Penelope Stewart
Artist Statement
“A wood is a garden of forking paths- even when there are no well-trodden paths in a wood, everyone can trace his or her own path, deciding to go to the left or to the right of a certain tree and making a choice at every tree encountered.” Umberto Eco
While driving one spring Stewart was struck by bundles of branches on the side of the road ready for recycling. She stopped her car and retrieved several bundles with the intention of making moulds of the individual branches from which to cast. These cast branches in all their iterations beeswax, bronze and now paper are hyperobjects, imbued with a poetic presence, a vital materiality.
Penelope Stewart, Les Petites Branches, cotton paper cast and beeswax, variable sizes, limited edition series
Bio
Penelope Stewart was born in Montréal, Québec. She received an MFA from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and in 2010 she was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of the Arts (RCA). Her work has been exhibited at such notable institutions as The Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo New York; Musée d’Art de Joliette, Québec; Lotusland, Montecito, California; Musée Barthétè, Boussan, France; Koffler Gallery, Toronto; Oakville Galleries, Ontario; Tom Thomson Art Gallery, Ontario; ACT Design Museum Canberra, Australia; Poimena Gallery, Launceston, Tasmania, Australia. Currently on exhibit, Cleave …a walk in the wilderness, is the first part of a yearlong project at Dawson College, Montréal and in 2017 Stewart will be Artist in Residence at the Medalta Museum in Medicine Hat, Alberta.
