Michelle Bellmare, Kitter installation view, 2004
KILTER | MICHELLE BELLEMARE
18.09.2004 | 14.11.2004
The practice of Toronto artist Michelle Bellemare has continued to explore the momentary embodiment of loss: the loss of security, identity, and voice. Drawing from the realm of the everyday, the artist lifts commonplace objects out of their safe, comfortable context. Changes in the structure and materiality of these familiar forms elicit a host of subconscious fears in the viewer, and attendant feelings of anxiety, apprehension and vulnerability.
Bellemare’s past works focus on residues from the domestic environment. Selecting objects traditionally invested with the capacity to console, she modifies the forms to such a degree that the visceral sensations of psychic and physical discomfort become palpable. The soothing motions of a rocking chair are undermined by the steel blades at its base, grinding into the floor beneath. The surface of a plush pink teddy bear is bound with tenser bandages. The leg of a wooden crutch is replaced with rubber. A cozy pair of work socks, cast off in the corner of the room, has been re-knit from dust. While each work operates as a projection of subjective longing, each simultaneously describes a territory of doubt within the structure of the psyche.
While Bellemare’s objects imply use, their alterations thwart our expectations of function. Unsettling and disorientating, each undermines itself, betraying its intent. Rocking Staircase (1998-2003) is an enormous, mechanized wooden staircase fitted with a semi-circular metal railing across the underside of the stairs. Any progress is obviously at cross-purposes; ascension would not only be fruitless but perilous and, ultimately, illusory.
Michelle Bellemare’s most recent work is Tease (2004). A ball covered by a blond wig made from human hair rolls aimlessly on the floor, stopping momentarily when it bumps into an obstacle—only to turn around and continue the blind, blundering cycle again. The object both attracts and repels. Is it involved in a pathetic act of seduction as the golden hair sweeps about the floor—or is it writhing in pain at our feet?
Bellemare’s approach is relational, experiential and phenomenological. As metaphors for the body and its experiences, her enigmatic forms lend voice to the inexpressible, creating a haunting, surrealistic dreamscape.
Michelle Bellemare lives and works in Toronto. She is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design and a member of the Red Head Gallery and the Unconscious Project Collective. Her work has been shown in Canada at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Tableau Vivant Gallery, University of Toronto at Scarborough, Meg Gallery, Archive Gallery, the Koffler Gallery and the Red Head Gallery. In the United States it has been exhibited at the ARC Gallery, Chicago. A comprehensive publication on Michelle Bellemare's practice will be co-produced by the Koffler Gallery, Toronto, and the Southern Alberta Art Gallery.
Organized by the Southern Alberta Art Gallery (Curator Joan Stebbins). Funding assistance from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and The Canada Council for the Arts. Catalogue co-produced with Cambridge Galleries.