The University of Lethbridge art gallery opens two new exhibits exploring LGBT issues. The opening reception for the exhibit is 4-6 p.m., Nov. 7. It runs until Dec 20.
“Acting Out” includes three separate parts.
As soon as you enter the gallery, you will see a massive mural dominating the west wall of the room. It features a piece from the University of Lethbridge Art Gallery collection from a group of early ”80s LGBT artists called General Idea. Other examples of some of their word based works are in a cabinet on the north wall.
“Two of them died of AIDS in the early days of the AIDS epidemic,” said gallery administrative manager Jon Oxley.
That ties in nicely with Tiffany Muller-Myrdahl's text based exhibit “The Value of Making Sexual Differences visible” in the alcove as soon as you enter the gallery.
When she and her same sex partner moved to Lethbridge, they got involved with Lethbridge’s LGBT community and got their stories.
She posted excerpts of her interviews, all anonymous but including their age and sex, all over the wall surrounding a map of Lethbridge with a string and a thumbtack pointing to where they are from in the city.
They explore a variety of issues from coming out to their families to their favourite hangouts past and present.
“ I collected their oral histories from members all over Lethbridge and found out about their sense of place and sense of community,” said Muller-Myrdahl.
“When I moved to lethbridg
e in 2008 with my same sex partner, I wanted to find out and experience queer culture in Lethbridge,” she said adding it was an easy task to do. She interviewed 26 people for the project.
She has never had an art exhibit at the gallery.
“I’m a geographer, so this is new. But it was very interesting,” she said.
There is a website to go with this part of the exhibit — www.queerlethbridge.com.
The third part of the exhibit is a more whimsical take on queer lexicon from Toronto artist Wendy Coburn.
She brought several terms in the LGBT lexicon to life in sculpture.
On the walls, there are several graphics of U-Haul trucks. There are also a couple of sculptures. She has a giant acorn in one display case, a pillow with a cookie on it on another. There is also a bronzed turkey baster and most interesting a bronze toaster oven.
“That comes from the (television show) Ellen. There is an episode where one character, Susan, makes a joke that if you convert a straight woman, you get a toaster oven.
But there wasn’t an award for it so I created one. It’s a 40 pound bronze sculpture,” she said.
“There’s this other joke that when two queer girls move in together, the U-Haul trailer is a general ride,” she added, explaining her U-Haul trailer pictures.
“ I guess in a nutshell, I’m taking some mythical images of the LGBT lexicon and making objects that are real out of them,” she summarized, adding they also explore the utopia and dystopia of the situations.
“ The turkey baster is a kind of code of the perception for reproduction as part of the LGBT experience,” she continued.
There is another collection of Coburn’s works in the Helen Christou Gallery. “Anatomy of a Prtotest,” explores the questions of freedom of assembly and the impact of media and the state on organizing protests through the use of agents provocateurs.
The opening reception for the exhibits is 4-6 p.m., Nov. 7, however they will run until Dec. 20.
