Java Toile (2015)
(photo: Paul Litherland)
Java Toile began as a reaction to and a reimagining of a series of 19th Century European candelabras I saw at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris. These excessively ornate porcelain object were meant to represent the continents. Each one featured a central, robed, female figure sitting on an exotic animal supposedly representative of said continent, flanked by depictions of local flora.
Installation view, Centre M-A-I, Montreal, 2015