Daniel Faria Gallery is pleased to present ear to the ceiling, eye to the sky, featuring works by Shannon Bool, Marlon Kroll, Élise Lafontaine, and Kristine Moran.

ear to the ceiling, eye to the sky brings together works that explore the relationship between abstraction and the metaphysical. The evolution of abstract painting has historical links to spiritual and occult philosophies of the late 19th century[1]. For instance, the Theosophical and Anthroposophical writings of philosopher Rudolf Steiner were influential to artists such as Wassily Kandinsky and Hilma af Klint (though Klint and Steiner had their disagreements). The artists in this exhibition also contend with the abstraction of architectural spaces, be those real or imagined. The relationship between bodies and their environments comes into play: the emotional and physical effects transferring from space onto body and vice versa. Distance is also a component: what it means to be here, as opposed to there. The exhibition’s title suggests a contortion, a directing of one’s sensory organs upward, perhaps in an attempt to find something beyond the physical, past the ceiling towards the sky.

Moran’s abstracted landscapes often originate from quick line drawings made while moving through specific places, whether by car or foot. “Drawing this way urges me to stay present knowing that the moment will pass me by shortly,” she writes. Moran spent the last year living in Bordeaux, France, and her new series of paintings on paper originates from drawings made during her frequent walks through the public gardens. Once in the studio, Moran uses the line drawings as a framework within which she can explore colour and texture, letting go of the original geography of the garden altogether and instead approaching the composition as an abstract painting. The repetition of her walks along the same routes and paths mimics the formal framework that Moran utilizes in her abstraction, both providing parameters as a tool for slowing observation.