Current Exhibitions 
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GALLERY LEVEL ONE
Ticketed Admission applies to Level One exhibitions.
AGH Members receive Free Admission to all exhibitions.
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Posing Beauty in African American Culture
On view January 16 to May 9, 2010
Curated by Deborah Willis and organized by Curatorial Assistance, Pasadena, California
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Anthony Barboza
Pat Evans ca. 1970s
Courtesy of the photographer
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Ushering in the AGH’s Vital Africa theme, Posing Beauty explores the contested ways in which African American beauty has been represented in the media in both historical and contemporary contexts. Throughout the Western history of art and image-making, beauty has been idealized and challenged, and the relationship between beauty and art has become increasingly complex within contemporary art and popular culture. This exhibition of photography challenges the relationship between beauty and art by examining the representation of beauty as a racialized act fraught with meanings and attitudes about class, gender, and aesthetics.
Posing Beauty examines contemporary understandings of beauty by framing the notion of aesthetics, race, class and gender within art, popular culture, and political contexts. This exhibition features works drawn from public and private collections and will be accompanied by a book published by W.W. Norton. Artists in the exhibition include Carrie Mae Weems, Hank Willis Thomas, Bruce Davidson, Lee Friedlander, Garry Winogrand, Eve Arnold and Edward Curtis.
Dr. Deborah Willis is a Professor and Chair of the Photography and Imaging Department at New York University. She was named among the 100 Most Important People in Photography by American Photography Magazine.
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Ritual Evidence: Tim Whiten
On view January 16 to May 9, 2010
Curated by Melissa Bennett
Tim Whiten’s artistic practice, developed over the past forty years, has consistently probed transcendental themes related to rituals and relics. Using authentic human skulls, his sculptural pieces cause an arresting encounter. Featured works from the AGH collection are Ram, Canticle for Adrienne, and Siege Perilous. Upon first encounter, the works may appear unsettling in their gravity, but in fact they invite the viewer to engage in personal reflection on one’s place in the physical world. To experience the essence of Whiten’s practice, the viewer can interact with Ram. To understand the work, the viewer must kneel at the height of a human skull perched on a cedar log. This act of kneeling is akin to the act of supplication. Peering through an aperture placed in the skull, one can see his or her own reflection in addition to a close-up view of the skull. This combined imagery suggests that above one’s self, there is a superior being. Canticle for Adrienne was made when Whiten’s daughter Adrienne was a child playing in his studio. The form of this work reflects the shape of her crib, and also plays on the idea that one must always work from what has been historically pre-determined. Siege Perilous is a wooden chair with skulls mounted on its arm rests. This work generally represents a seat of power and betrayal, and specifically references the person who betrayed Christ and the thirteenth seat at the Last Supper. This exhibition of Whiten’s work is commanding – both spiritually and visually.
Whiten is a highly prolific senior-career Canadian artist who has influenced generations of artists through his position as Professor of Fine Art at York University since 1968.
His works have appeared in solo and group exhibitions both nationally and internationally. He is represented by Olga Korper Gallery in Toronto.
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Arctic Passion: The Inuit Art Collection
of Christopher Bredt and Jamie Cameron
On view January 16 to May 9, 2010
Curated by Dr. Patrick Shaw Cable
This segment of the ongoing AGH Collectors Exhibitions Series features selected works from one of the best private collections of Inuit art that exists today in Canada — the collection of Christopher Bredt and Jamie Cameron in nearby Toronto. Assembled over many years, this notable collection includes comprehensive holdings from different areas like Baffin Island and Baker Lake, revealing a side to Inuit art that many of us do not usually recognize: the rich variety of Inuit visual expression — extending to materials and subjects, as well as intentions, meanings and moods. Bredt and Cameron, respectively a hardworking practitioner and professor of law, possess an intimate relationship with these objects they have collected together and live with daily — the couple’s collection expresses both their passionate appreciation of the forms of Inuit art, and their uncommon understanding of Inuit art’s development and cultural context. The AGH is proud to usher in 2010 with this public presentation of choice Inuit sculptures and prints, which comes on the heels of the 50th anniversary of the first appearance of catalogued Inuit prints in 1959 — at Cape Dorset, one of the major locales to be represented with singular breadth in the Bredt and Cameron collection.
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End of the American Road: Terence Byrnes
On view January 30 to May 24, 2010
Curated by Melissa Bennett
Premiering in Canada, Terence Byrnes’ photographic series Springfield, Ohio: The End of the American Road yields surprising views of small town America. Byrnes has been photographing the people and places of Springfield for over forty years. On his annual visits, he looks for things that might often be overlooked, and many of his images show people living in poverty. Byrnes has formed enduring friendships with the many locals who are unlikely to escape Springfield’s tight orbits of class and race.
Often compared to the work of Walker Evans, Byrnes’ images are moving in their depiction of the lives of the citizens of Springfield. The images are at times flecked with humour, or tenderness, or plain, if shocking, realities of American life. On display are black and white and colour photographs taken from 1966 up to the present, showing the evolution of people and place while Byrnes’ unassuming presence remains a constant.
Byrnes is a Montreal-based artist and author. His photographs have been exhibited in Canada and the USA.
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david merritt: sham
On view January 30 to May 24, 2010
Curated by Melissa Bennett
David Merritt’s works are playful, serious, humorous and conceptually weighted all at once. He examines the relationship between the way words are used, and the way they appear when written. Taking the words of popular songs, he charts them in intricately drawn diagrams, making connections between the many songs that use the same phrases, such as "last train". Interwoven lines, supplemented by many erasures, place an authoritative yet absurd order on the content of pop songs. Merritt’s signature sculptural works are also on display: delicate forms are made from unraveled lengths of sisal rope. Battling the tensions between heavy and light, some of the sisal sculptures also incorporate language, working with the themes of music, and the connections between words, meanings, and their visual presence in popular culture.
Merritt’s work has been exhibited in Canada and internationally, including at the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Textile Museum of Canada and TENT CBK, Rotterdam. He is based in London, Ontario and is represented by Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, Toronto. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication co-published with Museum London and the Art Gallery of Windsor.
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William Blair Bruce Memorial Donation
On permanent display
A salon-style hanging of the entire Bruce Memorial Donation of 1914 signals the beginning of the Art Gallery of Hamilton. Upon the premature death in 1906 of Hamilton-born William Blair Bruce, his widow, sculptor Caroline Benedicks-Bruce, his father William and his sister Bell Bruce-Walkden bequeathed twenty-nine of his paintings to the city, with the proviso that a properly equipped art gallery be established to house and present the collection. When the Gallery opened its doors for the first time in June of 1914, the Bruce Memorial Collection was the permanent collection. Presented here in its entirety, the Bruce Collection continues to be an appropriate touchstone. As an important nineteenth-century Hamiltonian who trained and worked abroad and exhibited both nationally and internationally, Bruce’s skill and activities reflect the scope and nature of Hamilton’s permanent collection: regional, national and international in scope, tracing the efforts and activities of artists who have exerted an impact on the visual arts past and present.
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GALLERY LEVEL TWO
Free admission courtesy of Orlick Industries.
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Liquid of Rain and Rivers
On view December 5, 2009 to April 11, 2010
Curated by Melissa Bennett
Water has been culturally mythologized for centuries. In this exhibition, Canadian artists Robert Burley, Paterson Ewen and Ron Martin have taken water as their subject matter, interpreted through diverse approaches. Ewen’s Red Sea is central to this exploration of the mythologies of water – while Ewen often animated landscapes through his paintings, his reference to a "red sea" adds an element of ambiguity. Is the artist commenting on the Red Sea theories, which include arguments based in religion, historical accounts and geology? Could this Red Sea represent environmental chaos or perhaps something more personal for the artist? Ewen created this work by gouging a large plywood surface, and applying paint and metal. It is a compelling example of Ewen’s practice, and a popular work from the AGH collection. Also on display is Ewen’s Rain in the Forest.
In stark contrast to Red Sea, Robert Burley’s photographs from the Great Lakes series are much calmer. The Great Lakes appear as immense bodies of water, visually comparable to seas. The surfaces of the water appear smooth due to Burley’s use of slow shutter speeds. Burley has lived in various places near the Great Lakes, and these lake views have become a constant in his life. As Burley writes, “this view of nothingness becomes as much about a state of mind as it is a manifestation of geography.”
Ron Martin worked with water in the early 1970s to extend its creative possibilities. As a painter would drip paint on a surface, he dripped water over paper to create wet areas. Instead of working additively to build up the surface, Martin altered the chemical composition of the surface itself by adding moisture to paper. Once dried, the results are minimalist abstractions.
Together, these works show innovations in media as well as diverse perceptions of the meanings and myths we associate with water.
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Simon Glass: The Thirteen Attributes of God
On view December 19, 2009 to April 11, 2010
Curated by Melissa Bennett
The Thirteen Attributes of God is a suite of thirteen gelatin silver photographs that were recently acquired by the AGH. The images are fragile in character, showing intimate views of lips, hands, and feathers in tandem with poignant imagery of dead birds. Glass overlays the images with biblical and liturgical Hebrew related to the holy names of God, found in the liturgy of the Jewish High Holidays. These attributes are traditionally invoked on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Like Hebrew text, the images are intended to be read from right to left. Glass presents an inviting glimpse into his own questions about language, faith, history and meaning. Glass’ work has been exhibited widely across Canada and Internationally. He is based in Toronto, and is represented by IndexG Gallery.
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The Shock of Seven: The Group and Their Contemporaries
On view April 10, 2009 to April 5, 2010
Curated by Tobi Bruce
Experienced today, it’s difficult to imagine just how shocking the Group of Seven was to an audience largely accustomed to seeing representational landscapes, portraits and still lifes in the 1910s and 1920s. The Shock of Seven seeks to take the viewer back in time and provide the opportunity of seeing works by Group members within the context of their more conventional painting colleagues. Vibrant and modern works by members of the Group are set against the more traditional fare of such artists as Fred Haines, G. Horne Russell, G. Wyly Grier, and Hamilton’s Arthur Heming. It’s only in seeing the works of the Group of Seven hung alongside art being produced at the same time that we immediately understand just how avant-garde the Group really was.
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Canadian Classics: Celebrated Works from the Collection
On view April 3, 2009 to April 11, 2010
Curated by Tobi Bruce
The paintings and sculptures included in this semi-permanent installation are among the most prized of the Canadian collection. They are, in part, the works through which this collection is recognized and distinguished. Many are icons of Canadian art, paintings that have come to occupy a central and pivotal place in the story of Canadian art. Why? Because on the one hand, they are images that are familiar to us, and that we have seen again and again, in catalogues and textbooks, on cards and posters, and most importantly in exhibitions. On the other hand, it is the quality of these works that distinguishes them; these paintings and sculptures have come to represent the very best of an artist’s body of work, or a significant moment in their artistic development. Often, as with William Blair Bruce’s Phantom Hunter, the work is synonymous with the artist him or herself — the first image that comes to mind upon hearing the maker’s name.
This select gathering represents many of the highlights of our landscape and portrait collection, but it is only a small sampling of the greater depth and breadth that is the AGH collection of Canadian art.
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Scultori Italiani
On view February 7, 2009 to February 14, 2010
Curated by Dr. Patrick Shaw Cable
This selection of a dozen bronze sculptures installed in the David Braley and Nancy Gordon Sculpture Atrium highlights the expressive artistry and technical skill of six nineteenth- and twentieth-century Italian sculptors represented in the Gallery’s European collection. Most of the works come from the AGH Joey and Toby Tanenbaum Collection: several pieces each by Augusto Rivalta, Paolo Troubetzkoy, and Alfredo Pino, as well as one delightful head of a Street Urchin by Medardo Rosso, often called the only “Impressionist sculptor” in the history of art, and whose dynamic works particularly influenced his younger compatriots the Italian Futurists in the early decades of the twentieth century. Scultore Italiani also features two bronzes from the mid-twentieth century that have been part of the Gallery’s European holdings for many years — Pietro Consagra’s abstract Coro Impetuoso, and Giacomo Manzù’s beautiful Bust of Inge, which melds a lyrically classical mood with expressively primitive modeling.
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Kim Adams' Bruegel-Bosch Bus
On permanent display
Repeatedly in his work, Canadian artist Kim Adams has explored the patterns of a mobile society, creating works of art that are eccentric hybrids of the readymade. Blending humour, satire and seriousness, he builds “worlds” as a means of social critique. Adams’ installations exist comfortably in the space that divides life and art. His works have been presented in two very different social worlds: in a densely social environment such as a park or street and in a museum setting like the Art Gallery of Hamilton. Neither setting is privileged.
A magnificent visual masterpiece, Bruegel-Bosch Bus consists of a 1960 Volkswagon that appears to pull a post-industrial universe displaying a cornucopia of fantastic and seductive worlds that play with our senses. It was produced over a 7-year span. This futuristic diorama is a permanent fixture in the AGH Sculpture Atrium overlooking the Irving Zucker Sculpture Garden, past Hamilton City Hall and the Niagara Escarpment. Reminiscent of a previous installation by Adams titled Earth Wagons that presented a micro-model North American society fixed on leisure and entertainment, the Breugel-Bosch Bus encapsulates the next whole world picture, a world in which reality and unreality, logic and fantasy, banality and sublimation of existence, form an inexplicable unity. This ‘bus’ is a Kubrickesque megalopolis made of icons symptomatic in present society and draws upon urban fantasies, phantasmagoric, post-apocalyptic landscapes, and a plethora of different times and cultures. Buildings from different epochs are aligned side by side and space becomes an imaginary territory where chaos prevails.
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The Jean and Ross Fischer Gallery
Free admission courtesy of Orlick Industries.
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Selections from AGH Art Rental & Sales
On view January 30 to March 7, 2010
A selection of new works to the AGH Art Rental & Sales Programme, including metal work, abstract, landscape and figural painting.
Featured artists include
Adam Colangelo,
Elizabeth Lennie,
Greg Benz,
Laura Culic,
among others.
Image credit:
Laura Culic
i dreem uv northern skies
40x48
Purchase price: $3900
Rental fee: $117/month
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*Please note that as a multipurpose space, the Jean and Ross Fischer Gallery is an area where photography is allowed by patrons and members of the public in accordance with the AGH Photography Policy. Click here for the Jean and Ross Fischer Gallery Information Package.
Also, the Jean and Ross Fischer Gallery is a space that can be rented for private or corporate functions and therefore may be unavailable for viewing by the public. We apologize for any inconvenience. If you are interested in viewing this space specifically, please call ahead to ensure the exhibition installed is available at 905-527-6610.
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AGH Entrance Foyer
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Pascal Grandmaison: New Acquisitions
Presently on view
The AGH strives to maintain the highest integrity for the collection through acquisition of pivotal works by contemporary artists, regional and national, that continue to exert a profound impact on Canada’s cultural landscape. It is with great pleasure that we present two recent acquisitions by Pascal Grandmaison: Verre 8 and Verre 9, both created in 2004.
For his Verre series, the Montreal-based Grandmaison asked individuals – mainly friends and acquaintances – to pose in his studio while holding a sheet of glass, like a dislodged window pane, in front of them. The models generally look down, away from the viewer. Their averted gazes and the barrier created by the glass create a sense of containment within the picture plane, and an exciting tension between the viewer and the image. The images from this series first brought international acclaim to Grandmaison, and are a foundation for the artist’s ongoing investigations of the barrier between frame and subject.
Grandmaison has consistently demonstrated a rigorous approach to his art-making, a commitment to innovation in photographic and film media, and an unyielding sense of direction as he expands his practice. The AGH is delighted to have the opportunity to collect three key works from two distinct periods of his production: Verre 8 and Verre 9, on view on the main entrance wall, as well as Increasingly Empty Forms: 1928-1999, 2008. All three works were on view in a recent exhibition at the AGH, Pascal Grandmaison: Double Take (September 27, 2008 to January 5, 2009). A full colour catalogue with curatorial essays, created in collaboration with the Carleton University Art Gallery, is now available.
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