Day by Day

Drawings from the Journals of Mowry Baden

April 6 to May 12, 2007

For over 48 years, Governor General Award-winning sculptor Mowry Baden has kept journals, meticulously mapping the trajectory of his life and artistic practice.

Deluge Contemporary Art is pleased to present this exhibition of over 70 drawings selected from amongst hundreds by Baden himself and curator Deborah de Boer. Excised from the numerous volumes of remarkable career-spanning documentation, Day by Day represents the first occasion this body of work can be seen by the public.

Encompassing schematics for sculptural projects (some realized, others not), delicate gestural figurative works and resolutely powerful abstract ones, these drawings have been literally and figuratively unmoored from their textual and diaristic context. Freed of these references, and titled only with dates, the drawings are installed non-chronologically inside the gallery space. Day by Day is a recombinant visual rereading of Baden’s seminal experiences and consciousness as a human being and artist, and a rare and compelling look at the nature of the creative process.

Mowry Baden has influenced a generation of sculptors in Canada and the US with his engaging, participatory installations. For almost 40 years, he has challenged contemporary sculpture through a staggering number of projects and artworks that borrow from psychology, architecture and performance. Born in Los Angeles in 1936, Baden received his BA from Pomona College (Claremont, CA) and MA from Stanford University (Palo Alto, CA). After teaching at Stanford and the University of British Columbia, among others, Baden began his tenure at the University of Victoria in 1975; he is currently professor emeritus. He has had solo and group exhibitions across North America, including Los Angeles, Mexico City, Montreal, Vancouver and New York (including MoMA). His work is represented in collections in Canada and the US. He has been commissioned to create public art works in Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Pittsburgh, Washington and Victoria, where he now lives.