Floating cabbages, glossy apples, grapefruits, cherries, flower beds and the night sky explode with playful and whimsical colours in this retrospective of Gathie Falk’s celebrated work

A visionary and experimental artist, Falk’s 60-year career covers a wide range of art forms including video, sculpture, ceramics, painting and performance. She is considered one of Canada’s most important living artists.

Above and below: Installation views of the retrospective Gathie Falk: Revelations, a travelling exhibition at the Audain Museum in Whistler, BC until May 6, 2024.

Falk has defined her work as a “veneration of the ordinary,” the witty and whimsical treatment of the common objects of everyday life.

Her work reflects childhood memories

Falk refers fondly to the close-knit Mennonite village in Manitoba where her family settled. Her parents were German-speaking Mennonites who fled Russia for Canada two years before Falk was born in 1928.

Falk has memories of fields of juicy, red watermelons, the fragility and economy of eggs, her mother’s gardens, piles of fresh fruit from the neighbour’s cherry tree, homemade shoes and dresses, a colourful Parcheesi game board with mesmerizing illustrations of rural scenes.

Falk’s 2018 memoir (Apples etc.) paints an idyllic childhood filled with joy — despite poverty, the loss of her father, and frequent moves. It was her imagination which filled her early years and propelled so much of her later art, including performances such as Red Angel (above).

The work 196 Apples, 1969–70, is one of the most admired and recognizable of Falk’s creations. Each ceramic fruit is individually handcrafted and slightly different than the next. Together they are carefully arranged into a glistening red pyramid, like one we might encounter in a grocery store. Falk made more than two dozen of these “Fruit Piles,” and the series can now be found in public and private collections across the country and around the world.

–Art Canada Institute (free, bilingual downloadable book about Gathie Falk)

Everyday objects inspire Falk

Falk also paints extensively. Embracing the simplicity of everyday objects, Falk encourages audiences to see the world with curiosity and wonder.

Explore More About Gathie Falk

The Art Canada Institute’s free, downloadable e-book about Gathie Falk, here.

An interview with the National Gallery of Canada, here.

An overview of the Revelations exhibition at the Audain Art Museum here.

At the McMichael, which curated Gathie Falk’s exhibition , then sent it travelling, here.

Gathie Falk’s artist page at Equinox Gallery

This is No. 63 in 150 Artists, an ongoing series on Canadian artists you should know.