Exhibitions

Joshua Jensen-Nagle | Endless Summer
Bau-Xi Gallery Vancouver
May 5 - 19
Opening Reception: Saturday, March 24, 2-4PM

In his acclaimed series Endless Summer, Canadian photographer Joshua Jensen-Nagle continues to­­ capture aerial images of sunbathed beaches around the world, transforming crowds of people into toy-like figures set against sublime natural backdrops.

Approaching the medium of photography as a “means to evoke emotion rather than document a reality”, Jensen-Nagle’s beach-goers in repose evoke a collective reminiscence, sparking personal associations that might resemble the artist’s own nostalgia for a “childhood spent on the shore… memories of never-ending days floating in the water, jumping waves.”

Jensen-Nagle’s bird’s-eye view and immersive, large-scale format disturbs one’s sense of depth and perspective to abstract these familiar sites of leisure; dramatic visual patterns emerge from the photographic surface: colourful umbrellas form recurring motifs, swimmers afloat become the material of choice for the artist’s mark-making, poised between the painterly washes of sand and surf demarcating these compositions.

Beyond their evocative potential and arresting imagery, Joshua Jensen-Nagle’s scenes inspire a dialogue revolving around the nuanced spatial history of the beach. The effect of this imaging is multifold, a study of topographical and ecological tensions between the boundaries of land and sea; a liminal space between nature and civilization, the familiar and unknown. Situated in this intersectional space, Jensen-Nagle examines the ways in which humanity inhabits these environments at the furthest reaches of the earth; ruminating upon the nature and evolution of leisure and its place in the breakneck pace of our everyday lives.

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Frederick Hagan | Close to Home: Paintings from 1940-1990
May 5 -19, 2018
350 Dundas St. West, Toronto, Upper Gallery
Opening Reception: Saturday May 5^th, 2-4pm

Frederick Hagan’s unique work has for decades responded to and shaped Canadian painting. Born in Toronto and raised in Cabbagetown, Hagan looked to his lived environments as sources for his artistic subjects. This is certainly evident in the collection of work to be exhibited in Close to Home: Paintings from 1940-1990. The works offer intimate glimpses into the artist’s home and studio; masterpieces honouring the humble objects found there.

Immersed in a culture of painting that increasingly privileged abstraction, Hagan was firmly committed to his figurative style with little investment in self-promotion. But the artist’s canvases were nonetheless deeply symbolic, powerful, and energized portraits of humanity that combined Cubist, Mannerist, Expressionist, and even Classical principles of composition while ultimately creating a style all his own, rooted his personal, existential questioning.

In 1967, Hagan was awarded the Canadian Centennial Medal; in 1985, he was commissioned by Canada Post to create the 16 postage stamps, issued 1986-1989; in 1998, he was awarded the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts Medal. His work is presented in prominent public collections including those of the Art Gallery of Ontario, the National Gallery of Canada, and the Royal Ontario Museum.

Frederick Hagan passed away on September 6, 2003 at the age of 85. "Close to Home: Paintings from 1940-1990" is being held this May to honour the late artist’s centennial.

View the collection here

Cori Creed | Strata
April 14-28, 2018
340 Dundas St West, Toronto
Opening Reception: Saturday April 14, 2:00 - 4:00pm - Artist in Attendance

Bau-Xi Gallery is pleased to present a new body of work by celebrated Canadian painter, Cori Creed. Inspired by her travels to coastal locations around the globe, Creed continues to capture the Canadian landscape with joy and vitality.

At once fascinated by her subject and by the process of painting itself, Creed's work focuses on the subject and the creator, with thick brushstrokes and marks of vivid colour reminding us of the artist's creative process. The newest vistas fracture and dissolve, allowing the viewer to oscillate between the depth of the scene and the two-dimensional nature of a painting's surface.

Cori Creed studied Fine Art at Simon Fraser University and Design at Capilano College. She lives and works in Vancouver, BC.

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Lori Nix and Kathleen Gerber | THE EMPIRE, THE CITY
Featured Exhibition, Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival 
May 1-31, 2018
350 Dundas St West, Toronto
Opening reception: Saturday, May 5, 2-4pm

Lori Nix and Kathleen Gerber’s urban scenes represent the spaces which celebrate modern culture, knowledge and innovation: the mall, the museum, the library and the vacuum showroom. Here, the natural world reclaims itself in an ironic realization of a paradise lost, leaving the monuments of civilization and material culture abandoned. Evidence of human presence may still be visible, but the cause for their absence is left unclear; the narrative remains open-ended.

As self-described ‘non-traditional’ photographers, Nix and Gerber meticulously construct their subject matter by hand, and capture it entirely in-camera, refraining from the use of digital manipulation. They build painstakingly detailed, three-dimensional dioramas, which often measure no more than twenty inches high, and can take up to fifteen months to complete. Nix uses a large-format film camera to render these miniature scenes larger than life, infusing layers of irony and whimsy into the seemingly grandiose scale of her and Gerber’s urban tableaux.

This exhibition has been selected as a featured exhibition for the annual Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival. 

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE COLLECTION 

Barbara Cole |  Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival 
April 17-May 31, 2018
First Canadian Place Gallery, 100 King Street West, Toronto 
Artist reception: Thursday, May 10, 5-7pm, with a collector’s preview at 4:30 pm

Bau-Xi Photo is proud to present a retrospective of photographer Barbara Cole’s work at First Canadian Place Gallery, as part of the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival. The exhibition features works from Cole’s four most recent series; Duplicity, Miroir d’eau/Meditations, Falling Through Time and Figure Painting. Join us at FCP Gallery, 100 King Street West, on Thursday, May 10 from 5-7pm for the opening reception, and to hear the artist discuss her work. Please RSVP at photo@bau-xi.com to attend the collector’s preview at 4:30 pm.

Barbara Cole is an award-winning Canadian artist who is known for her distinct underwater photography. Cole’s artwork is extensively collected by both public and private institutions and has been exhibited worldwide in venues such as the Canadian embassies in Washington, D.C. and Tokyo, Japan. 

Click here to view Barbara Cole's work 

Pat O’Hara | Serpentine
March 24 - April 10
3045 Granville St, Vancouver
Opening Reception: Saturday, March 24, 2-4PM, Artist in Attendance

Pat O’Hara’s latest suite of acrylic paintings draws on a variety of techniques which overlap sinuous swirls and curvilinear forms. A departure from the bright and saturated palette of her previous body of work Linearity, O’Hara’s use of dense and earthy colours evokes landscape imagery and meditates on life and death.

Since her break away from representational subject matter in 2013, repetitive line and mark-making have become O’Hara’s signature oeuvre. In Serpentine, the artist eschews her emphasis on even line and experiments with modulated brushstrokes to investigate the psychological tension revealed in broken line and ambiguous colour relationships. Each painting is rich with atmospheric effect. The eye dances between bundled marks of opaque paint which meander in ever-searching oblivion, fragmented and incomplete, evolving into transformative and hopeful utopias.

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Joshua Jensen-Nagle | Dreams and Journeys 
April 14-28, 2018
350 Dundas St. West, Toronto
Opening Reception: Saturday April 14, 2:00 - 4:00pm

In his latest series Dreams and Journeys, Joshua Jensen-Nagle brings a playful approach to the everyday traveller. These works capture architectural subjects from all over Europe, revisited by the artist who returns to his past subjects with a new perspective. Each image is a sublime experience of a known site: Rome’s Pantheon glows in white light as an admiring public spill from its doors onto a busy street; Jerusalem’s Western Wall humbles its reverent visitors; the sprawling Place de la Bourse in Bordeaux enwraps a lively scene of tourists waiting to see their reflection in the Miroir D'Eau. These newest scenes are impressive theatres of civilization and geography that both indulge our sense of nostalgia and appreciation of architectural treasures. Common to each image is a distinct sense of contemporaneity: every place—embattled, sacred, and sometimes austere—re-enters the present by way of human engagement. History and daily life coexist; Jensen-Nagle’s places are not documents, but “views,” intended to prompt the curious and familiar sensation of dreams and memories intertwining. Joshua Jensen-Nagle has mounted over fifty exhibitions in Canada and abroad, and is included in notable private and institutional collections such as the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, Cirque du Soleil and the Griffin Museum in Boston. His work has appeared in publications including Canadian Art, Harper’s, Art in America, and Fashion. He holds a degree in Image Arts and Photographic Studies from Ryerson University and lives and works in Toronto.

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350 Dundas St West, Toronto
March 24 to April 7, 2018

Bau-Xi Photo is thrilled to present a group exhibition, showcasing work by David Leventi, Jill Greenberg, David Burdeny and Barbara Cole. 

Click here to view the photography collection