Pattern Play

July 22, 2023 – August 19, 2023

Olga Korper Gallery invites you to our summer group show, “Pattern Play,” an exhibition exploring how pattern bridges pathways through science, culture, mathematics, language, and the natural world.

Looking at the patterns of everyday experience, some turn to their surroundings like Gerald Ferguson’s use of found objects and Meaghan Hyckie’s investigation of suburban landscapes; while others, like Barbara Hobot and Lois Andison travel outside their immediate surroundings to comb through bodies of water and explore the world of fog-catching nets. Ken Nicol, Kelly Mark, and Shabnam K. Ghazi ponder the power of language with its unsuspected patterns of linguistics. Veering to the historical use of pattern, Robert Fones and Esmaa Mohamoud examine how the weaving of patterns into architecture and textiles reflect principles of culture and identity. When finished with the world among us, John McEwen and Matt Donovan turn to that which is not easy to grasp like the patterns of the cosmos and mathematics.

With pattern comes play—the play of movement, shape, texture and colour. Embodying these fundamental tools of art-making, in the work of John Brown and Ron Shuebrook are the patterns of their bodies as they move across the surface of paper and panel. Together our artists interweave ideas of pattern from conceptual to the act of production, making us stop for a moment to realize that pattern is at play all around us.