Ryan M. Wispinski, Gatekeepers - Acceptance, Mask pair – bark, jute hair, wild boar tusk, 2012. The Westin Edmonton, Photograph by Au7umn.

Born into a creative family, Ryan Wispinski learned to carve wood during his childhood and has since incorporated other mediums such as stone, paper, pen, and ink. His latest exhibit We Will ART YOU! features a large, intricate ink drawing and several attractive wood carvings that encourage people to take a closer look. As seen in works such as Bat in Fir, Red Shoulder Hawk, and Hunter, each of them contains intricate details that enhance their realism, also revealing the numerous hours of labour and care devoted to them.

Deep personal meaning and memories are associated with his works. For Wispinski, each act of artistic creation is an open-ended process of discovery and a fulfilling journey that viewers are invited to experience. It is never evident what path his new creations may take, although it may become clearer as his work progresses. However, there are instances, such as for Whiskey in the Coffee, in which the work may end up being something that is still in the creative process, that Wispinski may never feel is complete.

His evolving practice is characterized by an intuitive and meditative process that draws inspiration from various sources and life experiences. Functioning as a form of personal therapy, his creation of art also becomes a way to connect with people as well as reduce the societal stigma around mental illness. For example, he attaches great significance to Serpent and Mask as it has been a part of many life stories and exhibits over the years. For The Three Turtles, he worked on this piece over nine months, during which he lost a friend as well as others who have struggled with mental health issues.

Wispinski previously participated in The Works Art & Design Festival 2015, during which he invited the public to join him within his creative space while he worked. His current exhibit is available for viewing at the Westin Hotel until late August.

Sylvain Voyer, Selected artworks from "I Speak Tree", 2023, Stantec Tower, Edmonton, AB.

If you were to think about trees in Canada, one of the most visible reminders of their presence is when their leaves change colour and fall in the autumn, prompting people to clear their yards and sidewalks.  Apart from that time of year, the ubiquity and omnipresence of trees in our communities is something that people may not give much thought about as they go about their daily lives. Sylvain Voyer’s installation I Speak Tree could be regarded as a reverential tribute to trees, through which it encourages viewers to reflect on the significance of trees and, more broadly, nature to their own lives. 

I Speak Tree consists of several repurposed poster and reproductions of original paintings. Viewers will be struck by their colourfulness and variety as well as the different aesthetic techniques used.  Representing all four seasons, the images include evergreen, deciduous, coniferous, and other types of trees within different natural environments and climates. Some images depict trees in daylight surroundings with backdrops such as mountains, rivers, and other natural formations, whereas other images feature close-up shots of the trees’ leaves or atmospheric representations of trees in the evening.  

One notable work is a framed image of a huge, ancient tree in a grassy field with mist and hills in the background. Beneath this image is a row of small fabric figures who appear to be wearing traditional Central or South American clothes. Connoting a connection between history and nature as well as between people and history, this work reminds us that all living things have a valuable history that we may be unaware about and that it deserves attention and preservation. Furthermore, it reminds us that trees sustain life as they are an essential part of the earth’s ecosystem. 

The installation also reminds us of how our own existence is dependent on and intricately interconnected with nature. Perhaps it encourages us to treasure and preserve the past for future generations, since it can never be recovered once it is lost. 

Voyer’s exhibit is located on the second floor of the Stantec Tower, where other exhibits are also available for public viewing. 

As part of their artistic practice, multimedia artist Breanna Barrington aims to work sustainably and often incorporates second-hand materials into her works, through which they explore ecological concerns and hopes to encourage people to take meaningful action. Featured on Churchill Square as part of this year’s The Works Arts & Design Festival, Barrington’s work Nature First Aid (2022) asked us to reconsider our society’s impact on the environment, similar to Agatha Chacinski’s work A Grasp for Love (2022) that also appeared this festival. Whereas Chacinski’s installation foregrounds real and artificial manifestations of nature as a locus for people to reconceptualize their relationship to it, Barrington’s work emphasized the proliferation of human-made goods to highlight human society’s adverse impact and encroachment upon the natural environment. 

Barrington’s work consisted of a stove and what appeared to be the remains of a fridge, within which she housed a wide variety of objects collected from various sources such as thrift stores, alleys, and the Reuse Center. The work raised questions about human impacts on the natural environment by asking us to contemplate the value that we put on material goods, as well as the significant volume of goods that we produce, consume, and throw away. According to recent statistics, Canada's estimated total waste generation is the largest in the world, with an estimated annual waste total of over 1.3 billion metric tons.  

In viewing the installation, it was worthwhile to spend some time looking at the various items that were displayed within it. The sheer volume and variety of items displayed in this installation created a cumulative effect that enhanced its impact upon viewers. People would see things such as a plastic fork, crushed pop can, chewing gum wrapper, and cap from a plastic container, all of which are reminders of the amount of waste that our communities produce. There were also familiar objects such as an umbrella, sunglasses, and fishing net, as well as vintage items such as an old photograph, a peace medallion, and various ornaments. Some items reminiscent of childhood appeared in the installation as well, including building blocks, stickers, and jigsaw pieces. Scattered among these numerous objects were some dry dirt and human-made items evocative of nature such as a paper butterfly, flower patterned wrapping paper, and artificial tree leaves.   

Taken as a whole, it was almost as if the installation’s volume of stuff overpowered and suppressed any vestiges of nature that emerged within it, even as most of those were human-made. Its location on the grey concrete of Churchill Square heightened its impact. At the same time, the installation itself embodies the importance and value of reusing and repurposing objects, since these can extend these objects’ longevity and also endow them with new meanings and significance. With its numerous vintage objects, some of which depicted images of nature, the work may also prompt some people to consider the relationship that human society has had with nature in the past and whether it has been better in comparison to today. However, Barrington’s work is not intended to be a harkening back to a naturalistic utopia of the past, but rather a call to action in the present that asks us to consider our individual and collective impact upon nature and what we can do locally to address it.  

The past two years of the pandemic have impacted people’s lives significantly and contributed to people’s sense of isolation and disconnection from each other. In this year’s The Works Art & Design Festival, two interactive installations on Churchill Square were a welcome addition in reigniting these bonds of communication and social interaction. In their own ways, Kristie Edwardsen’s Kindness and Connection (2022) and Kelly Andres’ Plantling a Promise (2022) both engaged with the act of communication as a means to make a difference by encouraging people to contribute their thoughts. Through people’s collective contributions, these inanimate installations came to life, generating a collective consciousness and shared sense of community that is envisaged by proactive and positive thinking in material form.   

Consisting of a wooden see-through dome, Kelly Andres’ Plantling a Promise invited people to write a sincere promise to care for the environment on a square piece of coloured cloth, which was subsequently hung up in the dome for other people to see. In return, people received a sunflower seedling to care for and remind them of their promise. Over the course of the entire Works Festival, the number of coloured cloths hanging in the dome grew as more people contributed their promises in writing. The increasing proliferation of colourful cloths created a pleasing aesthetic effect that enlivened the dome and also evoked a collective sense of accomplishment. Previously an empty wooden structure, the dome came to life and slowly became the material embodiment of expressed collective thought for a better world.   

Like Andres’ installation, Kristie Edwardsen’s Kindness & Connection (2022) produced a collective synergy of positive thinking through its accumulation of people’s thoughts. Two sides of Edwardsen’s box-shaped structure contains images and text from local students that demonstrate the numerous ways in which people can be kinder to each other. The other two sides of the installation consist of chalkboard panels where people would write their thoughts about what they are thankful for. As the chalkboards were cleared daily, the installation took on a dynamic quality as different people contributed their thoughts each day. 

These two works constitute a source of inspiration for what people can achieve together and how a sense of community can be built. Although there is the traditional saying “Actions speak louder than words,” equally important are the positive thoughts that are necessary to provide the conditions for such actions to be realized. 

When viewing Agatha Chacinski’s installation work A Grasp for Love (2022) for the first time, people may initially have been struck most by the bright blue wall of painted purple flowers and the colourful plant life residing in the five pot-like structures that were arranged on the grass. However, upon closer examination, visitors noticed that her work did not contain any live plants and that they were, in fact, artificial creations. Each pot also contained a painted purple heart that was attached to the blue wall via a long piece of sturdy rope. 

Chacinski’s work prompted us to contemplate our relationship to nature and the types of authentic connections that we may desire to cultivate with it. The work’s artificiality was heightened by the very surroundings in which visitors experienced it. Surrounded by Churchill Square’s greenery and concrete, visitors would become more conscious of its artificiality, even as they may have been simultaneously drawn to its colourfulness and beauty. Pleasant psychological states associated with nature such as comfort, tranquillity, and rejuvenation may have risen initially when people viewed Chacinski’s work, but these feelings were rapidly tempered in the presence of the actual, living vegetation and grey, impersonal concrete that surrounded it. The artificial plants may have evoked some fascination and attention from people, but they could never fully substitute for the real nature that surrounded it.   

This jarring juxtaposition highlighted the fragility of nature itself and the ease with which human-made structures and semblances of nature can supplant it. With increasing urbanization across Canada, people are becoming increasingly disconnected from the natural environment, such that their relationship with it has become filtered through an urban lens. Fake foliage and flora similar to what was found in this work can be seen in numerous indoor settings such as shopping malls, office buildings, and restaurants, in an attempt to evoke the presence of nature within human-made environments that have paradoxically displaced the natural environments on which they reside for their existence.   

Produced during the pandemic, Chacinski’s work raised questions about how humanity coexists with the natural environment, which has undergone drastic and debilitating impacts at the cost of human “progress” and development. Encouraging people to reconnect with nature in new and different ways, the work’s description asked, “How long will nature need to grasp for your love?” The question is intriguing and deliberate in placing nature at the centre of the conversation, rather than people. Perhaps this is the point, because only then can people truly rethink their understanding of nature and forge an ethical relationship with it that is not defined by its utility, but rather that recognizes its intrinsic value to the world in which we live.