Dara Humniski: MASS

November 20-May 20, 2012

In the summer of 2011, the Art Gallery of Alberta undertook a province-wide competition to commission a temporary installation for the walls of Ernest C. Manning Hall. The winning proposal, MASS by Dara Humniski, is the first in a series of new commissions by Alberta artists that will be created for the Hall over the next few years.

The exhibition comprises two large murals that are hand-drawn directly on the walls of the AGA’s Manning Hall. Each drawing references a different cloud formation, created from a dense web of fine, intersecting lines and woven shapes that are suggestive more of a solid mass than the weightless volume of a cloud. By making reference to clouds, however, MASS also then refers us to the sky, and metaphorically brings the outside into the Gallery. This is in keeping with the architecture of the new AGA building itself, and its recurrent design theme of the building visually opening itself to the exterior environment.

Dara Humniski is an emerging Edmonton-based artist. MASS is her first major installation.