MMFA 2024: Wanda Koop

WANDA KOOP:

WHO OWNS THE MOON

April 11 – August 4, 2024

The Montreal Museum of Fine Art is launching a new exhibition that features a Canadian artist Wanda Koop with her first solo museum presentation in Quebec. Her exhibition presents the all-seeing moon as its central motif, as if it were the artist's eye that perceives the reality of existence. It also invites the reflection on universal questions of territory, the environment, the memory and loss, while additionally offering hope through the transcendent powers of art.

Wanda Koop was born in Vancouver to parents from the Zaporizhie region of present-day Ukraine. Through her paintings she  expresses her engagement with her family's country of origin and the trauma of the present war in Eastern Europe. Nevertheless, her personal experience is but the point of departure for broader painterly meditations on the human condition. 

At this exhibition, Koop presents two new quadriptychs. One of them Sleepwalking (photo just above) is a poem to loss. It consists of four elongated rectangular paintings woven with memories of Koop's grandmother and mother, and allusions to forebears long gone. Similar like the memories that are emerging in a dream, the meaning of these paintings is not fixed. The artist, through the act of painting, griefs the loss of innocence and optimism. Yet reflecting on the ultimate tragedy of our actions, she projects a place of hope and beauty.

The second quadriptych Objects of Interest (photo just above), addresses the ultimately humbling nature of humankind's pursuits. Flanked by two paintings of the moon are two paintings of the International Space Station and China's Tiangong Space Station. This juxtaposition prompts existential questions on the unknown.  

Also included in the exhibition are paintings modelled after trees and flowers seen in the forest around Koop's retreat in Riding Mountain National Park, Manitoba. This motive is reflected in the two vertical canvases at the very top pf this article.

An additional artist's quadriptych consists of four monumental paintings that depict the Crimean Coast as seen from a distant shore across the Black Sea at different times of day, capturing the silver light of early morning as well as the deep blue of midnight with phosphorescent hues glowing in the moonlit water. Vertical bands of colours ranging from neon yellow to electric red remind us of the paintings' materiality as solid objects in this world and simultaneously opening a doorway to the imagination. (See photo of two painting of the Crimean Coast quadriptych just above this paragraph and the images of the additional two quadriptych paintings captured n the three photos below this paragraph.)

Mary-Dailey Desmarais, Chief Curator of the MMFA and curator of the exhibition, stated:

"We are honoured to welcome this eminent figure of Canadian contemporary art for her first solo presentation in a Quebec museum. Over the course of her more than fifty-year career, Koop has developed a singular visual language distinguished by its sheer mastery of colour and profound engagement with the human condition. Both poignant and deeply pertinent, Koop's work invites reflection on shared concerns of our historical moment."

On photos below Koop is being presented at a press conference and is later interviewed by a journalist.

Click on images to enlarge them.

All photos @ Nadia Slejskova

This article's dedicated internet address, or also click on the title above the very first photo in this article.

Visit the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts website to check on the opening hours and to purchase your tickets online.