18 September - 1 November, 2009

Opening: Thursday 17 September, 7–9 pm

Elizabeth Russell's  work explores the early transitional stages experienced by migrants and immigrants through the symbolism of everyday objects. Drawings, photographs and paintings portray the complexities of a new beginnings in Canada. The artist used personal recollections and oral stories from Vancouver and Richmond-based immigrants as research for the exhibition.

Elizabeth Russell is a conceptual, interdisciplinary artist whose practice involves the creation of site-specific works for alternative spaces and galleries. Russell is a sessional art instructor at North Island College in Courtenay, where she resides. The artist received her BFA in Painting from Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Vancouver, BC (1995) and her Masters in Combined Media from Chelsea College of Art and Design, London, UK (1997). Russell's art has been exhibited in a variety of unusual spaces from a London police station (2000) to a barge on the river Thames, London, UK (Drift, 2008) and in group shows at galleries such as the Evergreen Cultural Centre (Coquitlam, BC), the Art Gallery of The South Okanagan (Penticton, BC), Comox Valley Art Gallery (Courtenay, BC), word.image.sound.House (London, UK) and Galerie Herold, (Bremen, Germany).

Left: Elizabeth Russell, Blanket Coat, 2009, charcoal on paper