Exhibitions
In the Margins
Wesley Bates, Jeffrey Macklin, Elizabeth Menard, eXavier Peterson, Beth Rose, Ulf Stahmer, Alan Stein, Stephen Quick
April 22 – July 5, 2025
Traditionally, a Wayzgoose marked the turning of the year for printers: a festive gathering to usher in the season when daylight waned, and work would continue by candlelight. It was a celebration not only of craft, but of community—of those whose hands shaped the printed word.
This exhibition echoes that spirit. It honours the intimate, deliberate practices of book artists, printmakers, typographers, and binders—those who engage with the materiality of language and the architecture of the book. Centered around a long, communal table—an emblem of gathering, labour, and exchange—the exhibition conjures both the historic Wayzgoose and the enduring relevance of tactile traditions in a digital age.
The eight artists - Wesley Bates, Jeffrey Macklin, Elizabeth Menard, eXavier Peterson, Beth Rose, Ulf Stahmer, Alan Stein, and Stephen Quick - featured here have each contributed to the legacy of the Grimsby Public Art Gallery’s annual Wayzgoose festival, a celebration of book arts now woven into the cultural
fabric of this region. Their works, ranging from finely stitched bindings to experimental prints and sculptural pages, invite us to consider the book not simply as vessel, but as form, as object, as experience.
In the Margins is a meditation on process and permanence, on inked impressions and folded signatures, on the intimacy of reading and the labor of making. It asks us to pause—to trace the line, to feel the thread, to read with our hands as much as our eyes.
Community Exhibition Space (CES)
GPAG presents the community exhibition space as an opportunity to showcase regional talent and local community art exhibitions to the public in the main lobby.
Obscure
January 31 - April 26, 2025
The dream of unrestricted access to art and the advent of the Internet faces a new challenge.
Widespread digital access to art and images has been achieved. Through years of human labour in digitization projects at global art institutions combined with a growing necessity for artists to gain commercial success with online marketing, we are coming as close as we have perhaps ever been to utopian ideals of global community, shared knowledge, and borderless creative commons. However, this digital world’s continued evolution includes the construction and inclusion of Artificial Intelligence as a commonplace tool that threatens our personal privacy and societal development. AI pulls from this accessible net of visual culture to generate imagined scenes using both images of and from users. With little control over how an artist’s work or your own personal information will be used algorithmically, uploading ourselves to the Cloud has become increasingly fraught.
Obscure means many things. Firstly, it defines an action of concealment or keeping from being seen. As well, it describes something cryptic, mysterious, or unknown. While finally it creates a conundrum as the prospect of leaving this world in obscurity is the ultimate fear of an artist, however, without strict governance on individual digital freedoms, obscurity could be the antithetical solution to preserving artistic authorship as the thin veil between the digital and physical realms becomes thinner.
Curated by Sarah Oatley
Image: Stan Repar, Self Protection, 1998, acrylic on canvas
Cross Pollination
Clear Eyes Collective
Sept 23, 2023 - Summer 2025
True community is inclusive and nurtures everyone, providing a safe space for all.
Cross Pollination is a commissioned mural by Clear Eyes Collective for the exterior outdoor exhibition platform of the Grimsby Public Art Gallery and Library. Over the course of the summer, the collective collaborated with the community by asking them to generate key words to inspire the artistic development and content of the mural. Some words were reflective of the physical characteristics of the Town of Grimsby; its connection with agriculture, proximity to Lake Ontario, and the Niagara escarpment. Others looked to honor less tangible connections like culture, multiculturalism, and LGBTQ2S+ allyship. After reviewing each prompt, and drawing from their own connection to the area, the collective refined their final design, culminating in Cross Polination, which was live painted onsite during the second annual Grimsby Arts Walk, September 23, 2023.
Curated by Caitlin Sutherland
CLEAR EYES COLLECTIVE is a mural crew based out of Hamilton, Ontario made up of members Darian Poisson, Adam Bates and Josh Kellett. Their mission is to integrate the mysterious power of art into the plain cityscape, transforming ordinary spaces into an immersive gallery. Their approach to public art has always been rooted in creating vibrant visual environments that connect and uplift the community at large.
Clear Eyes Collective have been painting large-scale murals as a team for 10 years, and in that time they have had the opportunity to partner with local businesses, festivals, corporations and different municipalities and cities. They take tremendous care to make sure their designs are tailored to each project, while always maintaining a vibrant and bold style that naturally comes out of collaboration.
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