Judy Major-Girardin – Surface Tension
16 Feb – 21 March 2018
Canadian artist Judy Major-Girardin brings her show Surface Tension to NZ as part of an artist residency at Wharepuke.
Judy Major-Girardin – Artist Bio
Judy Major-Girardin received her BFA from the University of Windsor in Canada and her MFA from the University of Alabama in the USA. She teaches in the School of the Arts at McMaster University and is Co-Chair of the Cambridge Sculpture Garden. Her work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions throughout Canada and the U.S.A. Unites States galleries include NYC Ariel Gallery, the Staten Island Institute of Arts and Science; the Firehouse Gallery, Georgia; the Maralyn Wilson Gallery, Birmingham; the Susan Moody Gallery of Art, Tuscaloosa, Alabama; the Bloch Gallery of Art, Montevallo, Alabama; Malone Gallery, Troy University, Alabama Georgia; In Ontario she has shown at the Burlington Art Centre; Kitchener/Waterloo Public Art Gallery; the Mississauga Civic Centre; the Glenhyrst Art Gallery of Brant; the Cambridge Public Gallery; the McMaster Museum of Art; Transit Gallery; the Collingwood Art Centre and Nathaniel Hughson Gallery. In Montreal she has shown at ART 11 and in Toronto at Eastern Front Gallery; Pauline McGibbon Centre and University of Toronto Art Centre.
Prints and paintings have been included in juried exhibitions in Japan, Taiwan, New York, California, Ohio, Illinois, South Dakota, Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto. Her work was included in a National Touring Print exhibition that has traveled to Windsor, Chatham, the University of Toronto, the University of Western Ontario, Whitehorse, Sarnia, Sudbury and Cape Breton. Girardin has participated in artist residencies in Newfoundland, Quebec, Alabama, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Atlanta and New Zealand and regularly provides artist talks and conference presentations.
Artist’s Statement
I work to visualize, interpret and communicate ideas and observations about the natural world and contribute to a discourse that links art with environmentalism and sustainability. I believe that images are powerful motivators that have the potential to shift our attitudes and behaviours towards choices that are more compatible with conservation, preservation and restoration. This can happen through direct experiences with nature but can also be mediated through art that embodies an artist’s time spent looking, understanding, recording and translating information into new impressions that can raise awareness and promote thinking beyond the confines of an image. To quote UK author and critic, Michael Tanner:
“…in the end the only thing that matters in relation to the arts, is what they do to us, what state they put us in and maybe leave us in, and what the consequences are for other parts of our lives.”
My research advocates for a studio art practice that is committed to identifying and investigating environmentally responsible approaches with a purpose to question, activate and inspire positive change in our relationship with nature and lead in alternative studio strategies that consider responsible making, consuming and disposal. As an object maker, I am conscious of the potential negative impact of studio production and strive to make material and process choices that avoid acids, toxic chemicals, hazardous waste and excess. One example of this is my recent work with wood lithography that uses gum Arabic and lemon juice as an alternative to nitric acid, tannic acid and volatile organic compounds for processing a lithographic image. The printing matrix can later be reused as a relief surface for further printing or up-cycled as a support for painting to avoid waste. I believe that environmental responsibility and artistic practice can coexist without a compromise in quality and I keep this belief at the forefront of my research and teaching.
I work in a variety of media including printmaking (lithography, intaglio, relief), painting (oils without solvents, acrylic, gouache), book arts, fiber-based arts (printing and sewing on fabric) and occasionally employ nature recordings in my work. I have recently been pond snorkeling expanding my practice to include underwater photography. My concern for the environment is reflected in my choice of subject matter and content. I derive imagery from observing, photographing and drawing wetland areas to examine intersections between abstraction and representation while also considering our relationship with the natural environment. Wetlands, and in particular water, provide a continually changing source of visual information that I can interpret to invite a broad range of associations, including those connected with issues of sustainability. Wetlands are dynamic spaces that promote reflection and contemplation and function to efficiently restore ecological health. Once viewed as inaccessible, unproductive and insect infested, we now understand the unique contribution of these areas as biologically rich and productive systems in filtering, purification and flood management. Significant portions of wetlands globally have been converted to urban, agricultural and industrial development making their conservation and preservation an urgent topic of concern. Our assumptions regarding water are shifting rapidly and we now realize that it is not the inexhaustible resource that we once took for granted.
Judy’s Web site
Judy’s exhibition and residency at Wharepuke was supported by the Ontario Arts Council