Exhibition on view from March 6 – 22, 2025
The gallery has had a special relationship with Anne Meredith Barry for many years. Correspondence between the artist and the gallery date back to 1995, first recorded in Anne’s beautiful looping script. Since that time we have lived vicariously through her joyful paintings and prints of the Newfoundland landscape, images that are bold and graphic in colour and dazzling in pattern.
For the month of March we have curated an exhibition of paintings, original works on paper and prints of Barry’s beloved adopted province. Her sweeping vistas will take us on a rich visual journey along the rugged coast and down river valleys, showing us the strong, fragile and fluid world in all of its harsh and poignant beauty.
My home and studio are located in St.Michael’s. This is a small Newfoundland outport, perched on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, south of the City of St. John’s. Here, I live surrounded by an environment characterized by constant change – turbulent weather, four dramatically different seasons, and the endless rhythmic migrations of icebergs, whales, seabirds and sea creatures. Everything outside my studio is both in harmony and in conflict. Everything endlessly creates and destroys the other – wind, water and land. The marks of geological time are here also. For me, it’s important to know that aeons ago the place where I live was part of Africa; and that there are parts of this island that originated in the Appalachian Mountains, parts that have tilted to expose layers beneath the Earth’s crust, and parts that were formed by volcanoes. The marks of these events are in my mind as I work, and are another part of this island’s magic. My paintings and prints acknowledge this strong, fragile and fluid world in all of its harsh and poignant beauty. And through my work, I try to deal in a very personal way with my observations, participation, and feelings about some of these timeless things in this timeless place.
Anne Meredith Barry, 1994