Prairie Outdoor Exhibition

The Prairie Outdoor Exhibition is a sprawling outdoor gallery in Birds Hill Provincial Park held during the Winnipeg Folk Festival.

The festival is looking for visual artists to exhibit work in this beautiful outdoor setting. Experience this unique outdoor gallery and create something that will inspire, engage, challenge and amuse our festival patrons.

• Display your work! The majority of spaces are open fields, where the work can be freestanding. Work can also be installed in trees, tents, on fences or trailers.
• Transform a stage venue! Create a stage backdrop, paint a lock box, or design a sound tower scrim. Contact us for specs.
• Engage the public! Propose an interactive project that will engage our audience in the art making process: a workshop, group project, etc.

When submitting proposals please consider safety, ease of installation and removal, lasting impact on the natural environment, and the ability of the work to withstand sun, wind, rain, and curious patrons/children. Artists are responsible for installing and removing work.

Participating artists will receive an artist fee and a pass to the festival.

2012 Prairie Outdoor Exhibition submissions are currently being accepted. Apply Now!

Please fill out a Prairie Outdoor Exhibition application form. Send proposals to the attention of: Prairie Outdoor Exhibition #203-211 Bannatyne Ave. Winnipeg, MB R3B 3P2 ahelene@winnipegfolkfestival.ca

2011 Exhibition

Here are the 2011 artist exhibits that were near or around the west field of the festival site.

James Culleton
Labyrinth
Made of one continuous, unobstructed path, a labyrinth is a tool designed for healing, meditation and contemplation. The labyrinth can offer participants answers to unanswered questions. Born in St. Boniface, James Culleton studied painting and drawing at the University of Manitoba, where he received his BFA Honours. He is a visual artist, designer and musician.

Curtis DeMeyer
Esus
Esus is the Oak God of the Druids and the Celtic counterpart of Zeus and Jupiter. Symbolic of triumph and bravery, the energy of Esus was said to be manifested in the oak tree, making it the will of the gods and a doorway to inner spirituality and strength. Curtis DeMeyer is a metal artist based in rural Manitoba.

Brook Drabot, Ryan Lacovetsky, Tyler Allanson
Root Path, Celestial Garden and Borrowed Scenery
This piece is a triptych that frames the natural environment and surrounding views. It’s inspired by a seventeenth- century Japanese landscaping concept. These open-air, freestanding windows represent the earth and sky and the place where they meet. Ryan, Tyler and Brook bring together their skills of cast glass, blown glass and metal work, specializing in large scale outdoor sculpture.

Alison Froese & David Foster
Kinogratiscope
The Kinogratiscope features two short videos. A rockumentary on the world’s only zombie-folk musician, time-travelling bicycles, alien-car cinematographers and a documentary on the first “Secret Folk Festival.” Alison Froese Foster and David Foster are educators living in Winnipeg. They like to make music and art together.

Rowan Gray
Driftwood Movie Theatre
Inspired by forgotten ghost-town houses. The faint blue light from the projector filters through the silver driftwood and begs the viewer to come closer. This setting provides the perfect shelter to watch dream-like images. Rowan Gray is a second year Fine Arts student at the University of Manitoba.

Laura Lee Harasym
Wee Folk
Created out of recycled materials, imagination and loads of love. These Wee Folk are hiding in the trees, climbing up lampposts and catching your smiles and giggles. From self-taught street artist to showing her work in Winnipeg and Vancouver galleries, Laura’s “art to make you smile” is now hanging on walls all across the world.

Glen Knapp
Grassroots Player
A playful, organic nod to folk musicians and the original, spontaneous and natural spirit fundamental to the music. Glen Knapp is a freelance artist, consultant, promoter and critic who studied at the University of Manitoba School of Fine Arts.

Francis Leonard & Wyll Maynard
The Secondhandpants Science-Folktion Jukebox Sideshow
Just pop a coin or button into the slot, make your selection, honk the appropriate horn and prepare to be astounded! It’s a Jukebox! It’s a live performance! It’s a living piece of science-folkology! It’s the Science-Folktion Jukebox Sideshow! A revolutionary musical duo made up of Wyll Maynard, who hails from the far reaches of outer space, and Francis Leonard, a good-natured Saskatchewan-bred country boy.

Nicole Magne & Shannon Shields
Folk Fest Critter Cut-Outs
Take a closer look at some of the most overlooked visitors of the Winnipeg Folk Festival. You may be surprised to see what they are up to! Nicole Magne and Shannon Shields have both earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Manitoba. Nicole is a videographer and Shannon is a teacher.

Coral Maloney & Danielle Mondor
Prairie/Forest: a study in migration
The study tells a story about our past, explores our links to landscape, dissects our memory, behaviors and our biology, while juxtaposing questions about time, migration, settlement, land use and our futures as humans on the prairie. Danielle is a sprouting artist who is experimenting with new techniques in ancient crafts. Coral works in theatre, installation and craft.

Julia Mark
Handmade
The mural featured at the box office was inspired by a line from a Brian McLaren song, “Ours are the hands…,”referring to our hands as extensions of our actions, and that good works and faith can be acted out through our hands. Julia has studied art and illustration in Winnipeg and London, and now teaches art.

Teyana and David Neufeld
Door Beyond
Look in the mirror before opening the door to the question, “What’s Beyond Me Today?” Discover the key that is quietly in hiding. Many things become clear when you look though the fabric of the universe. David works with found and local materials to create spaces that inspire and add beauty to natural settings. Teyana is a windswept prairie girl currently surrounded by mountains as she attends Kootenay School of the Arts in the Fibre Program.

Cyrus Smith
Prefab
Cyrus Smith’s influences range from post-formalism to dumpster pop. His work raises questions of right or wrong, shared environments, appropriation versus reclamation, and the changing tide of youth empowerment. His most recent body of work exposes graffiti and the regulatory contradictions that surround street art.

J. Greg Sturko
Wood Man
Greg Sturko’s “Wood Man” is part of an annual series of sculptures. Why? Mainly because they look really cool and each year they get more and more awesome! Greg has been creating visual art his entire life. At the present, he expends his energies on sculpture.

Rick Unger & Gilbert Detillieux
Phineas Farnsworth’s Phanto-graphic Stereo-morpho-scope
Over a century before Avatar 3D, and decades before “stereo” was about playing music, 3D fans were making amazing photos that jumped off the page! Journey back to the era of the Victorian parlor to see the Winnipeg Folk Festival through the eyes of the visionary Phineas Farnsworth. Rick Unger has exhibited his packing tape sculptures and portraits in rust on sheet metal at previous festivals. Gilbert Detillieux creates “phantograms” and contributes to a shared portfolio with over a dozen other phantogram enthusiasts around the world.

David Wityk
Two Girls NYC-New York, Bucharetsi Metro-Romania, Sofia Metro-Bulgaria
These digital photomontages provide a candid view of metro/subway patrons in transit. The fractured multi-frame nature of the process allows different gestures and moments to be compressed into a single view. Urban geography and post-industrial landscapes are central themes captured in David’s photomontage works. A global view is expressed as he searches for subjects the world over.