CARL BEAM: Life and Work -- Saturday, September 21, 2024
Gallery Gevik is excited to announce the opening of Carl Beam: Life and Work, an exhibition of never before seen paintings from the artist’s studio, in celebration of the publication of the Art Canada Institute’s online and hardbound book, Carl Beam: Life & Work by Anong Beam. Please join us on Saturday, September 21, 2024 at 2pm when Anong will give introductory remarks about the artist and sign copies of her monograph. The exhibition continues until October 23, 2024
Carl Beam (1943-2005) has exerted a strong influence on generations of Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists. His work survives as a milestone in the development of a unique and powerful voice within the context of the presence of Canada on the international art scene. This exhibition consists of ten never before seen original paintings by Beam, incorporating signature imagery and techniques, as well as several works on plexi, ceramics and etchings, providing an unparalleled opportunity for collectors to own rare works that are almost now only found in museum collections. We’d like to extend special thanks to author Anong Beam for her guidance and assistance in mounting our exhibition as well as Founder & Executive Director Sara Angel, Executive Editor Tara Ng, Commissioning Editor Victoria Nolte, and the entire team at the Art Canada Institute for their outstanding work in bringing this illuminating study of the artist to fruition.
About the Book
In Carl Beam: Life & Work author Anong Beam offers a profound portrait of her father’s life and a chronicle of his extraordinary multimedia practice. Privy to unprecedented access, she shares how, born in 1943 on Manitoulin Island to an Anishinaabe mother and American father, Beam was raised by his maternal grandparents and attended a residential school from age 10 to 18. His formal art studies began when he enrolled in the Kootenay School of Art in British Columbia, and he later enrolled at the University of Alberta.
Beam’s career was transformed in the 1970s, when Norval Morrisseau’s highly stylized, narrative-based paintings dominated conversations about what Eastern Woodlands art should be. Beam was also inspired by American artists such as Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Andy Warhol. Responding to their innovative mixed-media techniques, he developed a new platform to speak out about colonial violence and the resilience of Indigenous peoples. His groundbreaking work The North American Iceberg, 1985, became the first piece by an artist from a First Nations community to be purchased by the National Gallery of Canada as contemporary art.
When Beam died in 2005 at the age of sixty-two, a posthumous retrospective was organized by the National Gallery of Canada in 2010. The exhibition later travelled to the Museum of Anthropology and the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Although Beam’s life was tragically cut short, it was not before his reputation was cemented as one of the most important artists in the nation’s history and a prominent advocate for Indigenous rights. –The Art Canada Institute.
