Essentia Calgary is honored to display the works of British-born artist, Simon Wroot during the month of April. This is the first time that Simon Wroot’s exhibit, “Remnants of Community”, has been shown in Calgary, although the exhibit was featured in many rural Alberta villages and towns as part of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts Travelling Exhibition Program (TREX).
You are invited to view Wroot’s exhibit of miniature metal churches in layers of bronze, copper, nickel, steel, and sterling silver, on the evening of April 4, 2013, 6:00 to 8:30 p.m. at Essentia, 1113 Kensington Road NW. Wroot’s delightful miniatures will be accompanied by interpretive information on the pioneer churches and the communities that formed around them.
More about the artist…
A resident of Calgary since 1987, Simon Wroot is highly knowledgeable about photography, woodworking, stained glass, and more recently, precious metals. Simon Wroot has studied at the Alberta College of Art and Design, the Lewton-Brain/Fontans Centre, and Red Deer College.
Simon Wroot started teaching the Craft Business Training Program for the Alberta Craft Council in 1996, presenting in both Alberta and the Yukon. In 1997, he joined the Craft Council’s Board of Directors, becoming Board Chair two years later. As Alberta’s Director of the Canadian Crafts Federation, Wroot was on the organizing committees of both CraftYear2007 and the 2009 project in Cheongju, Korea. He eventually held terms as Secretary, Vice President, and President, and is currently Past President.
In addition to his other artistic endeavours, Simon Wroot has developed several successful, popular lines of jewellery, reproducing the simple and elegant images of Canada’s prehistoric rock art, hand-cutting the intricate knotwork of the ancient Celts, and creating animal designs from 7th and 8th Century manuscripts and Gospels. Significantly, Wroot was also commissioned to create the presentation tiara for the World’s Irish Dance Competitions.
More about the “Remnants of Community” Exhibit…
“Remnants of Community” consists of a series of 15 framed, miniature metal portraits of rural Alberta churches. Artist Simon Wroot explains that:
The people who settled Alberta came from communities where the church was the centre, the heart, the most important and often the largest building. Their first priority in this new land was for food and shelter for their families. Their second was for a place to gather, to worship, a place to become the heart of their settlement; to make it a community. They filled these Houses of Worship with the energy of their faith, their hopes and dreams for the future for their families and the community.
Then came droughts, dust bowls, grasshoppers, depressions. There were also good times, plentiful times, hopeful times, but they didn’t last. Many of the small communities ceased to exist – so churches were abandoned and slowly disintegrated, they were moved or dismantled, sold as houses or store.
Those remaining Houses are the remnants of communities; remnants of the structure, remnants of the energy of the pioneers, remnants of their hopes and dreams. These little buildings are not just wood, glass, stucco, concrete, but are a powerful presence in the countryside. This project fulfills my need to tell these stories, to bring these remnants of lives, communities, and dreams to life again.
We hope you will exercise your sense of community this April 4 and join us at Essentia, 1113 Kensington Road NW, from 6:00 to 8:30 p.m. Meet the artist and explore Alberta’s heritage. Light refreshments will be served.
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