Janice Gurney: Reading Between the Lines

Despite decades of psychological, philosophical and historical study, the issue of what happens to us when we look at art can still be quite opaque. Even if one is inwardly moved by a film, a book or another piece of art, there can be little sign of this externally. And the words we use to communicate internal experience—should we choose to do so—can often fall short.

Artist Janice Gurney probes these fissures between experience and description of art in two works on view at Wynick/Tuck Gallery. In one video, Silent Reading, Gurney depicts seven professional writers, including Catherine Bush, Guy Gavriel Kay and Andre Alexis, reading silently from books of their choice. In a different video, Thick Description, Gurney documents six people, including artist Robert Fones, art historian Mark Cheetham and gallerist Lynne Wynick, reacting out loud to the Greg Curnoe text painting Nice Day Bad News.

In both cases Gurney creates a mood of reflection and searching meditation on art, its meanings and its ever-shifting impacts. In many ways it’s as if Gurney has created a little haven for informal aesthetic study, a temporary library of the mind.

This mood is particularly fitting given an accompanying show, “40_3,” the third in a series of group exhibitions held to mark Wynick/Tuck’s 40th anniversary. Kim Adams’s Mini Ride, a sculpture made of two Mini-car roofs fixed together, is a focal point, while stencils by Gerald Ferguson, assemblages by Ted Rettig, mixed media by Greg Curnoe, sketches from Doris McCarthy, small works by Monica Tap and an early painting by Angela Leach are also shown.

As Gurney’s works indicate, it’s well-nigh impossible to nail down what this business of art is all about. But as Wynick/Tuck’s longstanding run also shows, there’s a power there, even if indescribable and internal, that generates continuing returns. (128-401 Richmond St W, Toronto ON)