The Miniprint Exhibition runs until December 21

Calgarians might not be aware of the city’s flourishing printmaking community, but one artist-run gallery is out to change that. The Alberta Print Makers Society will be opening its second annual Miniprint Exhibition on November 23, featuring work from a variety of print media practitioners from across Canada and the world.

This year’s show is dynamic in its diversity of concepts, methodology and media. Kimberly Simpson’s Someplace in Time — Drowning with the Moon #2, a digital photograph rendered in silkscreen, depicts dark clouds with a ray of hope in the middle of the sky. Other prints, such as a collection by Eveline Kolijn, present the theme of biological entities like bacterial or cellular creatures, plant life or fetuses in various stages of embryonic development. New Life in Old Man’s Whiskers expertly combines a detailed image of gnarled prairie wildflowers subtly interposed with a multiplying cellular life form growing inside it. “Though I am working with the intersections between biology, physics and art, it is still inevitably the fascinating details in the forms and shapes of my subject that continue to inspire me and ultimately appeal to my sense of esthetic,” says Kolijn. The pink tones in Proto-phyto, a piece that represents a marine micro-organism that could double as an alien flower, similarly appeals to this intricate sense of biological minutiae. Likewise, Amoebe somehow manages to render the world of unicellular life forms at once complex and beautiful.

Wendy Cain, a print media instructor from Ontario, employs a mélange of ancient and contemporary concepts in her prints. One of the pieces juxtaposes a Greek bust of antiquity with random images of fish in Roman-style vessels. Another features ceramic pots with a prehistoric antelope reminiscent of the Lascaux cave drawings. Marijke Nap contributes colourful pieces with her Halloween Costume series. Each print displays ostentatious outfits of strange proportions, worn by a barely detectable model. Alden Alfon shows comparable work in his quirky and playful Mr. Sprinkles, a silkscreen of a mischievous house pet, and Eietwpiia, a seemingly nonsensical silkscreen incorporating a crossword style grid of letters with a superposed image of a man in glasses. Hardened in the Garden is a simultaneously raw and sweet etching by D’Arcy Wilson, inspired by a stuffed stout given to the artist as a present.

On the other end of the spectrum, in regards to themes and colour, are works such as Stuck (kitchen) by Heather Huston, a photo etching with collage depicting modern alienation in an anonymous female subsumed by her traditional milieu. Analogously, P202 shows the image of an equally anonymous and androgynous individual sitting in front of a TV, their face erased amidst the scene. Huston uses stark sepia tones to further underscore the feeling of her prints. Carrie Phillips Kieser presents some moody pieces in her black-and-white etchings, Head and Shoulders and Knees and Toes. While the subjects in her pieces are children or infants, the ambiance seems to steer away from innocence and bespeaks darker notions.

Over 150 pieces in total from almost as many artists are on display. As the name of the show suggests, the pieces are generally small prints, to facilitate this large grouping of art.