Into the Fold: Jessie Demers, Beth Kope, Victoria Edgarr
Xchanges Gallery and Studios, Victoria, BC - April 4 – 19
Adoption is a practice that has been with us for a very long time. The Bible’s first mention of adoption is in Exodus 2:1–10, when the Pharaoh’s daughter saw a baby floating in the Nile in a basket, rescued him and raised him as her son Moses. Adoption has both negative and positive connotations, and for the adoptee, enough unknowns to complicate what many of us take for granted. For members of Victoria’s Adoptee Artists Collective, adoption is not just a status but, as one might expect, a recurring theme in their work.
In the words of the AAC, “Into the Fold reflects the gesture of being welcomed into a chosen family, as well as exploring what lies underneath the hidden folds of our histories and genetic ancestral memories. The work challenges and decodes social ideas around adoption, opening up a conversation about topics that have historically been draped in shame and secrecy.”
In their explorations, collective members Jessie Demers, Beth Kope and Victoria Edgarr employ a variety of media to both uncover and recover what is held in those folds. In unnamed (n.d.), Kope has produced an interactive origami toy known variously as a chatterbox, a whirly bird and a fortune teller. Those familiar with this 1970s playground game will recall that, upon stopping, a flap is lifted to reveal a secret, a truth or a directive. In Demers’ Grafted Tree 1 (n.d.), we see not only the tree and its graft, but also its fissure. Edgarr’s drawing titled Double Doll (n.d.) features two figures: the first in graphite, the second a golden Oscar-like stick puppet held in the first figure’s hand.
