André Ethier + Jasmine Reimer

Exhibition : from June 3 to July 22, 2017    
Installation views: Jean-Michael Seminaro

In this eponymous exhibition, Ethier and Reimer's works come together both as theatrical spaces and as a play on otherworldly forms. Symbolic imagery joins the everyday experience to interlude between inside and outside: body and cavity; the grotesque and beauty.
André Ethier paints mythical images of psychological landscapes where tropical scenes come from dreams, and creatures become either self-examination or reflection, particularly around themes like parenthood. In one painting, a dog-like creature appears to snuggle a baby with care, but upon looking twice we see the creature is actually giving birth in a pet shop. Moments of beauty and tenderness like these spark throughout the works. Ethier paints with heavily thinned oils producing watercolour-like scenes submerged in the greasy, wet, sticky and runny characteristics of oil paint. This technique permits an outstanding luminosity and optical depth, which is also underlined by Ethier's dexterity and confident brushwork. By examining personal and internal views of himself and his family life, Ethier constructs narratives that become rich and layered shared experiences.
Jasmine Reimer explores the sensual, corporeal experience of the everyday. She combines found objects and visceral materials to explore the ‘primitive’ body; a state of being that situates the body outside of normative language and within an incoherent, embodied experience. Her interests reside within the traditional grotesque (including the grotesque body, exaggeration and ornamentation), fetish objects and intuition, transformation, fluidity, ritual and the female body. Through her practice, she aims to re-assert the value of embodied experience. She selects objects based upon their inherent ability to seduce and her capability to infinitely increase its power as a thing of fetish, symbol, sentience and persuasion. To degrade an object is to create an opportunity to deal with its intricacies, to know a thing only as you know yourself. For Reimer, creating a peculiar alien status through perversion or corruption is of utmost importance. Meaning is re-ordered, sometimes eradicated and re-invented, language is overcome by the silent unknown of embodied experience.

Biographies
André Ethier’s (b. 1977) paintings are often surreal, mystical, and fantastically grotesque. Ethier evades specific narrative and concrete concepts, and works from his own subconscious. His hybrid, folk-like fantasy, sci-fi scenes, still lifes and portraits are equally informed by Old Master paintings, Fauvism, Dutch still life, contemporary culture and psychedelic rock. Ethier had solo exhibitions at Honor Fraser (Los Angeles), Galeria Marta Cervera (Madrid), Harper’s Apartment (New York), Derek Eller Gallery (New York) and Pastures Contemporary Art (Toronto), among others. His work has been included in group exhibitions at institutions such as Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal and Weatherspoon Art Museum in Greensboro. His work has been reviewed in The New Yorker, Artforum, Los Angeles Times, Frieze Magazine, Canadian Art and Border Crossings.

Jasmine Reimer (b. 1981) has exhibited internationally including exhibitions at Fondazione Benetton (Venice) and The Art Students League of New York (New York). Recent solo exhibitions include Georgia Scherman Projects (Toronto), G Gallery (Toronto) and The Dunlop Art Gallery (Regina). Reimer has been awarded grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, the SSHRC and the British Columbia Arts Council. She recently released her first book of poetry titled, Small Obstructions in February 2017. Reimer holds an MFA from The University of Guelph.

Press (exhibition)
The Editorial Magazine: http://the-editorialmagazine.com/?p=12779
Canadian Art Must-Sees: http://canadianart.ca/must-sees/must-sees-week-june-1-7-2017/
Ton Barbier: http://www.tonbarbier.com/2017/06/27/les-artistes-visuels-andre-ethier-et-jasmine-reimer-la-galerie-projet-pangee