Betty Goodwin, from the collection of Salah J. Bachir, at Oakville Galleries

I was recently very kindly asked to write the essay to accompany an exhibition of Betty Goodwin‘s work gathered from the collection of Salah J. Bachir and on display this month at Oakville Galleries. It was a daunting task, especially to write about such a prolific and well-respected Canadian artist.

I was interested in trying to write about Goodwin’s work without getting bogged down in her biographical details, which is how much of her work has been analyzed and discussed, but it proved difficult, especially to write about someone whose practice seems so personal and emotionally wrought. After a lot of stress and hand-wringing, the text is finally done and available to download on the gallery’s website. I’m still not sure how well Aby Warburg goes with Betty Goodwin, but it was a fun experiment to try and put them together.

The exhibition, curated by one of the most consistent curators in Canada, Marnie Fleming, opens tomorrow out at Oakville along with a new exhibition curated by artist Micah Lexier titled “Silent as Glue” and featuring the work of Lynda Gammon, Matt Harle and Elspeth Pratt. Marnie and I will be speaking at the opening, which starts at 2:30 in Micah’s show at Centennial Square and continues with a reception at 3:30 in the Goodwin exhibition at Gairloch Gardens.