New Brunswick’s oldest private art gallery steps up to support NBCCD graduating students after flood waters cancel end of year exhibition.
Matt Carter
2018, Archival Inkjet Print 20 x 30 in. unframed $260 framed $340.
Some complications are a blessing in disguise. After the recent flooding resulted in the cancelation of a planned exhibition by graduating students of the New Brunswick College of Craft and Design’s Advanced Studio Practice Program, Gallery 78 stepped in to lend a hand.
The exhibition, Momentum, originally planned to take place at NBCCD’s George Fry Gallery, now joins Gallery 78’s mid-June exhibition following another flood related incident.
“As it turned out, Nikki [Thériault] and I were at the Lt. Governor’s house judging the NBCCD’s Sterling exhibition and we were chatting with Brigitte Clavette (coordinating instructor with NBCCD’s Jewelry/Metal Arts program) about the terrible flood and all the aftermath,” said Gallery 78’s Germaine Pataki-Thériault. “She told us about how the Gallery at the NBCCD was still being filled with items from the basement and there was no place to house the Advanced Studio Practice Program exhibition.”
large pendant 4.5mm x 19mm Sterling silver, pastels, acrylics, jewellers resin. Crafted by Rory Greythorn.
Around the same time further down river in Queenstown, New Brunswick potters Lee and Yolande Clark were unable to access their kiln due to road closures. As a result, they were unable to finish work planned for display at Gallery 78 this month.
“That’s when we realized that both of these exhibitions had been planned to open on the same day, so voila!,” said Pataki-Thériault. “Later that afternoon Craig Schneider from the school came for a visit to discuss in more detail. We have had the students here to examine the space. Now the students are all busy finishing their work, getting images and information to us so that we can showcase them on the website.”
Momentum features work by six silversmiths, a fashion designer, a photographer, painter and ceramic artist. In addition to having their work displayed at one of the province’s most recognized private art galleries, the exhibition will open on their graduation day and continue until July 8.
Work by Fredericton raised artist Eric Budovitch will also open on June 15. His exhibition Caryatids reimages ancient Greek statues of the female form as everyday women “incorporated into a tall stack of items and boxes, supporting themselves, others and the world around them”.
2018, oil on canvas, 36 x 38 in. unframed $3,200
“The show demonstrates an organic development of imagery as my work has evolved,” said Budovitch in his artist statement. “Originally focused on an individual’s association to their belongings as they are dragged out into the light during a surreal moving day where characters and memories emerge and are in turn hidden by the ‘stuff’ that makes up our lives, a large work emerged that re-articulated my view of the scene. When a single girl was incorporated into a tall stack of items and boxes, she assumed a position in my mind not unlike that of the ancient stone sculptures known as caryatids that decorate a number of Greek archaeological sites, most famously the Acropolis in Athens.
“This Mediterranean motif, of women supporting great weights, temple roofs and by relation, all that stood under them, were symbols I recognized as woman’s involvement and importance in that ancient society,” he said. “At the same time I recognized the fertile symbolism they offered and sought to reimagine them in our society.”
Momentum and Caryatids will both be on display until July 8.
