"Focus on form reminds me of interfaces between art and science, between illustration and expression..."

— Dr. Peter Trnka

"Interestingly, their idyllic representations contrast the contemporary realities of being black within North America."

— Melinda Pierre-Paul Cardinal

"Iconic in composition, the pieces are striking, hypnotic. There's the element of suffocation, of being hidden, and then the opposite--the freedom to explore yourself, even when it's uncomfortable for others."

— Tracey Waddleton

"Curiously, the combination of the quiet exhibition space and the steady, cyclical motion of the net suggests the rhythm of breathing, effectively arousing a kind of embodied awareness of a visitor's own respiration, particularly in relation to pace, depth and sound. As though caught in a trance, one begins to enter a relationship of unconscious mimesis, re-adjusting each breath to closer reflect the even breaths of the installation."

— Melinda Pierre-Paul Cardinal

"Order-signs are images that command. Order-words are words or strings of words that command: tell us to do, something. The basic point here is that there are many, many commands. Language primarily commands. Images, also, command. Not always, everywhere, but a lot, and intensely in particular places."

— Dr. Peter Trnka

"Consider the photo installation, Coast to Coast (NL, ON, YK). Three photographs: one of detritus, one of a graffito, and one of a fire pit. Each photograph relates a different narrative in turn, and at face-value reveals a different stage of alteration. However, there is more to consider: that they are printed on metal which is not diminutive of the subject matter as it does appear quite beautiful. Yet we are obligated to accept that we are getting a photo of a surface served on a surface, enlarged and fashioned horizontally as if it could be the essence."

— Martin Poole

"The images were photographed using my cellphone camera, a device readily accessible to many inhabiting this environment. The images were taken quickly, to keep with the directives of the game, i.e., obeying the rule of a short, brisk walk. After the walk was completed, the images were then selected (19 from a couple of dozen or so, hence few deletions); the selections were cropped, and light and color fixed."

— Dr. Peter Trnka

"The point of this digression is to illustrate that sometimes art and viewer are inseparable, that when art permeates our environment we sometimes complete it. And so, we then experience an opposite effect; not the effect of going to a gallery to see art dangling from white walls, but an effect that blurs the boundary between art and reality...however, tenuous that distinction is."

— Martin Poole

"Sculpture is deceivingly simple. Unlike paintings, photographs, and other plastic arts, sculpture is not normally framed or put behind glass, it is objectively individual, a self-contained art piece that acts as its own vessel. The presentation is built-in, and offers little outside of these physical limits. There are obvious exceptions to this, but the point is that sculpture, in many cases, is an art piece that is physically complete."

— Martin Poole

"Howse's work, I feel is primarily about heritage, belief and every-day saints. Jeff Werner makes me think of how particular people in our lives may be to us personally sacred. "

— Erika Jane Stephens

"The teachers, the boundary pushers, are the ones who can get you to look at things a different way. Her father, she says, noticed things, and 'maybe this is the purpose of art: noticing things; allowing people to notice things and to feel or respond, or not.'"

— Emily Deming

"If it were something like a hare it would be two. Two hares somehow in one. Each in its own material, one ceramic, one resin. One is coming out of or being stuck on to the other, but within the shortest duration, a split-split-second in time. A hair's breadth of time in the hare's breath. The beginning of an exhale. A becoming of another hare through a basic gesture."

— Dr. Peter Trnka

"Akin to the subject depicted on the Pioneer Plaques, Fowler strips away anything resembling reality, that is, context, colour, and spatiality, essentially how we perceive these subjects normally within our sensory scope. Remaining are the elements that he aims to push forward, which can be considered the plan, or perhaps the blueprint of a subject."

— Martin Poole

"Semblances of language appear within the painting; clouds as near-legible marks on the sky, and shrubs and grass directly on the landscape. Perhaps we are witnessing a confusion that comes from a desire to remember, and a quick burst of words stands in for the moment and things missed—the sky, the land, elements that he remembers were present, but cannot affix detail. In turn, Gough's hand simultaneously writes and draws."

— Martin Poole

"Placing an idea of the Newfoundland landscape in association with the celebrated Japanese printmaker breaks the tendency to navel-gaze, bringing the work into a broader more global context if still highly popularized. The image, a partially covered blanket in the snow, would be a familiar sight to many local residents. In St. John's, households are encouraged to cover their garbage pick-up with blankets or fishing nets to keep birds away. The fresh layer of snow transforms the candy colored blanket into a vast mountain range, hence at the relationship to the Japanese printmaker. Here Hollett seems to suggest we look to the now, to the everyday instances where place is affirmed, rather than the past alone. It is a soft and beautiful work that hints at broader questions."

— Mary MacDonald