#mfa studio

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Featured MFA: Louis-Charles Dionne

Our featured MFA this week is second year sculpture and installation artist Louis-Charles Dionne! 

Louis-Charles Dionne is a multidisciplinary artist and educator from the South shore of Montreal, Quebec. He holds a BFA in Sculpture and Art History, and a graduate diploma in Post-Secondary Education from UQÀM. Dionne re-positions prosaic artifacts in order to twist and question relations with everyday objects. His work reorients the material cultures around us through slight shifts in their composition, framing and utility.

Check out more of his work here: www.louischarlesdionne.com

What are you working on right now?

For the past year, I have been carving a fitted bedsheet out of a slab of ordinario bianco (‘ordinary white’) marble. I carved the first side over the summer and fall semester, flipped the stone in early January, and was carving up to the last day we had access to our studios, before the lockdown. When it happened, I was finishing the last portion of the carving: the elastic band (3 more days and I would have been done!) Carving the elastic band was challenging. It is the defining feature of a fitted bed sheet so it is the part I really could not mess up. On the other hand, it was very satisfying to see this last little touch tie all work together.     

In the present context, it is a bit hard for me to continue stone carving on my kitchen table so, instead of the physical work, I have been spending time working on the written thesis.  

How do you relate/see your studio?

There are a lot of objects in my studio! I work with found objects so the studio is where I accumulate them and live with them for a while. Some of them end up in installations/compositions, some are just great studio buddies, and some I just eventually get rid of. I need to spend time with these objects to figure out who they are, what they want to do, what I would like them to do, and what could be a successful compromise.

Is there an object in your studio with significance/a story? Maybe it’s just weird?

One of the first objects I brought to the studio is this piece of driftwood I found on the waterfront. It is actually a tree. I had help bringing it in my space, I think, in the first month after starting the MFA program. I picked it up for two main reasons: 1) the tree had grown around a small rock that it is still holding on to 2) it is covered with worm tracks that create a pattern very similar to cross-hatching. I spent two years with it and still have not been able to use it in any forum. Now it feels like it is a completed work in itself.  

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Featured MFA: Jordan Beaulieu

Our featured MFA this week is first year expanded media artist Jordan Beaulieu!

Jordan is a visual artist from Prince Edward Island with a BFA in studio art and art history from Concordia University. They work primarily in drawing, mixed media and printed matter, with a focus in intersections between art and forms of popular and ephemeral medias including comics, zines, and amateur video.

What is your focus/medium?

Drawing, comics and zines for a long time but lately I'm using photo, video, writing, rug hooking and performance I guess. I'm not particularly skilled in any media and I find a lot of freedom in playing around without the expectation that I need to become an expert.

What are you working on right now?

Right now cases of COVID-19 are beginning to be diagnosed in the Maritimes, so I'm in self-isolation at my mom's house and not really sure what to work on. It feels weird to be trying to make art or do school work in the midst of a massive global health crisis, right? Maybe I will go to the beach and film some seagulls flying around? Hans Haacke did that. I might make a 2021 calendar of drawings based on antique hooked rug designs, just for fun because I'm such a fan. I could work on a rug I already have going--I just started learning how make them earlier this year and I highly recommend trying it out. Maybe I'll adopt some kind of Lee Lozano shtick where I stay in bed full-time, obsessively watching the news! 

Is there an object in your studio with significance/a story? Maybe it's just weird?

I don't think so. I am notably NOT there at the moment, my partner took these pictures when we went to clear my stuff out, shortly before the school closed. I sold my car to a junkyard a few hours before that. What a weird day... 

How do you relate to/see your studio?

I feel like it is very precious. I used to work from home and do a lot of things on the computer, which I still do, especially now, but having a dedicated space for making things has made a big difference, more than I expected actually, as I never had a dedicated studio space prior to this year. I feel relaxed and energized when I'm in there, so I can usually get work done, or sometimes it's just nice to have a semi-private space to check the email and eat some croissants.

Check out more of Jordan’s work on their website: https://jordanbeaulieu.com/

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Featured MFA: Joseph Pesina

Our featured MFA this week is second year ceramicist Joseph Pesina!

Joseph is a ceramic sculptor from Northeast Wisconsin; he comes to NSCAD from Logan, Utah where he earned his BFA in ceramics and sculpture from Utah State University. Joseph has completed artist in residencies at the Peninsula School of Art, The Clay Studio of Missoula and the Pottery Workshop and Experimental Sculpture Factory in Jingdezhen, China. Joseph’s work is very much centered on abstract ceramic sculpture influenced by the constructivist movement of the early 20th century.  

What are you working on right now?

The construct of my sculptural objects concerns itself with the planning of spatial relationships and object correlations with regard to conceptual practices. I use modular fabrication to reference mechanical processes alongside repetitive units to imply rhythmic motion. I rely heavily on visual balance and line weight to guide the development of series of artwork I make. In doing so I can explore positive and negative space as it relates to scale, surface, and form. Constructivism, formalism, and conceptual minimalism are key factors in the artwork I make and serve as a foundation upon which my sculptures are built. The aim of my sculptural practice is in questioning the role of technology, industry and modernity in our contemporary society.

Is there an object in your studio with significance/a story? Maybe it's just weird:

No. lol

How do you relate/see your studio?

My studio is often much more than a place to make artwork. I frequently refer to my studio as more of a laboratory or a think tank that exists without a physical space at times. The place where I make objects, and the place(s) where I think about objects are usually never in the same place. In many cases my relationship to my studio is more akin to a daily practice similar to praying or washing the dishes; both can be considered necessary for fulfillment.

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Featured MFA: Merryn Tresidder

Our featured MFA this week is second year Painter Merryn Tresidder!

Merryn is a Cornish, abstract painter, primarily concerned with the effect of hegemonic structures, such as ‘Art International English’, on colonized communities. His research stems from an informed sense of place using ideas surrounding minority languages and identities native to the UK. He is interested in how colours are interpreted in particular environs, their politics, and how the use of the Cornish language itself can give pigments a context. He graduated from The University of Westminster in 2013, and has exhibited and coordinated shows in London and Cornwall. Merryn has also worked with the Tate Gallery in St Ives where he designed & delivered learning activities aimed at young people.

What are you working on right now?

My Thesis show - an oceanscape panorama, with a diorama acting as a ‘key’, for the topographical references in my paintings. Inspired by the moment British modernism found its ‘primitive’ inspiration in Alfred Wallis’s kitchen, my images will try to elevate Wallis’s painting style and knowledge of the sea, to the art discourses of his discoverers. What was to be dubbed ‘British’ Modernisms pivotal moment, happened a stones throw from where i grew up, I’m apart of that ‘primitive’ culture that Ben Nicholson found in Cornwall, and Gauguin ‘found’ in Bretagne. The scene will extend its self to Nova Scotia, following Alfreds journey as a young fisherman, desperate to escape regionally imposed poverty. They’ll reference Alfred, The Vorticists and ideas from ‘De Stijl’ and the ‘New Plastic Expression’, combining them with other Celtic narratives that connect Kernow (Cornwall UK) and Ki’jipuktuk (Halifax NS), pastiche if you will. My thesis document thus far is taking the shape of a sea acknowledgement, looking at what it means to de-anglicise the colour of the sea here, and at home.

Is there an object in your studio with significance/a story? Maybe it's just weird?

There’s a Bunnahabhain that keeps me warm in the winter.

How do you relate/see your studio?

My studio is firstly where I work, paint even. Since my time as Grad rep and now MFA rep, on the student union - it’s also become the GUNSCAD office. A non-ratified group that upholds MFA interests in a predominately undergraduate student population. It’s been a fun two years.

Check out more of Merryn’s work on his website: www.merryntresidder.com/

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Featured MFA: Luke Fair

Our featured MFA this week is first year Painter Luke Fair!

Luke was raised in Calgary, AB, and graduated with a BFA in visual arts from the University of Victoria in 2016. He has lived and worked in Denmark, England and Scotland. Luke has previously worked with perceptions of nature and memory through painting and sculpture. His current practice investigates visual cultures of the outdoors and tensions among ecology, doom and ontology. Check out his work at: cargocollective.com/lukefair

What are you working on right now?

Questioning perceptions of 'climate, environment, ecology, and nature' are critical to my work. What are these things and how does visual imagery and identity present wilderness as a cultural object in Canada? For example, in response to the history of romanticism and landscape, I have been making palm sized sketchbooks to capture the sublime in my pocket. I hope to merge more of my sketching techniques with larger surfaces of canvas, paper, and wood. Source imagery for larger paintings mainly come from sketches, photographs, or notation from my own experiences but I also use imagery from mass media and the internet. My goals this semester are to carve out and expand a visual identity for representing land through a 'window' type view, disrupt traditional or expected compositions, and experiment with alternative painting mediums and surfaces. By the end of the semester I hope to have a mobile studio practice by bicycle.

Is there an object in your studio with significance/a story? Maybe it's just weird?

I have been saving a small take-out ketchup packet from superstore for a project at some point. The design on the front is completely bland and mundane. I love it. Red, white, text, negative space logo, printer marks. For some reason it doesn't really look like it would contain food inside. I think it reminds me to pay attention to even the small and mundane things of the world, they may conceal more than they reveal.