David Barnett Dorothy 1977

The Permanent Collection

No Standard Rules

September 2009-Ongoing

This exhibition of works, highlighting the Gallery’s permanent collection, focuses on the figure, both present and absent.

The title is taken from the turn of phrase: “No standard rules are included for those average heads which don’t exist,” written in the preface of a book on how to draw that part of the anatomy. So it is with this exhibition – No Standard Rules apply.

The exhibition includes numerous works that have the figure as its primary element — portraits and figure studies. Through portraits we are made aware of the likeness of those of the past. History becomes more tangible by looking at individuals who passed before us; the mortal become immortal through paint on canvas, graphite on paper or bronze moulded into sculpture. Art that gives attention to the figure is often a more intimate study of our human form whether clothed, or more classically posed works of the nude. The human body has been a central subject in world art throughout its history; that the Gallery continues to provide lessons in life drawing demonstrates our ongoing interest in the human body.

But this exhibition also comprises works that clearly show an absence of the figure: clothes that omit their owner, houses that are not abandoned, but do not physically reveal their tenants. Traces of the figure are details that the viewer must fill in from their own sense of memory and history.

Landscape is something we traverse around and through, but our mark is always there. The idea of the pristine wilderness, devoid of human contact, does not exist in the 21st century. So it is with the myth of the icons of the Canadian wilderness: the Group of Seven. Their landscape paintings, and the work of those whom they would influence, show a succession of scenes that make us believe that what we see is untouched, devoid of human presence. But all the while, those lands have been traversed, for generations, by First Nations people whose relationship to and with the land has traditionally informed their character.

By forging connections between seemingly disparate paintings, drawings, photographs and sculptures in a collection of some 4000 works of fine art, we are given the opportunity to create new and varied links between subject matter and material, object and thematic arrangements that assist us in viewing differently. Ours is an opportunity to add our unique experiences and histories to the mix and by doing so continue an engagement that was begun in the past and will link us to the future.