Women Make The World

In celebration of Women’s History Month, NAVA Contemporary is pleased to present Women Make The World, a group exhibition that brings together a dynamic group of ten artists whose practices challenge and reimagine the world around us. Featuring the work of Linda Bradford, Tracie Cheng, Amelie Ducommun, Christine Flynn, Angela Hau, Vanessa Kocking, Mimi Montan, K’era Morgan, Loreen Oren, and Zoë Pawlak, the exhibition honors not a single narrative, but a constellation of experiences. Women Make The World celebrates the enduring power of women’s creativity and the collective momentum that continues to redefine what art can be.

Women have shaped the trajectory of art while often navigating systems that overlooked or constrained their contributions. From the radical self-portraiture of Frida Kahlo to the luminous environments of Yayoi Kusama, from the fearless performances of Marina Abramović to the incisive text-based works of Barbara Kruger, women artists have persistently expanded the language of contemporary art. Their influence is not a footnote to art history, but foundational to it.

This group exhibition honors that continuum. The works presented here move across mediums and geographies, weaving together personal narrative, collective memory, and poetic abstraction. Together, they remind us that creativity is both a site of resistance and a space of possibility.Their work invites us to reconsider the stories we tell about who shapes culture.

Linda Bradford seeks to achieve the illusion of dimensionality in her work, employing custom-fabricated brushes to pull and push paint in a way that opens up space, making two dimensions appear to be three.

Tracie Cheng’s work portrays otherworldly organic forms inspired by the multilayered dimensions of topographical maps. Woven into the very essence of each work is the idea that there is always more than meets the eye. Her most recent body of work references the slow and steady shift from night to day alongside the complexities of parenthood, filled with exhaustion and cracks of brilliance.

Amelie Ducommun’s deeply textured and layered paintings address the behaviors and visual qualities of marine environments. The core of her practice seeks to uncover the rhythms, echoes and hums of different ecologies and translate them into a visual experience.

Christine Flynn is known for her landscape photography imbued with abstract elements, creating works of art that exist in between traditional photographs and mixed media.

Angela Hau’s practice is an investigation, expressing a building’s personality through a play of geometry and graphics – constantly calibrating the different elements until the image becomes a space to be inhabited.

Vanessa Kocking’s paintings bring to life an alternate reality, one that exists on the palpable brink of imagination and materiality. The essence of the artist’s work is borne of her memories and seeks to translate the emotional consciousness of her experiences.

K’era Morgan’s multi-media works are guided by intuition and mindfulness. Her collage/paintings are colorful and expressive, featuring gestural strokes, mark-making and various found papers representing ephemeral thoughts. Every ripple in the paper or the choice to use a variety of materials replicates life which is rarely black and white or uniform or void of texture.

Zoë Pawlak’s landscape paintings mark her relationship to the expansive geographic landscape of Canada. She employs emotive color to extend the sky and land, creating vast spaces for contemplation.