David Holt’s paintings in his third show at Loop depict landscapes as well as motifs derived from displays of birds, antiquities, and other collections found in museums of natural history. Many of the works playfully reinterpret the grid-like arrangements of objects in museum display cases while others elaborate on concepts of ideal landscapes, from both Eastern and Western classical traditions. Taken together, the works explore our ideas about nature, culture, and memory.
A painter who has had many solo and group shows in the US, David Holt has been the recipient of a painting grant from the Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation and an artist residency at the Ragdale Foundation. Holt lives and works in Toronto where he teaches art at Upper Canada College.
In a classically inspired narrative that looks at the idea of passage as both a means of access and a turning point or crossroads, Suzanne Nacha’s series of paintings entitled Signs for Travelers offers up a simplified visual logic that acts as a mirror to the human condition. Dark humour prevails as anthropomorphic forms evolving from underground tunnels, caves and rail systems play at the boundary between visual sign and physical trigger.
Suzanne Nacha is a visual artist working in painting, sculpture and installation. Through the systematic abstraction and anthropomorphism of industrial and natural landscapes, she seeks to make iconic images that act at times, as psychological mirrors to human experience. Born in Hamilton Ontario, she holds undergraduate degrees in both Geology and Fine Art from McMaster University and the University of Guelph respectively, as well as an MFA from York University in Toronto. She has taught in the Fine Art departments of OCAD, Sheridan/UTM and York University, and for the past fifteen years has worked in the mining industry mapping geographies of fortune and need.
Patrick Macaulay is the Head of Visuals Arts at Harbourfront Centre. Over the past fifteen years he has curated numerous exhibitions and has moved the visual arts programming at Harbourfront Centre in new and exciting directions. He received his MFA from The Art Institute of Chicago, BFA from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and has worked in the studio programme at The Banff Centre.
October 15 – November 6, 2011
Reception: Saturday, October 15, 2011, 2-5 PM
Q&A: Saturday, October 15, 2011, 1 PM moderated by Patrick Macaulay
Images: David Holt, Landscape with Bird, acrylic on linen, 20 x 20 inches, 2011; Suzanne Nacha, tongue tied, oil on panel, acrylic, rope, 25 x 32 inches, 2011.
