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Oct 12, '24 - Jun 28, '25
An exhibition that presents the work of Dominique Rey, MOTHERGROUND represents one of the first exhibitions of its kind in a Canadian context to thoroughly meditate on the subject of motherhood.

MOTHERGROUND (featuring Madeleine and Auguste Coar) presents the work of Franco-Manitoban artist, Dominique Rey as a solo survey exhibition in three “chapters” referring to three distinct phases of her visual explorations into the complex tapestry of emotions and cultural constructs of motherhood. Using small and large-scale photographs, photo collage, human-scale sculpture, and video installation, the exhibition is an immersive experience of our universal connection with motherhood.

This exhibition reflects on artistic practice, fertility, and maternity as forms of creative labour through an in-depth exploration of motherhood and how everyday gestures between a mother and child can be radical. At the core of MOTHERGROUND is an attempt to unravel the myriad transformations during the early developmental stages of motherhood, the relentless balance/imbalance that is at stake, and the oscillation between extreme emotions—from agony to ecstasy.

These works focus on the moments when the mother and child’s bodies merge and pull apart, morphing into altered shapes. The mother’s body functioning as the ground/soil/armature for the child to come into being. The performative images of MOTHERGROUND explore ideas of presence and absence, attachment, and desire, blurring the corporeal and psychic edges that link mother and child.

Artist

Dominique Rey

Dominique Rey is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice includes photography, video, performance, collage, and sculpture. Her work delves into peripheral subjectivities, from individuals and groups of people on the margins of dominant culture, to performance-based works that mine the terrain of the unconscious. She is interested in examining the outsider within society, as well as a deep sense of being we have of being strangers to ourselves. For this reason, she utilizes modes of fragmentation to explore the construction of self, as it relates to current experiences of dislocation and disorientation. Throughout her work there is “the tension of being outside one’s own desires, a palpable absence of certainty and longing for connection – both from within and without” (Sandra Fraser).

Her recent work focuses on practices of recontextualization and translation. One form this takes is in the creation of collages derived from her photographic archives that are then re-interpreted into large-scale sculptures that she considers photographic objects. The play of two dimensions within a three-dimensional space is an important facet of this work and forms the basis of her formal investigations. She is interested in pushing the boundary between photography and sculpture, reinvigorating ideas of surface, materiality, and illusion.

Presented By

 

Michael Nesbitt

Media Sponsor

Supported By

Laura Holt • Jamie Holt & Andrew & Oscar Newman • Mitousis & Co. • Daniel Bubis & Jennifer Blumenthal • Shirley & Paul Martens

 

In the News

Winnipeg Free Press: Play and Unpredictability, October 10, 2024

Radio Canada: Motherground: nouvelle exposition de Dominique Rey, October 10, 2024

The Uniter: Labours of Love, October 10, 2024

Classic 107: The Ties that Bind: WAG-Qaumajuq Celebrates Motherhood with MOTHERGROUND, October 11, 2024

La Liberte: Le grand solo de Dominique Rey, October 11, 2024

Galleries West: Dominique Rey – MOTHERGROUND, November 25, 2024

Winnipeg Free Press: Artist Dominique Rey makes case motherhood a catalyst for creativity, December 21, 2024

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WAG-Qaumajuq recognizes that land acknowledgements are part of an ongoing dialogue with Indigenous Nations, and we are grateful to live and work on these lands and waters. Institutionally, WAG-Qaumajuq is committed to acknowledging our colonial history and we are actively working to interrogate the Gallery’s colonial ways of being.

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