Emily Pelstring: The Passion of the Hedge-Rider

Access

À propos

In this significant new installation, Emily Pelstring channels the figure of the hag to reconcile material and immaterial realms and re-evaluate the thresholds between technology, nature, body and spirit.

The hag is a cultural figure cast upon a threshold. A figure that shares many characteristics with the witch, the hag sits at the boundary between the tamed garden and the uncultivated wild: the hedge-rider. They reside between order and disorder, known and unknown, or inside and outside, operating fluidly across all spaces, perforating the limits of the edge.

Organized into two parallel rows, six stained glass windows evoke a medieval chapel and invite visitors into an atmospheric corridor of fallen shadows as animations pulse on the panes. Like the hag, viewers are situated at an anachronistic crossroads, hovering between neo-gothic architecture, the aesthetics of 1980s video experiments and contemporary image mapping technologies. Familiar icons and symbols become fluid mediums to reflect upon in-between spaces. Flickering candles, creeping familiars and mating salamanders work as powerful ciphers while barriers dissolve amongst processes of creation, destruction, and magical transfiguration.

The Passion of the Hedge-Rider highlights presumed thresholds of our material and immaterial lives, and questions the implications of these categorical divisions through entrancing ambient cinematic spectacle.

Emily Pelstring acknowledges the support of glass consultant and fabrication assistant Kelsey Haynes, the Faculty of Fine Arts Core Technical Centre at Concordia University and the Ontario Arts Council.

Links

• Emily Pelstring: The Passion of the Hedge-Rider kwag.ca

Organisateur

Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery

KWAG is Waterloo Region's leading public art gallery, connecting people and ideas through art, with a focus on the best of contemporary culture. For the benefit of current and future generations, the Gallery collects, preserves, researches, interprets, and exhibits the visual arts and offers dynamic public programming relating to the visual arts, all with a view to inspiring creativity and an appreciation of the visual arts in the Region. Established in 1956 and incorporated in 1968, KWAG is a non-profit organization open to the public and administered in the public trust. The Gallery emphasizes contemporary art, often premiering works by Canadian and international artists. Exhibitions frequently draw upon selections from over 4300 works from the Permanent Collection to provide a context and forum for dialogue on current exhibitions and contemporary issues. KWAG plays a vital educational role in the community, offering a full spectrum of artistic experience for adults, children and families alike.

Contact