Matt Shane

A video capsule about the show is available here.

McBride Contemporain is pleased to present In Fitzca’s Pond, our second solo exhibition by Matt Shane. Over the past year, the artist has set aside the monumental aspect of landscape in favour of a personal, intimate vision. His new body of work springs from close observations of amphibians seen while wading in Fitzca’s Pond on his friends’ land in the Laurentians.

Frogs are the beloved subject of this series, and they take pride of place in the foreground of an abundant natural domain. The imposing format of these paintings leads to a sense of immersion in the landscape. The audience, in turn, is given an intimate encounter with the animal — a moment when eyes meet and time dissolves. What does our experience of this habitat have in common? What is the sensorium of these beings who seem so dissimilar from us, yet have inhabited our world since time immemorial? Despite their fragility, amphibians have found ingenious ways to adapt to extreme and changing environments. Over the course of millennia, their bodies have evolved to produce a staggering diversity of traits, complex camouflage mechanisms and defense strategies to ward off predators.

Shane’s corpus reflects his fascination with these sophisticated animals, highlighting their importance in today’s context. Frog skin is semi-permeable, which allows these creatures to breathe underwater. This same mechanism renders them acutely susceptible to pollutants and fungal infection. The presence or absence of frogs tells us about the biotic health of a wetland. With their strangely warm and vibrant hues, Shane’s paintings invite us to pay closer attention to these “ecological barometers” and the flora that shelters them. If these surreal natural images exude a certain violence, even a sense of urgency, it is only to underline the vulnerability of our ecosystems and the vital need to protect them.

Translation of a text by Marianne Cloutier