The Riding Mountain Artists’ Residency provides professional artists with an opportunity to be inspired and create their works in the park’s setting. In return these professional artists invite visitors to interact with them and uniquely discover the park through their eyes and works.
We will all die. Yet our society no longer knows how to deal with death, grief and mourning. Drawn to the stories and histories that tie one individual to another, Carolyn Mount reveals the interconnectedness that shapes our world. Utilizing a variety of tools and mediums including drawing, printmaking, ceramics, textiles or relational means of expression, Mount gives material form to our social or personal experiences. Mount’s delicate and sensitive explorations give voice to our inner knowing through quiet moments of honouring. Not afraid to unpack or navigate questions of social obligation, spirituality or family relations, Mount respectfully but insightfully draws the audience in to a deeper, richer way of being as one connected to another.
Urns for Healing is a collection of vessels that give shape to the mystery of the body that one moment holds life and the next is an empty vessel.
“What began as a process of grieving the loss of my mother and giving shape to the way the body holds grief, Urns for Healing has evolved to become a collection of vessels that give form to and explore the mystery of the presence and absence of life,” said Carolyn.
Each form has a metal armature or skeleton made of soldered copper wire. The forms are then wrapped or covered in reclaimed fabric or soft materials and hand-stitched. Though these forms sit empty, they beg the question of what they can or once did contain.
“As we ourselves are skeletons and structures wrapped in the soft and fragile nature of skin, our bodies are ever changing, evolving and responding to the nature and cycles that life brings our way,” said Carolyn. “Likewise, the shape these forms take represents a response to the ever-changing nature of life, death and grieving.”
A new career working in Palliative Care has provided her the honour of working with and supporting others as they die, or are in the process of dying, or are coming to terms with loved ones that have died.
“The mystery of life and death surrounds me and I work to capture and represent the balance of the fragility of life and the death that awaits us all.”
Mount received her MFA from the University of Manitoba. She has had solo shows across Canada, recently including the Society of Northern Alberta Print-Artists (SNAP), Martha Street Studio and Centre de diffusion Presse Papier, and has exhibited in numerous group shows internationally. Her work is a part of important public and private collections in North America and internationally.
Heading out to Riding Mountain?
Connect with Carolyn on Saturday, June 10th at 2:00 p.m at the Clear Lake Bowling Greens.
