This 1985 acrylic, photo-serigraph and graphite on Plexiglas is one of 50 works by Carl Beam on display through February at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery. It is titled The North American Iceberg.
In January and February 2013 the Thunder Bay Art Gallery will host the National Gallery of Canada’s retrospective exhibition of works by artist Carl Beam (1943-2005), whose influence as a leading contemporary Aboriginal artist from the mid-1980s challenged the prevailing marginalization of contemporary Aboriginal art.
This exhibition travels to the Thunder Bay Art Gallery from the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa and is curated by the National Gallery’s Audain curator of indigenous art, Greg Hill. Thunder Bay marks the last stop on a tour that has also included gallery locations in Ottawa, Vancouver, Regina, Winnipeg, and New York.
Starting in the 1970s, Carl Beam was at the vanguard of a new and assertive art discourse. Beam’s philosophical approach to contemporary art in the three decades since has contributed much in terms of a critique on the place of reason and instrumentality in the colonial expansion of Western society.
His art engages his Anishinabek traditions through its recognition of the important role of dreams, the place of spirit helpers, and the lessons of his Aboriginal ancestry. At the same time, it builds intellectual bridges between the philosophical thinking of Western and Anishinabek traditions. Beam contrasts a society transfixed by the lure of a fleeting technological utopia against that of the unyielding permanence of the natural world. He creates a temporal space measured in concepts of time based on natural forces, as opposed to the linear systems of time measurement that regulate Western civilization.
The late artist’s work builds intellectual bridges between the philosophical thinking of Western and Anishinabek traditions.
Approximately 50 of Beam’s works have been selected for the exhibit.
On Friday, February 15, 7:30 p.m., Aakideh: The Art & Legacy of Carl Beam, a documentary film about the artist, will screen at the Paramount Theatre, 24 South Court Street. Admission by donation.
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