Paul Smith

15 November 1990 - 15 December 1990
Opening Reception 15 November 1991 8pm

West Gallery:

Whistle Reel Hover Pluck Plummet Flicker Stir

Montreal artist Paul Smith’s solo exhibition at Mercer Union, WHISTLE REEL HOVER PLUCK PLUMMET FLICKER STIR, opens on Thursday November 15 at 8:00pm and continues through to December 15. The artist will be exhibiting a number of large illustrative paintings that experiment with the existent relationship between representation and pictorial language.

Paul Smith attempts to jar notions of nostalgia and theatre through his groupings of signs, symbols and forms borrowed from the graphic arts, advertising, and from mechanical and musical languages. Each painting is a collection and compression of distinctive images, represented through styles borrowed from historical image-making practices. Questioning and building on ideas of the past and present and moral, social and scientific perspectives, Smith re-evaluates aesthetic notions of beauty and the value of the artwork.

Paul Smith has participated in solo and group exhibitions in Montreal, Quebec, Moncton, Banff and Paris, France since 1980 and is currently teaching painting at the Banff Centre. 0riginally from Montreal, Smith was most recently the Assistant to the Head of Art Studio: Painting at The Banff Centre for the Arts. He’s currently residing in Lethbridge, Alberta. This exhibition in Mercer Union’s West Gallery will be the artist’s first solo show in Toronto. On Wednesday November 14 at 9:00pm a public talk by the artist will take place at Mercer Union. Admission is free.