Lauren Bell

body and mind

March 14 - March 18, 2022

Gordon Snelgrove Gallery

Despite its complexity, pain can be understood as a shared experience in ways both physical and emotional. Experienced chronically, it can become debilitating and exhausting, infecting both the body and the mind.

In my exhibition, body and mind, I hope to express feelings of loneliness, confinement, and fear as these are not only emotions that accompany pain, but they are also afflictions of their own. I have often found that there are not enough words or mediums to express pain, drawing me to a diverse range of materials to communicate this feeling. My outlook and perspective on humanity – thinking particularly about the depth of the connection of the body and the mind, has significantly influenced the way I create my artworks. Being trapped and torn apart in the mind due to suffering of the body makes their powerful connection hard to deny. Pain that can not be seen is still felt, for example migraines… Is it all in the head? 

Despite their thorns, roses have long been symbolic of beauty and even fragility. I draw on this parallel in many of my artworks, such as using glittery art deco façades or calm flowing lines like a mask to hide the underlying sense of being torn apart.

About the Artist

Lauren Bell is amid completing her final year towards her Bachelor of Fine Arts Honours degree at the University of Saskatchewan. Besides her passion for contemporary, acrylic figure painting, she experiments with a large range of materials to create expressive, abstract sculptural works in order to construct a complementary dialogue between the third and second dimension. Exploring themes of discomfort and loneliness, Lauren uses herself as the subject of many of her paintings to introspectively express the exact emotion intended in each individual work. Her passion for gaining the skill to communicate emotion visually has always been at the forefront of her drive through artistic pursuits. She intends to push her artistic capabilities as far as it will take her, adapting her primary media of choice as necessary to excel in meeting her goals of expression.

McCall Kindt

Iyashikei

March 14 - March 18, 2022

Gordon Snelgrove Gallery

Iyashikei Iyashikei (癒し系) is the Japanese word for ‘healing’, a term used to describe anime and manga created with the specific purpose of having a healing or soothing effect on the audience. Works of this kind often involve alternative realities with little to no conflict emphasising nature, the mundane and the little delights in life.(1) I am interested in exploring the ‘iyashikie’ experience whether it be through art, lived experiences with others, or through a connection with a cherished object.

An art exhibition might offer the viewer an escape from real life, transporting them to another place, challenge them to contemplate new ideas, thoughts or to reminisce about their own memories. Art making can also be a tangible way to express one’s thoughts and emotions for others to relate to. Good memories can be a transformative because they can define what we value most, and who we are. Physical activities such as playing games, walking, re-visiting familiar places, or escapes shared with others can form long lasing bonds. Art can encapsulate these moments and my paintings pay homage to shared experiences with nature, family and friends. Objects: small, simplified, imperfect, and no longer in that place or time can also be a source of nostalgia. For example, my floral prints are simplified and abstracted forms of flowers and plants that I find in the backyard at home. Each year they grow again, and yet are different and new even though they are familiar. They leave impressions on me, and then I leave impressions in my art of them.

With this exhibition Iyashikei, I am celebrating life’s pleasures found through the relationships we have with observing the natural world, the people, and objects we surround ourselves with and the things we create.

1. tvtropes n.d.

About the Artist

Hi, I am McCall Kindt, and I am an artist that is trying to find their way in the world and discover and explore the relationships I have with it. I work primarily in acrylic painting and linocut relief printmaking. I enjoy the freedom paint gives me to explore and work through ideas and I enjoy the technical processes printmaking gives to analyze what I experience. These methods allow me to share what I discover in a tangible and relatable form that is my art. I am interested in exploring the idea of relationships, particularly the relationships between people and the nature that is around us. I find the memories we make with others and the places we make them fascinating, and how our relationships with people, places and memories develop and change.