Sherrard Grauer, The Dogface Boys – On the Cliff, 1974, oil pastel on paper, Firestone collection of Canadian art

Drawn from the holdings of the Firestone Collection of Canadian Art and the Ottawa Art Gallery's Contemporary Art Collection, Laughing Matter examines the various ways in which artists use humour in their work. Employing absurdity, caricature, irony, and satire, the works in this exhibition address a variety of social, cultural and political concerns. In some cases, they incite us to learn from laughing at our faults, as with Edmund Alleyn's caricature of fellow artist York Wilson, or Arthur Lismer's sketch A.Y. Jackson as Clown, II (1955). In others, everyday social interactions are the source of amusement, as with Betty Davison's Yummy (1985), in which two lovers appear to want to consume each other more than their forgotten, dripping ice cream cones, or Sherrard Grauer's work The Dogface Boys—On the Cliff (1974), which plays up the puppy-like antics of young boys. Lynne Cohen further explores the everyday, presenting the interior of a health club with stark irony, while Philip Surrey examines the inherent strangeness of an urban setting in which the patterns of pedestrian commuters seem to resemble a choreographed dance.

Artists have also often used humour as a means of protesting the status quo, or gaining power over oppressive, seemingly unalterable norms. Ghitta Caiserman-Roth and Edwin Holgate drew political caricatures that wryly and somewhat bitterly commented on union battles and the affects of World War II on those on the margins of society. Closer to our own time, contemporary artists such as Ron Noganosh and Gerald McMaster use humour to address serious issues facing Aboriginal communities. In That's all it costs (1991), Noganosh assembles an odd assortment of found objects—toys, coins, a Hudson's Bay Company blanket and an American flag—to underline some of the consequences of colonialism, such as alcoholism, while in Plutomaniacs (1992) McMaster uses cartoons to examine and question the history of Aboriginal oppression.

– Catherine Sinclair, Curator, Firestone Collection of Canadian Art

Events

Opening
Thursday 27 November at 5:30 pm

Talk with curator Catherine Sinclair
Friday 12 December at 12:30 pm

Family Workshop with caricaturist Laura Lynn Eggleston
Saturday 21 March at 1 pm