! Featuring over 20 Mennonite Clocks, this exhibit brings to life the stories of these treasured artefacts.

For centuries, Mennonite clockmakers focused their talents and energies towards creating iconic clocks that brought beauty and structure into homes and communities. Today these timepieces carry emotional meaning. They survive as cultural representations and witnesses to the social and political upheaval experienced by their makers and owners. These clocks and their stories now span the world as treasured historical artifacts.

Learn about clockmakers honing their craft, follow clocks moving across continents and oceans with waves of Mennonite migration, and admire the beauty of these clocks up close.

Barb Bottle

Barb Bottle is a queer inter-disciplinary artist, working in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Bottle received her BFA from the University of Manitoba, and completed the MAWA Foundation Mentorship program with mentor Sarah Crawley in 2020. Working in photography, video, sound, textiles, installation, and performance, Bottle explores themes of adoption trauma, memory, grief, and aging. Many of her paintings are currently held in private and corporate collections across Canada, the United States, and Europe.

As a photography-based, mixed-media artist, Bottle explores themes of grief, loss, and adoption trauma, initially inspired by her mother's stroke and subsequent death. Her initial body of work, ‘The Grief Project,' was largely influenced by her career as a dancer and choreographer; this connection created the need to include moving images into her work. In 2021, with support from the Manitoba Arts Council, she participated in a self-directed residency at Gull Lake, Manitoba, the location of her childhood cottage. While there, Bottle began to experiment with video and sound to compliment her still works on paper, wood, and canvas. Working at Gull Lake unearthed deeply emotional memories of childhood, and inspired ‘Untethered, a new body of work focusing on her personal experiences as an adoptee, questions around adoption loss, place, belonging, identity, and lack of identity.

Jozanna Loewen

Jozanna Loewen is the artist behind ‘Honey Bloom And’ creations.

She stumbled into pottery during the Covid-19 pandemic and fell in love with the craft. She started making small cups and mugs. Eventually she found joy and challenge in creating chainmail, vases, and more unique pieces. All of her vases are hand-built; the chains and chainmail are hand sculpted; the weaving is done by hand. While creating, Loewen works with the clay to bring out the organic curves and bends of each piece. While chains and chainmail usually have a restricting nature, creating with clay facilitates an interactive sense of mobility in the pieces. The surface expressions, colors, and textures come together to create a valiantly organic and uniquely spirited form. This collection is entitled ‘Reclaimed,' and is made from reclaimed clay in her home studio. Through a long process the potter is able to rebuild bone-dry clay into workable, pliable clay. She loves the thought of making old things into new and beautiful pieces, and giving broken, unused pieces new life as unique art forms. Each piece is inspired by the natural and ancient elements of the earth.

Candace Propp

This exhibit is about impermanency and its related outcomes. The inspiration arose from a series of trips within the grain belt of North America, particularly Manitoba. Propp became aware of the deterioration in and around many of the small towns and farming communities. Houses that were once grand were decaying and visibly returning to the earth; “for sale” signs dotted the main street buildings; railway lines were fenced off as trucks roared down the main streets. However, even as the economic viability of these communities dwindled, an interesting juxtaposition of rebirth was evident. Antique stores and flea markets were taking over abandoned businesses, and fairs and exhibitions were attempting to lure in new populations. A sense of impermanency and transition pervaded. Everything in our contemporary life is in constant fluctuation — nothing is as it was a second ago. And yet we hold onto possessions, personal image, relationships, values, beliefs, and habits as if they were meant to remain the same forever. On the other hand, we live in a throw- away world where nothing is made to last and we consume objects and resources as if without consequence.

The images within the paintings of Ghost Towns range from poignant, direct statements of our destructive nature, to sentimental scenes reflecting our past, to humorous even sarcastic interpretations of life as is or might be. As a mixed media artist, Propp likes to shift her processes of image-making to best achieve a specific goal. In this body of work she has chosen a combination of acrylic painting with image transfer. She begins each scene with layering the image transfers onto the canvas. She then pulls the images together through painting. More transfers and paint are applied until she achieves her desired effect. Because the images for transfer come from various sources, a discord is produced. Perspectives, proportions, colours and light are all slightly off from each other producing an uneasy, ungrounded and surreal quality — you might even say, ghostly.