Natures Way

Hatch Gallery opens its 2023 season with Natures Way, an exhibition featuring new original paintings and sculpted bas reliefs exclusive to Hatch Gallery by artists Kurt Swinghammer and Yechel Gagnon.

Kurt Swinghammer was born in Newmarket and studied at the Ontario College of Art. He has sustained dual careers as a visual artist and musician, and his many diverse projects include illustrating an album cover for  Stuart McLean, creating the set for Joni Mitchell’s award-winning live broadcast on MuchMUSIC, making a caricature of Jack Layton and Olivia Chow for their annual Christmas card, and giving a hot rod makeover of the Zamboni at Maple Leaf Gardens for Sam The Record Man – to name a few.

Canadian artist Yechel Gagnon has created a distinctive visual language using wood to create carved custom-made plywood bas-reliefs with tinted and natural veneers. Her process consists of carving the surfaces, revealing an imagery that oscillates between abstraction and representation with those intrinsic to the material. This effect evokes a fictional landscape where land and sea appear before us, where cavernous spaces are excavated and sweeping valleys emerge. One perceives the work as an aerial perspective and then all of sudden the viewer is plunged into a terrestrial realm. Much to many peoples’ surprise, Gagnon does not use any paint in her work; only wood, obtaining a personal language of mark-making that is both sculptural and painterly.

Natures Way continues until June 27th.