Sarah Cale
Mittelschmerz
16 January – 7 March 2020
Opening: Thursday January 16th from 6 to 9pm
GET RID OF MEANING. YOUR MIND IS A NIGHTMARE THAT HAS BEEN EATING YOU: NOW EAT YOUR MIND.
–Kathy Acker
For this new exhibition of paintings and sculptures Sarah Cale uses female forms caught in moments of transformation. Mittelschmerz, a word in German that translates as “middle pain,” is also a medical term used to describe when an egg is released from the ovary and the brief pain that often coincides with this pivotal moment. It also describes a moment of transition; a short period that is fertile, an opening of creative potential and possibility. Known for paintings that incorporate collage and fragments of paint that have been pulled from other, failed works, the visual genetics of these new paintings stem from earlier, labour intensive paintings that were abandoned, their strands disassembled and remade anew. Cale depicts female bodies and biomorphic forms that are caught “in the middle of something,” either in their narrative, in their composition, or in their awkward materiality. Each painting is playfully built up around repurposed abstract motifs that guide the compositions into being through their arrangement on the canvas. Figurative forms emerge in various states of being, caught between upheaval and flux, collapse and rebirth, confrontation and withdrawal.
Sarah Cale was born in Montreal and is based in Brussels. She received a BFA from the Nova Scotia Collage of Art and Design and an MFA from the University of Guelph. In 2009 and 2010 she was shortlisted for the Royal Bank of Canada painting award, and has been awarded numerous grants and residencies. Recent solo exhibitions include, Clint Roenisch Gallery, Toronto (2018); The Varley Art Gallery, Markham (2016); Kitchener Waterloo Gallery, Kitchener (2015); Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, Toronto (2015); Anna Leonowens, Halifax (2015); and the The Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge (2014). Her work has been included in group exhibitions at Towards Gallery (2019); McIntosh Gallery, London (2019), Galerie McClure, Montréal (2018); The Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver (2017); Galerie UQAM, Montreal (2013); Oakville Galleries, Oakville (2012); Equinox Gallery, Vancouver (2012); the Power Plant, Toronto (2010); and Musée D’Art Contemporain, Montréal (2009). She currently teaches at La Cambre in Brussels.
