The works in this exhibition present fantastical narratives in which animals preside over strange episodes: tales are rewritten or unwritten, travellers embark on uncertain journeys, danger lurks deep in the forest, a witch appears from nowhere, birds and beasts are spellbound, clothing is enchanted, and a shoe materializes, as if magically spun from gold. If animals are “good to think with,” as anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss once famously remarked, then folk and fairy tales have a long history of speaking through beasts, whose otherworldly transformations can express our innate or unconscious desires.

The exhibition is curated by Anne Koval.

Participating Artists:

Amalie Atkins
Matt Brown
Aganetha Dyck
Meryl McMaster
Sylvia Ptak
Vicky Sabourin
Diana Thorneycroft
Anna Torma
Laura Vickerson
Janice Wright Cheney

Anna Torma, Permanent Danger 2, 2019, hand embroidery and appliqué on linen, 210 x 150 cm. Courtesy of the artist