Correlations are often made between our interest in landscape and the human psyche, the temporal aspects of nature being similar to the emotions of man. The act of representing landscape [...]]]> ORDER & CHAOS
George Boileau
Jim Reid
October 13 – November 13, 2011
opening reception: Thursday, October 13, from 7-10pm

Correlations are often made between our interest in landscape and the human psyche, the temporal aspects of nature being similar to the emotions of man. The act of representing landscape through art stems from the desire to tap into the elemental. Order & Chaos joins two distinct bodies of work by George Boileau and Jim Reid. These artists are testing the boundaries of landscape both literally and figuratively. Gregory Salzman wrote: “…landscapes are never apprehended all at once but via a compilation, aggregation and assimilation of multiple moments and details…The gaze does not meet with another gaze but is constantly deflected and distributed. This fact underlies landscape’s democratic ethos.” This idea of the act of viewing the landscape is at the crux of Order & Chaos. Through the use of composition, space and materials, these artists are playing with the way we physically view the landscape and in turn, the emotional response they engage.

Jim Reid has spent his career examining the Niagara Escarpment. Both the scene of his childhood and an amazing geological phenomenon in Southern Ontario; the Escarpment has proved to be an endless source of inspiration for Reid. In his previous series “Ferals” Reid painted feral apple trees. These compositions were framed more as portraits than landscapes, each one telling the story of trees gone back to nature. In Reid’s newest series featured in Order & Chaos, the artist has drawn back his gaze to the full forest. The results are paintings that look as though they are infinite. The artist uses the scale of his work to further engage the viewer. With paintings measuring more than ten feet wide, the viewer is engulfed in the work and consumed by the forest. Other works present an intimate viewing allowing a personal experience of the scene. Reid uses layering and patterning of trees to show complexity and ethereal qualities of the landscape. Reid’s process of painting en plein aire with acrylics mimics the physical qualities of the landscapes he represents. The act of his painting then adds to the effect of the constant growth and decay, the eternal cycle of the forest.

In contrast to Jim Reid’s lush and overflowing works are the minimalist sculptures of George Boileau. Boileau has always concerned himself with the double edge advantages and perils of progress. Coming from both an arts and engineering background, Boileau’s work is informed by relationships of form, structure and dynamics. In a past series “Fragments of Preservation” Boileau enclosed both real and simulated natural elements within rigid structures, to show our precarious relationship to nature with advancements in technology and development. In his new body of work Boileau is creating minimal surreal assemblage sculptures. Boileau is playing in iconographic visual elements in juxtaposition to one another. Each piece is presented on a ‘table top’ –a flat ground representing land the sculptural elements atop these surfaces tell ambiguous stories of the relationships or conflicts between nature, technology and man. The artist presents a neutral scenario and allows the viewer to imply the narrative.

Order & Chaos plays with the positioning of the viewer in two distinct views on the same theme. Intermixing these two solo exhibitions allows the viewer to compare and contrast the ever evolving definition of landscape as well as questioning ones own personal relationship with nature.

For information contact Stanzie Tooth at 416-487-8733; info@lonsdalegallery.com
410 Spadina Road, Toronto, Ontario, M5P 2W2,
Gallery Hours: Thursday – Sunday 11-5pm or by appointment.

Featured artists in this year’s booth were: George Boileau, Neil Dankoff, Osheen Harruthoonyan, Amanda McCavour, Julie Oakes, Jim Reid and Pedie Wolfond

The exhibition has been extended until May 9, 2010.

Click below to see more photos from the opening reception.

[...]]]> Sunday, March 1st marked the opening reception of An Imperfect Order, featuring Jim Reid and Peggy Taylor-Reid. Thank you to all those who came out to celebrate with us. The exhibition will run until Sunday, March 22.

Click below to see more photos from the opening reception.

Jim Reid and Peggy Taylor Reid often draw inspiration from the same rural Ontario landscape. Though they both draw inspiration from the same [...]]]> The order society attempts to impose onto nature often proves to be imperfect. What people often perceive to be imperfection (chaos) in nature may in fact be a complex type of order.

Jim Reid and Peggy Taylor Reid often draw inspiration from the same rural Ontario landscape. Though they both draw inspiration from the same setting, their work is completely unique in style and concept. This exhibition shows the different interpretations of “ferals” by each artist.

Jim Reid’s new work is an extension of his “Ferals” series, the subjects being feral orchards and primal forests. These paintings are done on-site in the landscape: large canvases are portaged to different locations throughout the year, and the paintings evolve through the extremes of the Canadian climate. Most paintings take many months to complete and through this process become densely layered and slowly transform as the landscape changes. The modernist ideal of “Truth to Materials” is extended so that the painting-process becomes a metaphor for the timeless natural cycles of growth and decay.

Peggy Taylor-Reid documents nature through photography. This work is a continuation of the artist’s ongoing exploration which contemplates objects as traces and shadows of our physical world. Taylor-Reid seeks to place the experience of looking into the realm of personal experience where the act of seeing is a path to new knowledge and understanding of the complexity in the natural world. The work is designed as a critique of our over confidence of the cultural power of science and commerce. The installation and photographic recording methods are pseudo scientific with the aim of directing the viewer to a more poetic understanding.

Taylor Reid’s “Feral Apples” are catalogued and photographed in a way that reflects the two most powerful forces in our culture: science and commerce, yet they steadfastly refuse to conform to either model. They are imperfect, un-uniform, remnants of heritage varieties most of which have been abandoned by commercial producers. The apples reveal the wondrous complexity, variability, and tenacity of the natural world and have the added dimension of culture interacting with nature.

Lonsdale Gallery is located in Forest Hill Village and was founded in 1995
as a gallery of contemporary painting, sculpture and photography.
For information contact Chad Wolfond or Stanzie Tooth at 416-487-8733; info@lonsdalegallery.com 410 Spadina Road, Toronto, Ontario, M5P 2W2, Wednesday

November 2 – 30, 2007
Jim Reid – Ferals Continued

Jim Reid’s paintings are multi-layered textural earth coloured pastiche that draw us back to questions of identity and place. We live in nature, with nature, protect nature and exploit nature simultaneously. Reid’s continuing series ‘Ferals’ explores these strange [...]]]> For Immediate Release

November 2 – 30, 2007
Jim Reid – Ferals Continued

Jim Reid’s paintings are multi-layered textural earth coloured pastiche that draw us back to questions of identity and place. We live in nature, with nature, protect nature and exploit nature simultaneously. Reid’s continuing series ‘Ferals’ explores these strange contradictions and attempts to understand the systems of controlling the world around us. Through a comprehensive study of apple trees, Reid suggests that this non-native species represents the resilience available in nature to overcome human will.

feral (adj.): having escaped from domestication and become wild

Reid has shown his work for over 25 years in numerous group and solo exhibitions throughout Canada. His style has developed to embrace the spirituality of the natural world and to examine the processes of organic growth, resilience and decay.

Intense landscape paintings exploring the inevitable wild growth of nature overcoming man’s organization.

A mile east, the oxen nose-blow steam clouds into the grave chill, puff, shake soaked yoke. He heaves a mattock at a stubborn stump. Through her still-young pout she sucks at damp hair. After hewing pine, she suggests [...]]]> NOVEMBER 10-28, 2004

Intense landscape paintings exploring the inevitable wild growth of nature overcoming man’s organization.

A mile east, the oxen nose-blow steam clouds into the grave chill, puff, shake soaked yoke. He heaves a mattock at a stubborn stump. Through her still-young pout she sucks at damp hair. After hewing pine, she suggests apples which he bites wide-mouthed, wincing with the sour. Oxen huff. Let it rot, she says plainly. He over-arms the core at underbrush.

-Jonathan Bennett