Canadian Art Review: Frank Shebageget ‘Light Industry” at CUAG
by Emily Falvey (excerpts reposted from Canadian Art website)
“Some of the most thought-provoking exhibitions are the result of an exquisite balance of aesthetic and political concerns. Frank Shebageget’s solo exhibition “Light Industry” at Ottawa’s Carleton University Art Gallery was one of them.”
“Lodge (2008), one of the central pieces in the show, is part of an ongoing body of work devoted to the de Havilland Beaver, an iconic wilderness floatplane linked to economic and cultural shifts in remote Northern communities.
Composed of a heap of small, hand-carved, wooden replicas of the plane, Lodge resembles a beaver lodge, but also calls to mind the work of post-minimalist sculptors like Richard Serra and Eva Hesse. A more political tension is evident in the title, which refers to beavers— a Canadian symbol of industry—and traditional Anishinabe ceremonial lodges. Lodge brings to mind the history of Aboriginal communities displaced by dam projects undertaken by private companies in partnership with public corporations, such as Hydro-Québec.”