Great Plains Series: Points of Return – Spaces of Departure

Movement is positioned as a lens through which to understand the experiences of flora, fauna, and people who have traversed these lands.

The first iteration of the Great Plains Series, In the Middle of Everywhere (2022), pushed against the notion that the region is static or peripheral compared to the coasts and posited the Plains as a central hub — dynamic, layered, and deeply connected to broader histories and geographies.

In this second installment, movement is positioned as a lens through which to understand the experiences of flora, fauna, and people who have traversed these lands. Though often imagined as a place of stasis, the Plains have always been marked by activity: seasonal shifts, cycles of weather, cultural exchange, migration, and trade have shaped its terrain, atmosphere, and communities. At the same time, the exhibition challenges narratives that describe the region as a space to pass through, whether by expedition, migration, or the forced movement of goods and people. Those renditions overlook the region as a terminus, discounting the ways that life here on the Plains has been sustained, adapted, and renewed.

Includes work by Alana Bartol (Assistant Professor, Painting), Richard Gorenko (Sessional Instructor), Liz Ikiriko (BFA ‘03, Photography) and Richard Allan Thomas (Dip' 86, VCD). 

Curated by Michelle Jacques, Sally Frater, and Tarah Hogue.

Stanley Day, Acceleration, 1971. Acrylic on Canvas.