Elizabeth Zvonar at Daniel Faria Gallery

Artist: Elizabeth Zvonar

Exhibition title: The Weight, The Worry + The Wag

Venue: Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto, Canada

Date: June 10 – July 22, 2023

Photography: all images courtesy of the artist and Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto

Hello Stranger!

It’s been a while.

The world is imploding on itself and some rays of sunshine are breaking through this eternal windmill of chaos.

Needless to say, history keeps me up at night.

Give me a reason and I’ll procrastinate.

We are the product of all of our ancestors both living and dead.

I’ve been thinking about the weight we carry collectively, the harbinger of our individual burdens.

The bronze and iron speak to this. Heavy and stoic. A monument to perseverance.

Talismans embedded throughout in an effort to avert misfortune.

And the worry is a nod to the ominous reality that can feel like quicksand some days.

The pictures are the start of long tales, they’re waggish.

Funny/Grave

Heavy/Light

Daniel Faria Gallery is pleased to present The Weight, The Worry + The Wag, Elizabeth Zvonar’s fourth solo exhibition with the gallery.

Working across collage and sculpture, Zvonar wades through the visual matter of the world to create works that probe existing social and cultural systems through the use of humour and irony. In The Weight, The Worry + The Wag, Zvonar explores the collective weight of inheritance, the heaviness of the present moment, and the uncertainty of the future. Sometimes in opposition to that heaviness, and sometimes in concert with it, superstitions and apotropaic traditions are sprinkled throughout the show, along with images that reference the excesses of consumer culture and the perpetual search for spiritual fulfillment.

Combining source materials from fashion and lifestyle advertisements, art history textbooks, and popular science editorials, Zvonar likens her process of making collage to that of the childhood game Memory, moving around and matching images until one combination clicks. Her compositions are built by hand and then scanned, enlarged, and digitally altered. It’s often difficult to tell where images are spliced together, their alterations unnoticeable except for a certain uncanniness that pervades. In Halcyon Wag, the trees in a bucolic, unpopulated landscape hold up posters promoting relaxation and meditation techniques, a band looking for gigs, and a “One Way” sign with arrows pointing in opposing directions. Some works, like Magic Hands, do show signs of their making; the seams are visible in a layered image of disembodied hands levitating a red orb against a background of smoke and lights. Set at the entrance of the exhibition, the image conjures associations of mysticism—and acts as a promissory for what is to come.

Throughout the exhibition are wood and bronze sculptures, a balancing act of the weight of history and the good fortune required to deliver us into the future. A woman’s handbag hangs carcass-like from the ceiling of the gallery, while an oversized carpet bag rests on a burnt stump. Titled History, Influence, New Bag and History, Onus, Old Bag, both are cast in bronze, their heavy, rigid bodies referencing the baggage of patriarchy, capitalism and western feminism. In Apotropaic Magic , bronze-cast talismans and objects to ward off bad luck and evil forces hang from a rusted chain suggesting an exaggerated charm bracelet. Diane, a blond/yellow cedar wood column is also adorned with charms. Titled after the artist’s deceased mother from whom she learned the turn of phrase knock on wood and whistle, the column serves as an interactive protective wager upon entering or exiting the gallery.

Elizabeth Zvonar graduated from Emily Carr University, Vancouver (2022), after having studied at Capilano University, North Vancouver; Aichi Gakusen University, Toyota City, Japan (1994); and Hokkaido University of Art & Design, Sapporo, Japan (1996). Solo exhibitions include SFU Audain Gallery, Vancouver (2022); Polygon Gallery, North Vancouver (2020); Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto (2018); Burrard Arts Foundation, Vancouver (2017); and Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver (2009). Her work has been exhibited at institutions such as: Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge (2022); Vancouver Art Gallery (2021; 2019); Musée d’Art de Joliette (2020); Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver (2018); and the Aga Khan Museum, Toronto (2017). Zvonar has participated in residencies at Malaspina Printmakers and the Banff Centre, and was the City of Vancouver Artist in Residence from 2012-2015. She has received numerous awards including the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation’s VIVA Award, and was a finalist for the AIMIA | AGO Photography Prize in 2016. Her work is included in the 2023 Phaidon publication Vitamin C+ Collage in Contemporary Art. She lives and works in Vancouver.

Elizabeth Zvonar, The Weight, The Worry + The Wag, 2023, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto

Elizabeth Zvonar, Halcyon Wag, 2023, Inkjet print on dibond, 40 x 32 inches, 42 1/4 x 34 1/4 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Diane, 2022, Yellow cedar wood column, charms, 38 x 10 x 10 inches

Elizabeth Zvonar, Daytripper, 2023, Backpack cast in bronze, 23 x 12 x 4 inches

Elizabeth Zvonar, Magic Hands, 2022, Baryta on dibond, 15 x 14 inches, 17 1/2 x 16 1/4 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, History, Onus, Old Bag, 2022, Bronze cast, 27 x 18 x 13 inches

Elizabeth Zvonar, Shapeshifter, 2023, Inkjet print on dibond, 32 x 25 inches, 34 1/8 x 27 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Interference, 2022, Inkjet print on dibond, 30 x 23 inches, 32 1/4 x 25 1/4 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Apotropaic Magic, 2022, Found chain, custom mount, custom bronze cast charms, 40 x 16 x 3 inches

Elizabeth Zvonar, Unknown Master, Probably a Woman, 2022, Baryta on Dibond, 40 x 32 inches, 42 x 34 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, History, Influence, New Bag, 2022, Bronze cast, 23 x 15 1/2 x 5 inches

Elizabeth Zvonar, Loose Change, 2023, Inkjet print on dibond, 14 x 10 inches, 16 x 12 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Ambitions, 2023, Inkjet print on dibond, 46 x 40 inches, 48 1/4 x 42 1/8 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Blue Roses, 2023, Inkjet print on dibond, 40 x 34 inches, 42 1/4 x 36 1/4 inches (framed)

Elizabeth Zvonar, Rose Gothic, 2022, Baryta on dibond, 30 x 23 inches, 32 x 25 inches (Framed)