2017 EXHIBITION LISTINGS
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Hani al-Moulia
It’s Not Impossible Keshen Goodman Library and ISANS October 1 – 31 Artist talk and reception: October 7, 2:30pm Hani al-Moulia’s stunning images record life in a refugee camp that are both heartbreaking and beautiful, revealing both hope and despair. He will also show photographs taken since arriving in Canada in 2015. |
Devon Berquist
735 Kilometres North Timber Lounge October 2 – 31 This exhibition features photographs documenting a 735 kilometre journey via canoe on the sub-Arctic north-flowing Yukon River, which connects the Yukon Territory’s capital, Whitehorse, to the “heart of the Klondike Gold Rush,” Dawson City. The series was completed as part of the 2017 Canadian Wilderness Artist Residency and offers a unique perspective on off-grid and outback survival. devonberquist.com |
Dean Brousseau, Susan Coolen & Renate Deppe
Arrangements Secord Gallery October 6 – 27 Opening reception: October 6, 7pm Photo credit: Dean Brousseau Arrangements is a three person photographic exhibition. Dean Brousseau’s ingenious low-tech handmade sets and props are photographed with light and shadow imparting drama to his cryptic images. Susan Coolen’s staged compositions and dynamic photographic effects convey enigmatic and mysterious narratives. Renate Deppe’s work demonstrates the remarkable similarity of patterns and structures as seen in human brain scans and plant matter. secordgallery.com |
Peggy Cameron
Corridor Wasting Disease: Robie Street, a Case Study Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History October 4 – 31 Opening reception: October 4, 5–7pm Canada’s Endangered Places Committee recently added hundreds of Halifax homes on the brink of extinction to its List of Endangered Places. Corridor Wasting Disease, an infection introduced by Halifax Plan Central efforts to grow ~14 streets into “Corridors” is responsible. This exhibition of Robie Street endangered homes (sample population ~200) is part of the Species Survival Plan to alert citizens. |
Neil Clarkson
Maritime Lifestyle Bluenose II Restaurant October 1 – November 1 Halifax’s delightful restaurant, The Bluenose II hosts a Photopolis exhibit of brilliant, Maritime themed photographs showing spirited people, unique activities and hidden details exclusive to Canada’s Maritime region. Neil Clarkson is an Imaging Professional and Trade Instructor with the Canadian Forces and resides in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, a town that features predominately in many of his innovative photographs. |
Ted Coldwell
Photo Sculptures: 3-Dimensional Photographic Images Daily Grind Café & Art Market October 1 – 31 Photo Sculptures provides a unique viewing experience that is determined by the existing lighting and the position of the viewer. The addition of physical depth to a photographic print provides a perspective not possible with traditional prints. |
Alvin Comiter
Point Pleasant Park Anna Leonowens Gallery October 24 – November 4 Opening reception: October 23, 5:30–7pm Artist talk: November 2, 12pm Symposium speaker: Locating Photography, October 28, 10am A slide show of 80 photographs fade in and out while a slow song plays in the background. Most of the pictures were taken in Point Pleasant Park, where the trees, branches, twigs and leaves are, Comiter says, “as exuberant as the dog who walks beside me - or far ahead, or way behind.” The pictures were taken in bright sunlight between 2012 and 2017. alvincomiter.ca |
Contemplative Photographers
Seeing and the Present Moment Shambhala Centre October 1 – 31 Artist talk: The Possibilities of Perception, Charles Blackhall, October 15, 2pm. Photo credit: Charles Blackhall Contemplative photography is a mindfulness practice based on direct perception. Slowing down and actually seeing the world, rather than thinking about it, can reveal richness and magic present in what we often overlook as ordinary and mundane. Colour, texture, pattern - or a beam of light - can catch the eye and reveal a fresh way of seeing for both the photographer and the viewer. |
Creative Spirit East
Forgotten Not Plan B October 4 – 31 Opening reception: October 5, 1–4pm Forgotten Not will be a collection of personal works representing objects, places, times and personal belongings that are gone but cannot be forgotten. Creative Spirit East is a collective of artists working with disabilities, mental illness or other barriers to success. Administered by Veith Street Gallery Studio Association who’s mission since 2000 has been “Art Is For Everyone.” |

Alexa Cude, Jessica Emin, Lenny Mullins & Meghan Tansey Whitton
The Coast Presents Food!
Lion & Bright
October 2 – 30
Opening: October 5, 5–7pm
Photo credit: Alexa Cude
The Coast is a proud supporter of local artists and they’ve been publishing incredible food photographs for 24 years. They’ve picked just a handful of some of their favourite food shots in recent memory for this exhibition.
The Coast Presents Food!
Lion & Bright
October 2 – 30
Opening: October 5, 5–7pm
Photo credit: Alexa Cude
The Coast is a proud supporter of local artists and they’ve been publishing incredible food photographs for 24 years. They’ve picked just a handful of some of their favourite food shots in recent memory for this exhibition.
Thierry Delva & Steven Holmes
25: THIERRY DELVA + STEVEN HOLMES Hermes Gallery October 7 – 29 Opening reception: October 5, 6pm Photo credit: Steven Holmes This exhibition features the work by two artists who have maintained a 25 year conversation with each other about art. Delva will exhibit a group of sculptural objects based on a mould taken from his artificial hip, the result of a prior surgical procedure. Holmes will present photographs of contemporary burial grounds. |
Becky Gartner
Woven Fire Chives Window Space October 4 – November 17 Woven Fire is an exhibition that integrates the historic technology of weaving with the photographic image. The combination of a merino wool warp and digital photography considers the relationship that our technology has to the creative imagination in a time when both weaving and photography retain a significant role to the invention of everyday life. beckygartner.weebly.com |
Kip Harris
Staple Project Craig Gallery, Exterior Display October 10 – 29 As the posters for upcoming events in Halifax are removed or ripped off telephone poles, the underlying layers become a palimpsest of texture, colour, and typography. Staple Project photographically documents this. As stated by David Travis: “The trick was to encounter, through an accident of time, not what was suspected but what was unforeseen.” kharrisphoto.com |
Claire Hodge
Negotiations Dalhousie Art Gallery October 13 – December 17 Opening reception: October 11, 6pm Over the last couple of years, Claire Hodge has methodically documented the blocks of houses in the Hydrostone neighbourhood, a planned development built after the Halifax Explosion. The photographs expose a history of exterior changes that reveal, as Hodge notes, “a complex set of negotiations realized tacitly or explicitly by the people who have lived there.” |
Gül Ilgaz
Falling HRM Billboard October 1 – 30 Artist talk: November 2, Art Bar +Projects, 5–7pm Symposium speaker: Locating Photography, October 28, 10am Falling examines the contradictions between East and West/the traditional and modern; explores woman’s identity from a personal standpoint; highlights spiritual states which are shared by everyone. The works arouse the innermost, indefinable emotions of the spectator, bringing to the surface the sadness and melancholy suppressed in everyday life. Gül Ilgaz is an intermedia artist living in Istanbul. Ilgaz represented Turkey in the 50th Venice Biennial. She has photography in the collection of Istanbul Modern Art Museum. gulilgaz.com |
Gül Ilgaz, Kim Morgan & Abdi Osman
Big Pictures
Anna Leonowens Gallery
October 24 – November 4
Opening reception: October 23, 5:30–7pm
In this featured group show, international, national and local artists Gül Ilgaz, Kim Morgan, and Abdi Osman exhibit large scale photographs that are on display outdoors as billboards in HRM. In their photographs, the artists consider identity in complex variant forms, employing blood, costume and location as strategic elements for dialogue.
Look for the billboards throughout HRM in both Halifax and Dartmouth. The three locations are: along the Bedford Highway near Joseph Howe Drive; at the intersection of Barrington Street and Artz Street, near the MacDonald Bridge; and in Dartmouth along Alderney Drive before Ochterloney Street.
Photopolis would like to thank Gordon Stirrett Wealth Management, Pattison Outdoor and Susan Gibson Garvey for their support and assistance to make this new Photopolis feature an exciting possibility.
Big Pictures
Anna Leonowens Gallery
October 24 – November 4
Opening reception: October 23, 5:30–7pm
In this featured group show, international, national and local artists Gül Ilgaz, Kim Morgan, and Abdi Osman exhibit large scale photographs that are on display outdoors as billboards in HRM. In their photographs, the artists consider identity in complex variant forms, employing blood, costume and location as strategic elements for dialogue.
Look for the billboards throughout HRM in both Halifax and Dartmouth. The three locations are: along the Bedford Highway near Joseph Howe Drive; at the intersection of Barrington Street and Artz Street, near the MacDonald Bridge; and in Dartmouth along Alderney Drive before Ochterloney Street.
Photopolis would like to thank Gordon Stirrett Wealth Management, Pattison Outdoor and Susan Gibson Garvey for their support and assistance to make this new Photopolis feature an exciting possibility.
Sean Kelly
Southern Exposure: Reflections of a Time in International Development Just Us! Coffee House October 1 – 31 In 1986, Sean Kelly volunteered in a rural Caribbean community where he helped start a preschool. Kelly took with him a camera, one lens, five rolls of film, and youthful naivety. Thirty years later and a career in international development in between, he returned to Saint Vincent with a camera, one lens, two SD cards, and hope mixed with time-earned cynicism. southernexposure.ca |
Harold Klee
Delphian Constructs Bishop’s Cellar October 1 – 31 Wine tasting event: October 6, 5–7pm (registration required) These abstract images of Halifax landmarks accentuate the feelings of ambiguity many have towards the construction here. Progress is inevitable. Many heritage buildings have been completely erased from the cityscape. But sometimes, new buildings incorporate historical styles or original facades. Look carefully. Like the buildings in Klee’s photographs, the past can still be seen. hkleephoto.ca |
Adam Lanigan
Old Bones / New Bones Coburg Coffee House October 1 – November 30 Opening reception: October 1, 7–10pm An exploration of the changing urban landscape in Halifax. Development has seen a dramatic increase in pace, but, in the demolition and reconstruction of pieces of the city, is something being lost along the way? Is Halifax’s character and identity tied up in the makeup of its neighbourhoods? By replacing the old bones with new ones, is the body changed? thesaltyfog.com |
Frankie Macaulay
Tree Versus Sir Sandford Fleming Park N 44˚ 37.725, W 63˚ 35.946 October 1 – 31 An outdoor photography installation accessed from Adventure Earth Centre Trail or Frog Pond Trail. In contrast to the freely growing park trees, photographs of urban trees intersecting with human-made objects act as metaphors to illustrate how nature endures, adapts, reacts and falls to human-made impositions. Supported by NSCAD University’s Reznick Student Creativity Award. frankiemacaulay.ca |
Justine MacDonald
Remembrance Road: Photographs from the Battlefields of Europe NSCC Institute of Technology, Campus Library October 30 – November 15 Artist talk: October 30, 12:30pm Valley travel photographer Justine MacDonald has been interested in military history all her life. In April 2017, she photographed the battlefields of Europe - Flanders, Normandy, and Vimy Ridge, as well as Auschwitz-Birkenau. In Remembrance Road, she uses her photographs to document this journey and share her experience with the community. aurora-lee.ca |
James MacSwain
Reflections Annie’s Place Café October 1 – 31 Window reflections are absorbed by one of the luminal compartments of the mind. Representations there are neither false nor true. We live in a world of glass reflections that trigger questions of reality and appearance. We stare into our reflections and they dare to stare back. Our reflections are tricksters that ask the difficult question; who are you? |
The Magic Project
Humanity Has Magic Anna Leonowens Gallery, Port Loggia October 10 – 28 Opening reception: October 10, 5:30–7pm The Magic Project is a non for profit organization that aims to bring the voices, faces and experiences of marginalized communities to the forefront of social media and community discussion. Their exhibition Humanity Has Magic is a display of all four photo shoots they have hosted thus far. Come and experience the Magic! |
Kim Morgan
Blood Galaxy HRM Billboard October 1 – 30 Blood Galaxy portrays human blood – the vital fluid of life – as a complex system, a mysterious galaxy, an inner space, as vast as the cosmos. The forms shown in the image are red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets, magnified 5,000 to 10,000 times using a scanning electron microscope. Kim Morgan is a local artist and Associate Professor at NSCAD University. kimmorgan.ca |
Abdi Osman
Discover Us HRM Billboard October 1 – 30 Artist talk: October 27, Art Bar +Projects, 5–7pm Symposium speaker: Keynote Presenter, October 28, 11am Visiting multidisciplinary artist Abdi Osman is a Somali-Canadian, based in Toronto, Ontario, whose work focuses on questions of black masculinity as it intersects with Muslim and queer identities. The Discover Us Series is, as Osman states, “my attempt to complicate the visual field in so far as the black/African gay man can and is always an invention, always somewhere in excess of our collective imaginations.” abdiosman.com |
Meriem Oumessad
Ancestors MacPhee Centre for Creative Learning October 16 – November 3 Oumessad focuses on Berber women within her Algerian heritage and their practice in facial tattooing, which indicates different things within their community. She did this in the form of black and white photography to reference the act of colonization that was implemented by the French before the Algerian revolution. |
Rochelle Owen
The Nova Scotia Omelette Halifax Ferry Terminal October 9 – 28 Opening reception and artist talk: October 17, 6:30pm This photo exhibition will profile Nova Scotia places that have the ingredients names that make an omelette! The exhibition is inspired by Owen’s interest in reading atlases, making omelettes, and discovering new places. The photographs are from around the province and will feature Frying Pan Lake, Butter Island, Portobello, Egg Beach, Salmon River/Mackerel Cove, Cheese Factory Corner, Salt Mountain, Potato Brook, and Strawberry Hill on the side. rochelleowenphotography.wordpress.com |
John Perkins
Ojala Studio 21 Fine Art October 6 – November 3 Opening: October 6, hours extended to 8pm Gallery artist John Perkins experiments with bringing art to audiences beyond the traditional physical and temporal boundaries of the gallery, with images that explore the sky as metaphor for mind. studio21.ca |
Photopolis Society
Convergence Craig Gallery September 6 – October 8 Closing reception: October 8, 1pm Image credit: Adrian Fish Convergence showcases the art practices of the Photopolis Society: President, Wilma Needham; Past-President, Heather MacLeod; Coordinator, Frankie Macaulay; and Board Members: Peter Dykhuis, Lorraine Field, Adrian Fish, Laurel Rath and Roxanne Smith. Their artworks range from documentary examinations, feminism, cultural identity, to the personal. |
Peter Steeper
Harbour to Bay Rousseau Chocolatier September 30 – October 29 Opening reception: October 15, 1pm Harbour to Bay is a miscellany of photographs taken by Peter Steeper in his local wanderings from HRM to the South Shore of Nova Scotia. Steeper’s search for the photographic “it” factor seeks out unique situations of light—sun, sea, fog, time, water, weather, and perspective. His photographs are the culmination of looking at “familiar stuff in a new light.” petersteeper.ca |
Turtle Grove Project
Kepe’kek: From the Narrows of the Great Harbour Art Gallery of Nova Scotia September 30, 2017 – January 14, 2018 Kepe’kek: From the Narrows of the Great Harbour is a response to the impact of the Halifax Explosion on the Turtle Grove community - 100 years later - by five Mi’kmaw youth: Brandy Bernard, Sabrina DiMattia, Aiden Gillis, William Marshall Johnson and Kehisha Wilmot. The works include photographs, paintings, beadwork, and sculptural installations. Supported by the Halifax Explosion 100th Anniversary Grants Program. |
VANS Group Show
Connection VANS Corridor Gallery October 3 – 31 Exhibition curator: Lynn Ellis Photo credit: Doug van Hemessen Gary Castle, Shannon Donovan, Philip LaPage, Doug Van Hemessen, Katarina Marinic, Brandt Eisner, and Susan Walmstrom have joined together to present their interpretation of the theme Connection. |
Various Artists
Perfect Brightness: Discovery and Escape in Contemporary Photography Art Gallery of Nova Scotia November 10, 2017 – April 29, 2018 Photo credit: Lois Conner The works assembled in this exhibition demonstrate the extraordinary power of photography - as a documentary tool as well a creative mode of expression. The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia showcases recent additions to its photography collection with works by Ansel Adams, Tim Brennan, Ed Burtynsky, Genevieve Cadieux, Gary Castle, Cora Cluett, Alvin Comiter, Lois Conner, Franco Fontana, Thaddeus Holownia, Michael Kenna, Tod Papageorge, Ned Pratt, Stephen Shore, Larry Silver, and Gary Wilson. |
ViewPoint Gallery
SHOWCASE ViewPoint Gallery October 5 – 29 Opening Reception: October 5, 6–8pm Artist talk: October 15, 2pm SHOWCASE is a group exhibition, presenting selections of the best work by ViewPoint Gallery’s exhibiting members. Every month, ViewPoint members display their photography on the gallery’s walls, but SHOWCASE is an opportunity to see selected images which best represent each artist’s creative focus. viewpointgallery.ca |
Steven Wadden
Forged Saint Mary’s University Art Gallery September 9 – November 12 Artist talk: October 21, 3pm Forged is an exhibition of documentary photography by Steve Wadden about working class communities in crisis and transition in industrial Cape Breton. stevewaddenphoto.com |
Ian Willms
We Shall See MSVU Art Gallery September 2 – November 5 Symposium speaker: Photography & Mourning, Oct 28, 2pm Ian Willms’ father died after months of hospitalization and medical interventions. In We Shall See, Willms documents his father’s traumatic injuries due to a motorcycle accident and the details of daily hospital visits. Despite their fraught familial relationship, Willms’ father encouraged him to photograph their “journey through unknown emotional terrain, in collaboration.” Unframed and printed on fragile tracing paper, the photographs depict the complexities of love, grief and mortality. |
Gary Wilson
Faces From the Great War Naval Museum of Halifax October 16 – November 17 This slide show exhibition contains 105 WWI post card portraits collected over the past fourteen years. Although one in ten may have information on the reverse, Wilson has chosen to provide none for these men, women and children. They represent the six million people who disappeared between 1914 and 1918 out of eighteen million deaths. Nationalities include Canada, Britain, France, Japan, Morocco, Germany, Australia, Russia, United States, Belgium, Austria, India, and Italy. |
Paul Wong
Patti & Lawrence Saint Mary’s University Art Gallery, Side Gallery September 9 – November 12 Patti & Lawrence, a projection installation by Paul Wong, uses found images and personal film footage to construct narratives on growing up Queer and Asian. paulwongprojects.com |