VIU Student Art Exhibit Explores Questions about Diversity and Common Experiences

The View Gallery hosts student drawing exhibition, which runs March 5 to April 9.

The View Gallery’s latest exhibit, Puzzle: An Exhibition of Student Drawings, asks questions about who we are, how we got here and how we express ourselves.

The exhibit focuses on routes   ̶  how we get to our destination or travel through life; and roots  ̶ where we come from and some of the social, cultural and political influences in our lives.

Christine Battye, Assistant Curator for The View Gallery, says Puzzle is an opportunity to consider the diverse challenges people may face and one of the goals is to talk about diversity and create a dialogue that transcends the gallery walls.

“Puzzle was born from the fact that we have all these questions. It is for the community to really engage with and answer questions,” says Battye, adding that the name of the exhibit works on many levels. “It is both a verb and a noun and it’s a literal puzzle for me and Justin (McGrail, Curator of The View Gallery) to figure out how to hang the exhibit. It is a puzzle for the artists to determine how to express themselves within the context of the exhibit and for the audience in how they engage with the artwork.”

Battye hopes viewers are able to find some of themselves in the artwork exhibited, and it doesn’t matter if the viewer has an art background or not. 

Puzzle is the gallery’s annual juried student art show. Battye chose drawing because it is a basic fundamental skill taught to art students. VIU students were asked to submit pencil, charcoal, conté or ink drawings. Work was then juried by Battye and McGrail and hung salon style.

“Justin and I are looking at the pieces to create some form of music in a visual sense and hang them in columns. There won’t be that traditional white cube space, there will be multiple works on one wall,” says Battye.

Puzzle: An Exhibition of Student Drawings runs from Thursday, March 5 to Thursday, April 9 at VIU’s The View Gallery, which is open Tuesday to Friday from noon to 4 pm. The opening reception is 6 - 8 pm on March 5.

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Rachel Stern, Communications Officer, Vancouver Island University

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