The Rideau Canal Festival has commissioned 10 visual artists to express their interpretation of the Rideau Canal’s World Heritage. Working with a theme of “Connections/ Connexions”; these temporary art installations will become part of Confederation Park in a huge outdoor gallery.
Artistic Director
and Philippe Allard Dawn Dale Lynda Cronin Marc Walter cj fleury Emily Rose Michaud Diane Lemire Jennifer Macklem Lisa Creskey
Artistic Statement: Connections
The Rideau Canal is symbolic of Connections: connecting people to our shared culture and history. It connect s our city neighborhoods, Ottawa to Kingston and communities in between. It connects us to the other 911 World Heritage sites in 151 countries around the world, and helps in connecting Canada’s 14 World Heritage sites with Parks Canada’s 100th Anniversary.
The Rideau Canal connects us as citizens celebrating our local environment and connects us as Canadians into a wider global community. Together we strive to preserve and protect our planets most important places in art, culture and heritage.
Mary Faught, Artistic Director
Mary Faught is a Landscape Architect/ Sculptor from the area, who enjoys combining her skills to focus on site specific outdoor art installations. She has done numerous installations and group shows including Harbourfrontt Artists’s Gardens in Toronot, Stone Hill Quarry Art Park in Cazanovia New York, and Art Terre ’92 and ’94 in Buckingham Québec. For Canal ART, she accepted the role of artistic director, curating 10 artists in creating site specific installations in Confederation Park working with the theme Connections.
Justin Duchesneau,
Architect and teacher
Philippe Allard, Visual artist
The two artists worked together to create "Arc-en-ciel" public installation for the place des Arts ephemeral art contest in 2009. Now they have come together again with the challenge of inventing a space made of salvaged wood and natural light entitled “Tree”.
Dawn Dale
Visual artist from Alymer Quebec, and teacher at Ottawa School of Art. She will be joining iconic symbols of the Canadian wilderness with strong Canadians who care about Canada’s identity.
“A Reinterpretation of Joyce Wieland and Friends Reenacting an Historical Event”.
Lynda Cronin
Multi-disciplinary artist from Ottawa will be drawing on the history and folklore of the Rideau Canal during the 1800’s with her “Blue Woman” exhibit.
Marc Walter
Mixed media and environmental artist from Wakefield Quebec. 3 sculptures evoking the silhouettes of beings, and shapes of hydro lines in his exhibit “The Dudes”. The concept wants to get visitors to think about close connections between people, and over large distances using new media.
cj fleury
Working with diverse media, cj fleury is best known for major public art projects and ground-breaking collaborations with non-arts groups. Since 1992, she has completed 15 major commissions for public and private sector clients, including the City of Ottawa, the Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women and Sport and Physical Activity, Ottawa and District Labour Council, MDS Nordion, the National Capital Commission, and the National Arts Centre. She has been an artist-in-residence with the City of Ottawa, and has participated in numerous community-based events.
Guardian Moose: A Cautionary Tale draws on fleury’s interest in the condition of the human spirit and the energy of place, whether natural or fabricated. Viewing the Rideau Canal as a ‘channel through time’, fleury is connecting past to present, pain to pleasure. Through the lens of history and experience, Guardian Moose examines how regulation, as imposed by humans, trumps nature and spirit. The moose perches in a celestial forest high above the spectators; surrounded by angelic creatures big and small, he surveys human activity along the managed banks of the Rideau Canal. From this heavenly home, he recalls roaming the cedar-filled wetlands in the times before colonization. Contemplating the woes of Colonel John By and the canal-builders, he ponders the evolution of this fragile terrain, from wartime waterway to national treasure.
Emily Rose Michaud
Inter-disciplinary artist from Montreal and Wakefield Quebec, Her exhibit “like veins across heart”, will weave a river of plant matter upon a loom. This work will create a visual parallel between the interconnecting bodies of water in and around Outaouais to similar channels of blood that pulse through our bodies.
Diane Lemire
Multi-disciplinary artist and fibre art teacher from Chelsea Quebec. In her quirky and unique style “47 Coats and 47 Locks” uses the ancient technique of felted wool to represent the pioneers, while the objects bridge to the present use of the canal.
Jennifer Macklem
Visual artist and professor at University of Ottawa. She will use clear strands of like rays of light in her powerful exhibit “the rapture coming home to transfigure bureaucracy”, connecting the strength and power of nature in bureaucracy.
Lisa Creskey
Visual artist working sculpturally with earthenware and porcelain clay from Chelsea, Québec. Her installation “Rookery”, will be several great heron nests mirroring the construction of the canal. Porcelain blue herons will be painted with images that document the history of the canal.