Photo: Byron Dauncey
The Unreal
March 6 to 28, 2009
Rebecca Brewer
Matthew Brown
Jason McLean
Guest curated by Emmy Lee & Stephanie Rebick
The Unreal brings together the work of Rebecca Brewer, Matthew Brown and Jason McLean who strategically use fantastical narratives to entice the viewer to untangle the imagery they present. The atmosphere of their work is ambiguous, reflecting both the seductive and sinister. The artists negotiate the relationship between subconscious and rational thought, dream and nightmare. Collectively the works convey a sense of escapism and inner worlds.
Matthew Brown is a Vancouver-based artist who had a significant presence in the Vancouver Art Gallery’s PAINT exhibition in 2006-2007 as well as a recent solo show at Clint Roenisch Gallery in Toronto. Brown’s choice of colour, his use of form and his manipulation of paint is unusual but recognizable throughout his practice; the strange but consistently identifiable elements of Brown’s paintings contribute to the inner reality he conveys.
Vancouver-based multi-disciplinary artist Rebecca Brewer participated in a residency at The Banff Centre in summer 2008 and has an upcoming solo exhibition at Galerie Werner Whitman in Montreal. With a painterly approach, Brewer combines imagery from the physical landscape with fantastical figures, creating a dream-like atmosphere. Soft, muted pastel paint combined with flashes of bold colour create tension in her ambiguous haunting visions that are at once romantic and dystopic.
Artist Jason McLean recently relocated from Vancouver to Toronto and has exhibited extensively in Canada and internationally. McLean’s drawing practice incorporates personal references including pop culture, his former neighbourhood Strathcona, his own dreams, friends and personal encounters. The immediacy of McLean’s drawings evoke the Surrealist tradition of automatism in which artists worked without self-censorship. Though the works may appear fantastical to the viewer, the act of drawing, combining seemingly random and unrelated references, is mechanism of self understanding for the artist.