Surrey Metal

May 14 – June 1, 1991
Exhibition

About the Program

The exhibition focuses on the work of four British Columbian artists through their roots and inspirations. Jim Cummins, Stan Lake, Bill Rennie, and Joe Sarahan are artists well known in their media in Vancouver. All four grew up in the Vancouver suburb of Surrey. Surrey represents suburban sprawl—massive subdivisions devouring agricultural land. It is represented as massive subdivisions in a cultural wasteland. Surrey is the brunt of many jokes in Vancouver that denote it as crass, vulgar, and dense. Metal is short for Heavy Metal. Originally an adult fantasy comic book which appeared in the early 1970s, its name has been borrowed to describe a type of rock music that sprang up in the 1970s and flourished in the 1980s. Using an array of media—such as paintings, ceramic sculpture, and video—the exhibition's focus is how these premises manifest themselves in the work of these artists. It is important to note that none of these artists have any relationship to this music and little contact with Surrey, yet there seems a persistent strand of this in the work. The powerful pull of mass/pop culture on art is an old story and these particular artists attempt an exploration of these influences. The exhibition, a co-production with Smash Gallery, showed at grunt from May 14 to June 1 and at Smash Gallery from May 17 to 30.

Artist

Jim Cummins, Stan Lake, Bill Rennie, Joe Sarahan

Curator

Glenn Alteen

Identifier

1991.0514 SUR

Collection

grunt gallery Programming Archive

Location

grunt gallery (first location)
209 E. 6th Ave, Vancouver, BC, Canada, V5T 1J8
Unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ/selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations

Smash Gallery
101 E. 7th Ave, Vancouver, BC, Canada, V5T 1M5
Unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ/selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations

In copyright. For uses beyond Fair Dealing, research requests, corrections, takedown requests, or other inquiries, please contact grunt gallery: archives@grunt.ca