This book was published in 1997 by the Contemporary Art Gallery on the occasion of the exhibition, Sandra Meigs: *Dummies* at the Contemporary Art Gallery, May 17 – June 28, 1997. This book contains an essay by Barbara Fischer.

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Dummies

Sandra Meigs

Sandra Meigs is an artist who has been exhibiting nationally since 1974. Primarily identified with Toronto where most of her work has been exhibited and discussed, she has lived in Victoria since 1993 where she teaches at the University of Victoria. *Dummies* is her first solo exhibition on the West Coast.

*Dummies* is a series of paintings derived from loosely assembled eleven figure­ models that Meigs has constructed from found materials such as bubblewrap, towels, plastic, pillows and scrap wood. She has used these "figure-models" as a source for portraits in which the face emerges like a phantom within a ground of pure material and creates a perceptual effect that fluctuates back and forth between image and medium. As the intricate surfaces of the paintings are at times like skin with erupting wounds, they verge on the repulsive and ugly. At the same time, their ambiguity and resistance to be anchored in the representational or the abstract makes them fascinating, even beautiful objects. Meigs likens their haunting effect to an insistent mental image or memory that never becomes clear.

Sandra Meigs has exhibited at the Art Gallery of Ontario; the Power Plant, Toronto; Edmonton Art Gallery; Trepanier Gallery, Calgary; Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto; Galerie Chantal Boulanger, Montreal; Saidye Bronfman Centre, Montreal; and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.


Essay: “Sandra Meigs: Dummies,” Barbara Fischer

A closeup of a painting on a white wall, with a small white light extending from the wall, pointing to the painting. The work is mostly pale blue, with small blobs of colourful paint lightly blended. 

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Six visible paintings on the walls in the corner of a gallery. The paintings are colourful and vary in size. Three of them have bright lights attached just underneath them, creating bright spots. 

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A closeup of a small, square painting. The painting is abstract and very colourful, with some large blobs of paint near the centre. Below, a small light mounted on the wall shines on the painting.

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A closeup of a small abstract painting with a small light pointed at it from below. The painting is mostly blue and white with a thin yellow line and a dark red line along the left and right side. 

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Two paintings on a wall which are colourful abstractions, each with something like a figure at its centre. The left there are dark patterned forms resembling limbs on a colourful spotted background.

Sandra Meigs

Related Exhibitions