North West River AiR: Six Years of Artist-in-Residence at the Labrador Institute

2018

Over the last six years, Grenfell Art Gallery's North West River Artist-in-Residence (AiR) program has hosted artists from across Canada working in a range of creative disciplines, including film, music, writing and visual art. Embedded in the inspiring surroundings of Labrador, the program provides crucial space and time for artists to create. Presented in this exhibition is the work of six artists who have participated in the residency, their shared concerns and the diversity of creativity that has emerged from the experience. The residency has fostered a range of work including a critical engagement with issues as diverse as environmental policy, epistemology, and Indigenous identity in relation to place and land.

Founded in 2012 by past-Director Charlotte Jones in partnership with the Labrador Institute of Memorial University, the residency is hosted at the Institute's North West River Research Station. North West River has been used as a meeting place for 3000 years. The region is culturally and historically rich, inhabited by Innu, Inuit, Metis and settlers. North West River is in close proximity to the Innu community of Sheshatshui and Lake Melville, and the publically accessible programs and projects that participating artists produce as part of their residency often engage with these communities.

In addition to the artists featured in this exhibition Kay Burns, Geoff Butler, Steve Evans, Melissa Tremblett, Anne Troake, and Gerald Vaandering, over the last six years the residency has also included John K Samson, Jordan Bennett and Amy Malbeuf, Karlie King, Eden Robinson, and Janet Langdon and Bruce Pashak.

Grenfell Art Gallery gratefully acknowledges our ongoing partners in the North West River Artist-in-Residence program the Labrador Institute of Memorial University and Artist-in-Residence Sponsor PAL Airlines.