If you are interested in having your art showcased in the library, please contact the Library Manager.
The Alberta Foundation for the Arts (AFA) has supported a provincial travelling exhibition program since 1981. The mandate of the AFA Travelling Exhibition Program is to provide every Albertan with the opportunity to enjoy visual art exhibitions in their community.
Three regional galleries and one arts organization coordinate the program for the AFA: Northwest Region: The Art Gallery of Grande Prairie, Grande Prairie Northeast and North Central Region: The Art Gallery of Alberta, Edmonton Southwest Region: The Alberta Society of Artists, Calgary Southeast Region: The Esplanade Arts and Heritage Centre, Medicine Hat
Each year, more than 300,000 Albertans enjoy many exhibitions in communities ranging from High Level in the north to Milk River in the south and virtually everywhere in between. The AFA Travelling Exhibition Program also offers educational support material to help educators integrate the visual arts into the school curriculum. Exhibitions for the TREX program are curated from a variety of sources, including private and public collections. A major part of the program assists in making the AFA’s extensive art collection available to Albertans. This growing art collection consists of over 8,000 artworks showcasing the creative talents of more than 2000 artists. As the only provincial art collection in Alberta, the AFA collection reflects the development of the vibrant visual arts community in the province and has become an important cultural legacy for all Albertans.
The Rotary Club of Slave Lake Public Library is proud to be a part of the AFA Travelling Exhibition Program and will continue to showcase Alberta. Local artists will be showcased as well throughout the year. There is always something new on the walls, so come down and visit the library!
TOUCHING THE SKY
December 15, 2022 - January 18, 2023
(Curated by Robin Lynch and organized by the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie - TREX Region 1)
How can an artwork capture the dynamic experience of space? What does the smell of rain look like in a painting? Or our dream experiences in relationship to our waking experiences? Even in a moment when the landscape appears still, there is tons of activity happening that cannot be captured in a single frame—from the intricate and complex patterns of weather and climate to the buzzing of cellular exchanges on a micro level. The landscape is alive, and fluctuating—and so is our own journey through it. As we move through the world, we experience a wonderful abundance of senses, thoughts, and feelings, as our bodies respond to, absorb, and contribute to our surroundings. For millennia, artists have imaginatively worked to translate these embodied experiences, including phenomena that extend beyond the visual senses like smell, touch, emotion, spirituality, sound, and time. Balancing between abstract marking and painterly realism, Touching the Sky features three artists based in the Peace Region—Angela Fehr, Esther Hoflick, and Elizabeth Hutchinson—whose work is rooted in exploring these embodied experiences and our ability to represent them through art.
Each of the artworks in Touching the Sky hover between our ability to represent space, and our environment’s profound shaping of our daily experiences. As Elizabeth Hutchinson writes, “More than a collection of images, they are a gathering of memories that remind us of the poetic potential of our collective emotional relationship to the landscape.”
Esther Hoflick
Oil emulsion, carbothello, soft pastel and graphiteon styrofoam
Collection of the artist
CAREFUL SPACE, GENTLE MATTERS
January 26 - February 22, 2023
(Curated by Robin Lynch and organized by the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie - TREX Region 1)
Careful Space, Gentle Matters highlights the work of two Alberta-based artists who center and affirm their lived experiences of disability and chronic illness. Bodies all have wonderfully different and complex capacities. However, many of our daily spaces continue to be designed and programmed as if all bodies are the same. In response to this lack of consideration, many who live with disability and chronic illness experience feelings of grief, trauma, frustration and anger. The artists in Careful Space, Gentle Matters, explore these complex feelings in addition to celebrating the important forms of care, rest, and joy that they gently make with themselves, and with community.
Chelsey Campbell’s work examines the gentle rituals of care and intimacy during surgical recovery and illness. By magnifying mold growths and painting them in bright colours, Nicole Jones focuses on the often-unacknowledged environmental toxins that cause her chronic illness to flair. The artworks in the exhibition are paired with visual descriptive poetry by writer and poet Meredith Grace Thompson. The online ATL-text poetry is available as the virtual guide to the exhibition for anyone with visual impairments, which is also accessible in audio format through the QR codes in the exhibition. In addition to the educational catalogue, Careful Space, Gentle Matters has an educational zine developed by Chelsey Campbell. This zine is an interactive introductory guide to talking about life with disability.
Chelsey Campbell
crip daydreams of a garland for Patty, 2022
Laser cut Japanese tissue paper
Collection of the Artist
ADORNMENT
(Curated by MJ Belcourt Moses and organized by the Art Gallery of Alberta - TREX Region 2)
According to the dictionary, ‘adornment’ refers to the use of item(s) that decorate, embellish, enhance, beautify, or enrich. It could be said adornment is the finishing touch that distinguishes the wearer. Adornment from an Indigenous perspective goes beyond the items’ beauty. It is an artistic expression that conveys
many levels of communication. It makes connection to a spiritual foundation, the importance to land and place, and defines inherent culture.
Early adornment provides a sense of knowledge about our ancestors that reflect the natural world in which they lived. The seasonal round of birth and rebirth shape our world view in a circulatory way as everything is interdependent.
Spirituality has been the foundation for Indigenous peoples’ lives and an ‘intrinsic quality of creative activity.’ These artistic expressions were woven into the fabric of daily life. Artifact were generally created as items to be used, not as ‘art’. Bags, pouches, along with awl and knife sheaths were functional yet beautifully decorated.
‘More than beautiful ornamentation, adornment is a visual language expressing the joy of creativity, pride in attention to craftsmanship, and the desire to share with others. Above all, it honors oneself as well as one’s people by doing a thing well.’ (Sherr Dubin, Lois. North American Indian Jewelry and Adornment; Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, p 11, 12, 18)
Split Toe Moccasins, 2021
Beaded, hand sewn tanned moose hide, Size 7
Collection of the artist