AGA100: Act 1 Earth to Eternity

May 25 –November 3, 2024

Samantha Walrod, Warm Grey + Red Radial, 2018. Painted collage on wood panel. Art Gallery of Alberta Collection, purchased with funds from the John and Maggie Mitchell Endowment Fund.

AGA100: Act 1 Earth to Eternity shows a range of work that spans the spectrum of representation of the natural world, from the earthbound and everyday to the sublime. The exhibition begins with studied observations of the organic and natural world. It moves through abstracted, simplified, altered, or obfuscated representations of landscape and nature and arrives at works of pure abstraction that aim to represent the universal truths that lay behind our realities or play with our perceptions and beliefs. 

The Collection includes over 6,000 works of art with new works acquired annually. Works in the Collection are also researched, reevaluated and recontextualized on an ongoing basis. The Collection is an ever-changing, living document that is reflective of shifting values and interests over time. The AGA’s Collection does not represent the totality of artistic production in Alberta but, because of its mutability, there is opportunity within its gaps. The Collection charts a trajectory to this point but can also direct us to where we want to be and where we will go.  

Organized by the Art Gallery of Alberta and curated by Catherine Crowston, Lindsey Sharman, and Danielle Siemens.