See this world

Artist explores how we see things in a new show

If you were to look into the sheer blueness of Conrad Beaubien’s eyes as they sparkle in the work lights at his studio, you’d never know he had surgery on them less than a year ago.

It was the revelation of that surgery, the existential conundrum of realizing everything he does is tied to the way he sees, that inspired the title of his show, opening next week at Gallery One-Twenty-One in Belleville.

“Seeing things” is an exploration of how we see, and, Beaubein says, this does not mean literally, but rather our viewpoints, our imaginations, even our dreams. It means seeing things with the raw, visceral creativity and innocence of a child. In fact, Beaubien reflects that that childlike curiosity is a part of who he is.

“In my lifetime, I’ve never lost that childlike curiosity,” said Beaubiend. “I’ve watched children play and I realized I’m still not very far from that. Because anything can become anything; it’s how you look at it. As adults we tend to want to disregard that. Because a cow can’t be purple and floating over the field really. Who’s going to take you credibly?”

It was the gallery that approached Beaubien about doing a show. A long-time artist, musician, writer and filmmaker, he has never focused on one medium, a fact that will be reflected in his show.

The mixed-media presentation uses an array of found objects acquired from places like dump sites and country paths, combined with standard artist’s mediums such as paints, printmaking, plaster and clay. The materials are not really as important as the way they are used.

“I consider mediums are more than just materials,” said Beaubien. “They sometimes refer to oils or acrylics or ceramics or whatnot, but I think of the word in the literal sense that it is a go-between. Between something that is bigger than ourselves, and our unconscious abilities to communicate that and then use the language to translate it.”

In his slow transition from a Toronto studio to a studio in an old feed mill in Wellington which he took over this August, Beaubien came across some discarded drywall, and discovered a brand new medium.

He gestures to a long strip of drywall with squares of drywall and ceramic tile mounted on it in a stark pattern. One of the squares features a defined crack.

“As I came along, one of [the tiles] had fractured, in the kiln. It was broken in the box. And then when I laid it here I realized that the fracture or the nospace is as much as the real space. So I deliberately exaggerated it. And I thought, here’s the rhythm of life. We start, in the humble beginning, we work our way in a pattern, and we go through intervals of life and things come along and then this happens,” Beaubien gestures to the fragment. “And then you repeat again. You get up and keep going, you know?”

Beaubien’s show will be a collection of new and old work that will run along the theme of how we see, beyond vision. It opens January 13, with an opening reception on January 14, and runs into February.