Just My Imagination

Show Statement taken from Exhibition Catalogue: 

Within the hierarchy of visual disciplines, drawing has appeared something of a 
misplaced object. Located between and beneath such traditional media 
specializations as architecture, painting and sculpture, it has been ambiguously 
positioned at both the foundation and margins of artists' practices in the West. 

Although prized for its intimacy and immediacy, drawing has nonetheless remained identified as a preparatory practice, one overshadowed by media seen as possessing greater visual resolve and cultural significance. At the outset of the 21st century however, this story appears to have changed.  

Just My Imagination presents recent work in the expanded field of contemporary drawing in Canada. It brings together 14 artists whose practice reflects a rigorous and sustained engagement with drawing's broad ranging resources. No longer placed at the edges of traditional media categories, this work assumes an understanding of drawing as an ambitious and self-sufficient practice - one that appears to thrive in an environment less bound to disciplinary divides. 

While most artists in Just My Imagination work on paper, few restrict themselves to working exclusively with drawing's traditional means. Some actively extend classical drawing approaches into other media (such as textiles, sculpture, digital media and performance) or provocatively cross disciplines to produce new visual compounds. Still others adopt drawing's traditional process-orientation to produce works that elude media definition altogether. 

The works in Just My Imagination envision a world where psychic, social and material processes are intimately entwined. While primarily figurative, this work typically refuses static or closed pictorial spaces. Rather, cumulative, serial or recombinative approaches are evident in much of the work. The resulting imagery is alternately familiar and estranged, direct and mediated, seductive and grotesque. Many of these works are simultaneously one and the other. At play here is an imaginary that is mobile and transformative - perpetually perched on the edge of becoming something else. In its wake, conventional narratives can be seen to wobble, split and proliferate. Frequently unsettling, these narratives displace and overlay one another in eventful and unanticipated ways.  

Whether using familiar materials and techniques or translating these into media customarily seen as other to its traditions, in Just My Imagination drawing provides an extensive root system - one capable of issuing and sustaining the most diverse varieties of contemporary artists' practices. 

Signed,
David Merritt and Kim Moodie 
Exhibition Curators 

Artists: Stephen Andrews, Sheila Butler, Lucie Chan, Cathy Daley, Raphaelle de Groot, Michelle Gay, Luanne Martineau, Jason McLean, Alison Norlen, Ed Pien, John Scott, Candice Tarnowski, David Tomas, Anna Torma

Just My Imagination is organized and circulated by MMB Collective and Museum London. Curated by David Merritt and Kim Moodie. The exhibition is supported by the Canada Council for the Arts.