Salients is a solo exhibition of work by Hamilton-based artist and researcher Chris Myhr. The exhibition brings together photographs from an interrelated series developed by Myhr between 2016 and 2022, exploring themes related to water, the ecosystem, complex interconnectivity, and materiality through a photo-based approach.

The notion of “salience” describes what is most prominent – the point of critical mass, or that which emerges from the background, gesturing outwards for our attention. Depicting both human-made artifacts and ecological materials recovered from the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, the banks of the Athabasca River (northern Alberta), and the waters of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, the photographs explore the salient, or the material legacy of human endeavour and action, shaped and marked by water over long passages of time. Presented together, the work ruminates on the permanence of things, the tendency of matter to persist, and the ways in which the imprint humans leave on the material realm bridges and blurs delineations between past, present, and future – for better or for worse.

Salients includes projects developed with support from the Canada Council for the Arts and Ontario Arts Council.

EVENTS

Opening Reception: Thursday, January 26th, 5:30 – 8:30 PM

Artist talk: Thursday, February 9th, 12:30 – 1:20 PM