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July 18 - August 16, 2008
The Swag Bag Project looks at gift economy and its role in contemporary art and life. In order to connect the Regina art community in its inflated Open Engagement form with the art community in her hometown, Reeves gathered together a group of Winnipeg artists that made Swag Bags to be gifted to the conference participants.
The nature of a gift is to create social bonds by solidifying connections between giver and recipient. A community, instant or gradual, temporary or lasting, is created through the gifts inherent ability to create such bonds. Just as the gift acknowledges and celebrates the recipient, the giver of the gift must automatically be considered in order to avoid a diminishment of spirit of the individuals and the community.
In this project, the communities in Winnipeg and Regina became bonded through the gifting of the Swag Bags, which are in essence mini retrospective exhibitions of Winnipeg art. As gifts demand to be paid forward through direct reciprocity or gifting to others, a site has been created where this reciprocation can be recognized. This website is the place in which the gift can keep on giving. While some pieces in the Swag Bags have specific instructions on how to reciprocate or use the gift; others...
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More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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May 16 - June 28, 2008
Artist statement:
The title of this show is based on a series of drawings I have been making for the last year or so. There are a couple of different series that encompass this theme and title, the most prevalent being my compressed series, also known as "Hi-Lited 4 x 4's". It was this series that lead me towards the body of work I am doing now.
The Hi-Lited 4 x 4's began at my desk at work, during one of my coffee breaks. I felt the need to make some art, and had plenty of paper to work on, but could only find a black pen, pencil, and four Hi-Liter markers at my disposal. I decided to make the best with what I had, and started making art (for what ever reason) in a compressed four inch square area on my paper. When ever I had free time at work, I would do another, and eventually I started making them at my studio, and at home. Feeling the itch to work larger, I took the same materials and inspiration, and began expanding the themes and dimensions of these works. The bigger the works have become, the more diverse my materials have also become. You can only push Hi-Liter markers so far (and I have), so I began incorporating pencil crayons, gouache, and acrylics...
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More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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March 7 - April 25, 2008
RELEASE METAPHORS: Mythos and Messiahs is a two-person exhibition featuring works by Winnipeg-based artist Patrick Treacy and New York City-based artist Jenny Arenson (b. in Winnipeg). Both artists consider escape metaphors that reverberate throughout everyday thought and practice.
Treacy explores escape scenarios involving dogs, wolves and manikins to give form to everyday hopes and anxieties culturally experienced and expressed through myths (Mythos), origin stories, dramas and fictions. The scenarios possess the performative and hypnotic aspects reminiscent of Houdini's stunts. In some of Treacy's works, there also exist subtle references to the story of the founders of Rome, brothers Romulus and Remus, who in their infancy fled from a threat by a resentful patriarch. The twins survived in a wolf den, nursed by an alpha female. These stories point to a more general preoccupation with the highlights in the anthropological history of Western Civilisation.
Arenson paints various individuals (Jewish and non-Jewish) as Hassidic Jews by bestowing on them the identifying marks and accessories such as... read more >>
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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February 14 - March 5, 2008
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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December 14, 2007 - January 26, 2008
Opening Reception: Friday, December 14
7:00PM - 10:00PM
Artists in attendance
Winnipeg artist Michael Benjamin Brown's latest series of works consists of sequential ink drawings on paper that aim to capture the essence and the hubs of transatlantic jaunts between Winnipeg and London. Whether these travels are imaginary or actual, Brown fights to give form to the intangible universal core that unites all city-dwelling experiences, sidestepping that which differentiates them. However, it is a particular sort of city that Brown explores; not a vinyl and glass metropolis of today, but a turn-of-the-century capital with a rich heritage of modernity. Brown's illustrations are of London and Winnipeg, but for a fleeting moment the cities in the images could be mistaken for 19th century Chicago, Paris or Berlin. We are given very few visual referents to be able to tell immediately. Brown positions the viewer as looking up at an immense sky, that almost as an afterthought, is populated with building rooftops, exterior siding, trimwork, cornice molding, stone and concrete walls, fire escapes, and grounding antennas. These all-pervasive details suggest a milieu rather than a specific location. read more >>
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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October 26 - November 30, 2007
Opening Reception: Friday, October 26, 7:00 - 10:30PM
Artists in attendance
Grimhaven
A place unlike and like any other
The vision of Grimhaven is one of beautiful desperation, fascinating decrepitude and inadvertent jocularity. Nestled lovingly between
desolate concrete vistas and the tenuous dreams of urban family mythology, this is a world where irony and transient flotsam collide within the familiar
context of the everyday.
Gordon Arthur is a traveller through this parallel world. Through his captured visions we are witness to the crossing over points in which our
known world and that of Grimhaven merge. He has adroitly captured the essence of his surroundings via a medium that is germane to the subject matter.
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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September 20 - October 20, 2007
Opening Reception: Thursday, September 20, 5 PM
Artists in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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August 15 - September 18, 2007
A two-person exhibition
Opening Reception: Wednesday, August 15, 8 PM
Artists in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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July 24 - August 14, 2007
Curated by Aldona Dziedziejko
Opening Reception: Thursday, July 26, 7 PM
Artist in attendance
Winnipegfs visual artist Leslie Supnet seems fascinated with what Susan Sontag, speaking about literature, called the gcreation of inwardness.h
Introspection is the necessary ingredient in all of art making; however, some artists including Supnet seek to a greater degree all that is personal and lyrical.
In her own words, Supnet deals with gvarious subject matter and themes, such as identity, isolation, longing and despair all with a touch of whimsy and the surrealc
h and is subsequently interested in using drawing gas a mechanism to cope with the little tragedies we all face day to day.h A sizeable portion of her still growing oeuvre
is represented at Semai Gallery with the hope of nurturing her artistic production.
Pale Shelter - Drawings by Leslie Supnet at Semai is showing concurrently with the Royal Art Lodge exhibition Where is Here? at the Winnipeg Art Gallery.
But rather than engaging the question of location Pale Shelter considers nostalgia and its subtle range of emotional hues. Supnet shares with the Winnipeg
artist collective their signature affection for fantastic characters, living at an angle to society but nonetheless beguiling, rendered with faux naivete which tempers
their menace. read more >>
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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June 22 - July 22, 2007
Opening Reception: Friday, June 22, 7:30 - until late
Artist in attendance
Also meet the artist in the afternoon of July 7, 2007 (07.07.07)
The poster advertising Robert Pasternakfs current exhibition of small-scale drawings depicts the artist conjuring up fiery breath,
charming its snake-like coils towards his Solar Plexus - an energy centre of the body that resonates with emotional vitality and awareness.
This dramatic composition signals that in this latest series of pen drawings Pasternak moves towards the presentation of his farsighted
purpose with a magicianfs flare and a prophetfs insight. The forms present in the business-card sized drawings shown here have
preoccupied this Winnipeg artist since the early nineties; and over the years he has been distilling the curvilinear figures down
to their essence, something that he has achieved here. The drawings first began as doodles on napkins in coffee shops, and
they continue here in a similar spirit as a series of framed works done over a period of one month plus a collage of sketches
on bus transfers... read more >>
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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May 15, 2007
Semai Gallery is proud to distribute MAGNUM OPUS MAGAZINE (a Vancouver-based ART MAGAZINE).
Even better, they are FREE.
We have just received 84 copies of the PREMIRE ISSUE on May 15th. They are beautiful magazines! Drop by to take a copy to enrich your life with art!
For more information about Magnum Opus Magazine and PDF version of the magazine, visit their website http://magnopus.com |
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May 18 - June 15, 2007
Opening Reception: Friday, May 18, 8pm - 9:30pm
cnot a mirror, but a hammerc is a touring exhibition of artist trading cards from around the world exploring the theme
of artist as worker/ worker as artist. Curated from a trade-off held in Parksville, BC in 2006. Co-sponsored by the Parksville MayWorks Festival and the Semai Gallery.
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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April 13 - May 11, 2007
Digitally altered photographs of Winnipeg
Opening Reception: Friday, April 13, 8 - 11PM
Artist in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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March 02 - April 10, 2007
Original watercolor paintings
Opening Reception: Friday, March 02, 8 - 11PM
Artist in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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January 26 - February 16, 2007
Original watercolor and ink paintings
Opening Reception: January 26, 7 - 10PM
Artist in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
January, 2007
Newest GalleriesWest Magazine, Page 43
Semai's up-coming exhibition, drawings by a Japanese artist Natsuko Yoshino, is previewed by an art critique Lorne Roberts in the newest editions of GalleriesWest Magazine.
For details, read the page 43 of the current issue! |
From January 20, 2007
Semai Gallery will appear on Bravo!TV from January 20, 2007, so please keep your eye on TV! |
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December 28, 2006 - January 20, 2007
Reception: December 28, 5 - 8PM
Artist in attendance
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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December 02 - 16, 2006
Find the best Xmas gifts ever!
Opening Reception: December 02, 7PM - Late
Artists in attendance
Works (available for sale) by
Jennifer Arenson
Derek Brueckner
Paul Butler
Daphne Enns
Cliff Eyland
Adrian Gorea
Takashi Iwasaki
Kazu
Craig Love
Shaun Morin
Paul Robles
Don Ritson
Cyrus Smith
Leslie Supnet
Seth Woodyard
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page.
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November 23 - 30, 2006
Reproductions of original works
and documentation
Opening Reception: November 25, 8 - 10 PM
Artist in attendance
Gorea, originally from Romania, age 27, is presenting numerous duplications of his own drawings,
which he has been collecting since he was very little. The horizontal presentation of his drawings not only fits the narrow space of the gallery,
but it was a necessity to complete his documentation project called "Owninig Winnipeg."
He somehow claims that he owns various parts
of Winnipeg by his act of documentation. What has he done? Find it out in Semai Gallery.
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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November 02 - 21, 2006
Opening Reception: November 02, 8 - 10 PM
Artist in attendance
Free your creative thoughts and imagination
thatfsneighbour, an installation (assemblage) piece by Kazu is the result of his spontaneous and intuitive response to the objects he has acquired,
responding to the narrow space of the gallery.
As Kazu says, gwhat you see is what it is, and how you feel is what you feel,h interpretation of his work is all up to the viewerfs personal feelings and imagination.
Things in the world are not always about black and white: the gray area in between possesses immense flexibility and potential.
So free your creative thoughts and imagination, and find what his installation piece means to you!
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page. |
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September 26 - October 29, 2006
One of the most prominent young filmmakers in Canada, Noam Gonick has presented films at the Venice International Film Festival,
the Berlin Film Festival, TIFF, Sundance and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Semai Gallery is currently showcasing 135 pieces of his location scouting photographs, photos taken for selecting locations for his films. Take a look at the
film locations (all in Winnipeg) of Hey, Happy! (2001) and Stryker (2004) from a
filmmaker's point of view!
More information and some images from the exhibition are available in the exhibition page.
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July 28, 2006
Semai Gallery's official opening day - 11:00am
(No special reception will be held for the opening.)
Semai Gallery is currently showcasing Iwasaki's own works as a pilot exhibition to examine the function of the gallery space. |
| Copyright © 2006 - 2007 Semai Gallery, Takashi Iwasaki |
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