New exhibition brings to light ceramic roots of celebrated Ukrainian-Canadian painter

Toronto—The Gardiner Museum presents an exhibition of early ceramics and a recent monumental painting by Toronto-based artist Natalka Husar. Soaking Wet and On Fire: Ceramics and Painting by Natalka Husar opens on September 9, 2023.

Widely celebrated as a painter, few people are aware that Husar began her career with a series of ceramic sculptures. On view for the first time in 46 years, Husar’s irreverent depictions of food, clothing, and care packages explore themes of cultural identity and belonging in the Ukrainian-Canadian diaspora.

“There’s a real magic to this show,” said Husar. “The works came from a place of deep meaning for me, a desire for love and connection. I believe that’s why they’re still so relevant and topical. It’s a personal story, but it’s also very universal.”

Husar grew up with a strong sense of her Ukrainian heritage. Born in the United States to Ukrainian parents who immigrated as displaced persons, Husar moved to Toronto in 1973 after graduating from Rutgers University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. In late 1977, she introduced herself to the Canadian art world with a series of ceramic sculptures titled Golden Form.

The lead work in the series, also titled Golden Form, depicts the making of varenyky, a Ukrainian potato dumpling. The luxurious, metallic surface and the vertical icon-like orientation elevate the everyday staple to an almost holy status. In Sex and the Single Ukrainian Girl, red leather boots, a brassiere, and a beaded necklace are arrayed on a plate like a meal. Speaking to image, consumption, and sexual agency, the work suggests the tensions and opportunities for young women in breaking with past traditions.

Following their exhibition in 1977, the majority of Husar’s ceramics remained in private collections or with the artist, while others were lost. The presentation at the Gardiner Museum, which features 10 works from the original series, is the first time Husar’s ceramics have been on view to the public since they were made.

“While Husar’s art is specific in its cultural reference points, it speaks to questions of generational conflict and connection to ancestry relevant in any diasporic community,” said Dr. Sequoia Miller, Chief Curator at the Gardiner Museum. “In Canada, where many residents feel a strong sense of connection to a home or ancestral culture and traditions, Husar’s work can evoke parallel experiences of displacement, dislocation, connection, and discomfort.”

In this installation, Husar’s ceramics are displayed alongside a recent monumental painting that contemplates the death of the artist’s mother in 2020. Created over a five-year span when Husar was both grieving and isolated as a result of the pandemic, Losing Mama (2019 – 2023) is a tour de force that exemplifies the artist’s ability as a painter.

Ceramics functioned as the entry point for Husar into her work as a professional artist, from which she began to explore key themes that have sustained her practice throughout a long career of painting. As a medium that was outside of the central discourses of contemporary art at the time, ceramics offered a sense of security that allowed Husar to uncover banquets, high-heeled boots, letters, and other imagery that would enable her to investigate the nuances of Ukrainian-Canadian identity.

The exhibition is accompanied by a publication, printed in Ukraine, which features essays by Dr. Sequoia Miller and Sarah Milroy, Chief Curator at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, and a prose poem by Janice Kulyk Keefer.

“It was important to me that the book be printed in Ukraine,” said Husar. “I saw it as an opportunity to offer a sense of normalcy to the publishing industry and creative community in Ukraine. The text is in both English and Ukrainian so everyone involved in the process, from the designer to the binders, can connect with it. It’s a story of survival against all odds.”

Soaking Wet and On Fire: Ceramics and Painting by Natalka Husar is on view in the lobby of the Gardiner Museum from September 9, 2023 to January 7, 2024.

For more information, visit gardinermuseum.com.

ABOUT NATALKA HUSAR

Natalka Husar was born in 1951 in New Jersey to Ukrainian immigrant parents. She graduated from Rutgers University in 1973 and that same year moved to Toronto where she lives and works. Husar has exhibited extensively across Canada and is represented in numerous public collections, including the National Gallery of Canada and the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), where her painting Torn Heart (1994) is currently on view. Husar’s earliest exhibited works were trompe l’oeil ceramics, but in the early 1980s, she began painting, with subject matter drawn from the paradoxes and conflicts of the Ukrainian émigré experience.

ABOUT THE GARDINER MUSEUM

The Gardiner Museum brings together people of all ages and communities through the shared values of creativity, wonder, and community that clay and ceramic traditions inspire.

We engage audiences with exhibitions, programs, and hands-on classes, while stewarding a significant permanent collection. We interpret historical ceramics to emphasize their relevance today, and champion emerging and established Canadian artists and their role in the broader world. We innovate through clay education, as we bring together the experience of making with a deeper understanding of the art of ceramics.

We believe in making, looking, and thinking through clay.

The Gardiner Museum has a collection of over 5,000 objects from the Ancient Americas, Europe, Japan and China, as well as contemporary works with an emphasis on leading Canadian artists. The Gardiner Museum is among the few museums in the world focused on ceramics and is one of the worlds most notable specialty museums.

For more information, please visit: gardinermuseum.com

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Media Contact:
Rachel Weiner
Senior Manager, Marketing
Gardiner Museum
416.408.5062
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