A new exhibition by artist Cheryl Sourkes opens at the OR Gallery, 3rd Floor, 505 Hamilton Street, on Tuesday March 22nd at 8pm. The Environmental Unconscious marks the artist’s first exploration of three-dimensional work and this show will be comprised of both wall-mounted photographically-based art and two sculptural elements.
The work has increased in size, to 30″ X 40″. Unlike her last series, From The Book of Gates (Coburg Gallery, 1987), the pieces shown here are not Cibachrome, but Type C Prints; however, they continue to use colour. In addition, Sourkes has created two structures which each house prints. She has moved into the incorporation of sculpture in order to “break out has a practice of gradually adding, altering or deleting aspects of the work, this is a significant change.
The Environmental Unconscious also exhibits other prominent departures. Along with the increase in size, Sourkes has decreased the visual complexity of the images, without comprising the integrity of the overall work. While retaining such characteristic elements as regenerated images, text, marks and lines, she has provided a larger tableau in order to enhance the viewer’s relationship to the images. This is particularly appropriate to the content, as she has chosen to “evoke the externalization of self/internalization of exterior” (her words).
Sourkes is concerned with issues of existing ideologies, gender definition, representation, post modernism, surrealism, and science. Just as the images themselves are layered, so too is the work couched within many arenas of thought. (As guest-curator Jill Pollack notes,) “Cheryl Sourkes is firmly situated within an art movement that blurs categories. She responds directly to and reflects the complexity of the current state of the world by including multiple and diverse references in her work.”
The Environmental Unconscious runs until April 9th and is accompanies by a poster/catalogue. Gallery hours are: Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 1:30 to 5:30pm.
This exhibition has been financially assisted by the Canada Council and the City of Vancouver.
The Environmental Unconsciousness travelled to the Powerhouse Gallery in Montreal, Oct 29-Nov 20, 1988.
