Do You Remember That Time — Madelyn Gowler

Do You Remember That Time?

Do You Remember That Time?, 2023-2025.

Weaving | 2x7ft | Woven fabric and 16mm black and white film. Contact printed using my own jewelry, jewelry from my nana, and slides from my grandpa.

Film | 7:20 | The woven film was digitized before weaving, so I was able to re-shoot it on 16mm b&w film again and then dyed using marigolds, beets, and koolaid. I then soaked the re-shot film in a phytogram solution (vitamin c and washing soda) and placed on unexposed 16mm b&w film.

The work explores the storage of memories as a way of privatizing our lives. Protecting these moments transforms them into precious objects to either consume later or let fade away. I’m also trying to exhibit how overlapping experiences can affect our identity as a whole, forming our perspectives on events. I’m hoping my weaving and film will demonstrate this layering, transforming, and covering over past memories which overall make up an individual.

The whole is more than the sum of its parts, said Aristotle, but what if each part is considered to also be a whole? Holding two ideas in one’s mind at once like this has a kinship to weaving—the cloth is one whole, the warp is another, and the weft another. This is a useful way to think about Gowler’s work. Gowler is fascinated with how images are conveyed, and this drives them to detach photographs, negatives, videos, and other image-based materials from their origins and context. They do this with experimental processing and by collaging images with each other as well as different materials. In this exhibition, they have done so through weaving. Gowler is not interested in perpetuating aesthetics inherent to image-making, but neither can they extricate themselves from it. Instead, they present us with the textures and surfaces of images and of the work inherent to their making.

-Hannah_g

Seamless Transitions is the 2023-2024 MAWA mentee group show featuring new work by Daisy Wu, Heather Murray, Ingrid McMillan, Karen Fletcher, Kelsey Smith, Madelyn Gowler, Treetreetes, and Tess Ray Houston. The exhibition reflects the growth and insights gained under mentors Anna Binta Diallo, Cecilia Araneda, Dr. Maureen Matthews, and Sarah Anne Johnson in the 2023-2024 Foundation Mentorship Program, offered in partnership with the Winnipeg Film Group. It has been thoughtfully curated by artist and writer hannah_g. This exhibition celebrates the shared experiences and creative bonds formed within the group.

The ties that bond – The Uniter

Documentation by Daisy Wu.