The exhibition by Vancouver/Hornby Island artist Tom Burrows presents work by the artist from his early career to the present. The exhibition is a timely refocusing of attention on an artist who has made an immense contribution to the development of art in Vancouver, not only as an artist but as an educator and activist as well—in 1975 he received a United Nations commission to document squatters communities in Europe, Africa and Asia, a work that is now in the Belkin’s collection. Burrows first rose to prominence in the late-1960s and was included in several exhibitions at the UBC Fine Arts Library, an institution that was seminal in encouraging Vancouver’s growing and now vibrant art community. Burrows’ work, which demonstrates an interest in process and new materials, has encompassed a number of disciplines including sculpture, early performance art, video, painting and iconic hand-built houses on the Maplewood Mudflats and Hornby Island. Currently most well known for his innovative monochromatic cast resin “paintings/sculptures” produced during the last forty-five years, this exhibition examines the full breadth of his career with works from the Belkin’s permanent collection and others borrowed from the artist, collectors and public institutions.

This symposium is occasioned by the Tom Burrows exhibition at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery. Since the 1960s, Burrows’ work has reflected on the connections between the spaces of political and artistic/material practice. His home and sculptural works on the Maplewood Mudflats, his documentation of squatting communities in Africa, Asia and Europe, and his ongoing production of abstract works in resin and porcelain share an attention to the ways in which socially meaningful forms emerge out of engagement with, and intervention in, spatial and material processes. The symposium will take up some issues suggested by such attention in two panels.

Once again, we are pleased to welcome the UBC Contemporary Players to the Belkin Art Gallery for a concert inspired by the exhibition Tom Burrows.

Join leading UBC scholars, artists, curators and critics in a series of midday conversations. In this series, guests will address Tom Burrows, an exhibition of works by the Vancouver/Hornby Island artist from his early career to the present.