PAST EXHIBITS

Kootenay News: Read all about it

Kootenay News presents the story of Nelson’s print media, from a weekly hand-cranked paper to a bustling daily with a circulation larger than the city it served, to today’s online publications. It looks at pre-eminent figures in Nelson’s newspaper history, including John Houston, Bert Currie, Francis Payne, Art Gibbon, Doris Bradshaw, and Nelson Becker, along with notable journalists who got their start here or passed through town en route to prominence elsewhere. Featuring original pages from each decade, along with photographs and ephemera, it will look at the changing role of newspapers in the community and changes in the industry itself — both technologically and journalistically.

Gu Xiong: The Unknown Remains

Gu Xiong’s practice centers on the creation of a hybrid identity arising from the integration of different cultural origins and migrations. The Unknown Remains explores patterns of global human migration and capitalism through a local Kootenay lens.

Medium of Exchange

Memory is vital to our understanding of our lives, yet flawed, misremembered and coloured with individual experience. Forgotten and confused details are what create the absence of content in Brenda Draney’s artistic style. Art is an offering and Brenda Draney uses the canvas as a Medium of Exchange between the viewer and what is on view; fragments of memories which commemorate people and places and incidents which resonate with powerful aplomb for all the indistinct edges. 

Beyond Recognition: Aboriginal Abstraction

Beyond Recognition: Aboriginal Abstractions adds another chapter to the story of Indigenous art in the Pacific Northwest and across the country. The art showcased was created by 11 artists past and present; from across the country and spanning decades. Bob Boyer, Benjamin Chee Chee, Robert Houle, Alex Janvier, Katia KaK’wa Kurtness, Ann McLean, Kimowan Metchewais, Susan Point, Rick Rivet, Helen Wassegijig and Linus Woods are renowned, celebrated artists using the canvas to open dialogue and contribute to the evolving idea of Aboriginal Art in North America.

The Tablets

With an international reputation for large scale sculpture spanning more than four decades, The Tablets represents the Saskatoon-based sculptors’ first full-fledged gallery installation. The Tablets presents a collection of metal assemblages of richly textured bronze and brass panels constructed from an array of salvaged materials, an homage to memory and monumentality, language and culture.  

Kiltie Band: 100 Year Anniversary

402 Anderson Street: A History 

402 Anderson Street: A History served as a celebratory, commemorative show dedicated to the old museum site on the corner of Anderson Street. This exhibition marked the legacy of those who have contributed to the arts, culture and heritage in Nelson, BC, notably those directly involved in the establishment of the museum society’s previous location. 402 Anderson Street elaborates upon storied beginnings such as the building’s construction, the Mildred Erb Gallery and the infamous fire of 2003. This exhibition further identified and synthesized the museum society’s history, and a continued effort in ‘looking forward to the past’.

Lost Thread

Lost Thread is a group exhibition bringing together several regional, provincial and National artists who are creating on the forefront of contemporary textiles in Canada and are practicing in respective spaces that push the boundaries between craft/art, and the historical/contemporary in relevant and intriguing ways. The exhibition was the first of an ongoing series of medium-centric group exhibitions. Followed by THROWN and SHUTTER, these types of exhibitions enable us to see the expansive possibilities within a given medium and create opportunity for dialogue amongst a diverse range of artists.

WORD

WORD is a group exhibition that investigates text as the subject matter and also the vehicle for meaning and method. This exhibition explores, refutes and blows open the threads of commonality through the work of artists: Graham Gilmore, K.C. Hall, Nicole Dextras, Joi Arcand, Don Mabie, and Shane Koyczan. The intent is to illustrate how art allows for inexhaustible iterations of expression via myriad disciplines, aesthetics and artistic interpretations.

A Mountain Biking Retrospective

The History of Mountain Biking is an exploration of the culture, characters, infrastructure and landscape of mountain bike culture in the Kootenays. This exhibit is truly a community-curated exhibition, and is the result of a wide range of outdoor enthusiasts sharing their stories about the legacy and impact of mountain biking in the Kootenay/Columbia Basin. From the mossy overgrown bridges and tracks in the forest to the high tech gear and industry sponsored events.