SUSAN FEINDEL @ OFFTHEMAPGALLERY
Gallery director & curator: Antonia Lancaster

‘REMEDIATION: sea dumped munitions’
by Susan Feindel

OPENING RECEPTION, Saturday, March 5th, 2 - 5pm (artist present)
Show runs from March 5th - March 26th, 2005
80 Spadina Avenue, 5th floor, Toronto, Canada M5V 2J4
Gallery Hours: Wednesday through Saturday, 11am to 5pm

ARTIST TALK at OISE, Thursday March 3rd, 4 - 5:30pm
252 Bloor Street West, Toronto
The Peace lounge, 7th floor, south side

OFFTHEMAPGALLERY is pleased to present the current research and art work of prominent Nova Scotian artist Susan Feindel. Feindel’s art explores and exposes one of the most important ecological threats of our time.
Antonia Lancaster, curator

SUSAN FEINDEL: I am interested in Canada's Eastern Continental Shelf, the plains and slopes of what are widely known as The Fishing Banks. As my work tracks these distant and fragile habitats, it juxtaposes medical imagery with ocean life, bringing each closer to human consciousness and making visceral, the thought, "my body, the sea". While resident, aboard Bedford Institute of Oceanography vessel C.C.G.S. Hudson, I was able to access scientific data and video imagery as it arrives from the deep. There I also read "explosives dumping area" and "danger area explosives" on a chart of Emerald Bank and Emerald Basin. The corrosion of the shells and rounds which were dumped five decades ago is progressing quickly now. It's feared by some, that major quantities of chemical agents are about to leak into the sea, further impacting on the world's endangered fish stocks and endangering human life by entering into the food chain. Through my art work I enter into this dialogue and will partake in the World Conference on Sea-dumped Munitions taking place in Halifax, October, 2005. This exhibition reflects the delicacy and vulnerability of marine life and matter. It projects a utopian position for resilience of ocean essentials: salt, sediment, calcium, gelatin; and the will of people to remedy unfortunate decisions of the past.
Susan Feindel, Visual Artist

BIO: I make paintings and installations which reflect changes in natural habitats. Pursuing this research I have accompanied scientists to politically and ecologically sensitive locations; the Canadian High Arctic, Clayoquot Sound, and The Fishing Banks of Canada's Eastern Continental Shelf. I gained further insight into marine subject matter through participation in the First International Symposium on Deep Sea Corals, when Canada's eastern coral beds became a hot topic in fishing, scientific and political communities, and an issue of international importance. My installations are composed of large scale paintings for floor and wall, artist books, and videos in tiny monitors which emphasize "scale" and the difficulty of observing and understanding certain habitats. I have found support for my work through the National Art Gallery of Canada’s Claudia De Hueck Art and Science Fellowship program, the granting programs of the Region of Ottawa-Carleton, the Department of Tourism and Culture, Nova Scotia, and the interest in my work of staff and directors of galleries that represent my work; Studio 21, Halifax, Galerie St. Laurent-Hill, Ottawa, and Agnes Bugera, Edmonton. Notable public exhibitions are Figura: Susan Feindel, curator, Petra Halkes, The Ottawa Art Gallery, 1998; Susan Feindel : Marine Work ( working title) Dalhousie Art Gallery, Aug. - Sept. 2005, curator Susan Gibson Garvey. Permanent installations of commissioned mosaic and fresco murals, enable my studio developments to inhabit the public domain.

For more information please view the Susan Feindel page at the website of the Center For Contemporary Canadian Art: www.ccca.ca. Watch for Petra Halkes’ new book Aspiring to the Landscape with focus on four installations of large-scale paintings by Canadian artists Eleanor Bond, Susan Feindel, Stephen Hutchings, and Wanda Koop (University of Toronto press, Spring 2005).

Susan Feindel gratefully acknowledges the following:

The work and dedication of Antonia Lancaster, Director of Offthemap Gallery, in providing a "neutral" exhibition space for artists who are exploring new avenues of technique and subject matter.

The financial support of the Province of Nova Scotia's Department of Tourism, Culture and Heritage, for this exhibition of my work.

Tonya Wimmer Msc. President, of the Marine Animal Response Society, and The Whitehead Lab, Dalhousie University, for providing me with seismic and whale sounds recorded near Sable Gully, 2001.

For further information contact Antonia:
Tel: 416 642 2113 or 1 877 860 0019
email: info@offthemapgallery.com
web: www.offthemapgallery.com