Paige Gratland and Glenn Gear, Paper Lace #5, Material Collaboration, Handwoven textile, paper yarn and cotton, Hand stitched seal skin and glass beads, 10" x 10". Image courtesy of the artist.
For our final Main Gallery presentation of the year, the Alternator is pleased to present a unique half-residency, half exhibition by the Three Way Mirror collective.
For artists who belong to a social group that has often been marginalized, it is unsurprising that the Three Way Mirror queer collective are drawn to similarly marginalized crafts – art forms linked to the personal and political. For each member of Three Way mirror, there has been a natural progression, resulting in the production of queer colourways, glitter-bombed sealskins and paper-doll poems, as well as the “sewing circle” as a preferred mode of studio practice.
For the first few weeks of their time at the Alternator, the Three Way Mirror (Daniel Barrow, Glenn Gear and Paige Gratland) will create a queer craft “triangle” that will serve both as a production studio that will look forward to the group exhibition and as a touchstone for queer conceptual craft community.
On December 20th, the group will present their work in its final iteration. Join us for talks by the artists, inviting participants into conversations and reflections on identity, as well as a community drawing workshop. Stay tuned for more details about this event!
The completed Three Way Mirror exhibition will be on view in the Main Gallery from December 20 2024 - January 25 2025.
On Friday, December 6th, from 6-8pm the Alternator will host a reception for both Three Way Mirror and zev teifenbach’s exhibition salmon arm, bc. december 25, 2021. Please join us to celebrate these fantastic artists, and catch a sneak peak at some of the work that Barrow, Gear, and Gratland will be creating during their residency. This event is free to attend and light snacks will be provided. RSVP on Eventbrite.
Daniel Barrow is a Montreal-based artist who works in video, film, print-making and drawing, but is best known for his use of antiquated technologies, his “registered projection” installations, and his narrative overhead projection performances. Barrow describes his performance method as a process of, “creating and adapting comic narratives to manual forms of animation by projecting, layering and manipulating drawings on overhead projectors”.
Glenn Gear is an interdisciplinary artist of Inuit and Irish ancestry from Nunatsiavut, Labrador and based in Montreal. Gear has been working in hand-beaded objects, combining Inuit methods with his own intimate processes and approaches, which convey latent queer realities in traditional patterns. Working in beadwork on sealskin, Gear has begun incorporating glitter, sequins and other signifiers of queer culture to embrace personal and cultural connections between land, people, and animals through research-based creation. His handcrafted beadwork and animated films incorporate layers of meaning derived from materials, collage, and craft techniques, seen through an indigiqueer lens.
Paige Gratland is a visual artist and filmmaker. Her work is informed by social history and design, producing projects and objects that explore craft practices, intergenerational exchange and relationships to colour. She learned to weave in 2019 at the Richmond Weavers and Spinners Guild (British Columbia) and is currently enrolled in the Master Weaver Program at Olds College (Alberta).