Inspiring (2010)

I created the wall-text painting Inspiring as part of the 2010 group exhibition Giving Notice: Words on Walls at Dalhousie Art Gallery (Halifax). 

In response to Dalhousie University’s ‘Inspiring Minds’ slogan, I collected taglines from six other universities and seven corporations containing a form of the word ‘inspiring’. In 2010, Benjamin Moore ran a promotional campaign and home decorator’s contest under the banner, ‘Inspired by You’. I matched the seven colours used in the accompanying promotional material for Inspiring. I chose this location in the Gallery for its imposing, authoritative position at the entrance where this work would act as a tone-setting, temporary architectural frieze.

Giving Notice: Words on Walls was curated by Peter Dykhuis and also included work by Brad Buckley, Garry Neill Kennedy, Gordon Lebredt, Micah Lexier & Christian Bök, and Lawrence Weiner. A catalogue with essays by Peter Dykhuis and Jessica Wyman is available from the Gallery.

INSPIRING was subsequently readapted in 2014 for an exhibition at University of British Columbia's AHVA Gallery (Vancouver).