About the Exhibition

Reflective Movement in Kyla Fischer’s Origin Returning – exhibition essay by Sarah Nordean

Liquid drips and swirls, and repetitive, organic shapes and lines suggest nature and landscapes in movement in Kyla Fischer’s exhibit Origin Returning. Viewers may find themselves oscillating between viewing the works as non-objective explorations of media and technique, and also as poignant, otherworldly landscapes. An upward thrust of a mountain, an icy peak of snow, a turbulent swirl of water, or an ominous churning cloud emerge from the pools and splatters of Fischer’s abstract prints.

Fischer’s process is a comfortable tension between chaos and order, marrying painterly dripping and splattering with more structured printing techniques. The compositions have been carefully considered, and each print is comprised of a collage of 4 – 8 photo etching or photolithography plates. Paper is used as a medium in itself as Fischer prints on both sides of thin Japanese parchment to create a distinct veiled effect.

It is a tidal push/pull between these dichotomies–between chaos and order, the non-objective and the objective, and between detailed marks and conceptually expansive space­–that makes Fischer’s work so engaging. Her prints are comfortable being many things at once, and invite prolonged contemplation from viewers.

In Origin, repeating black drips and splotches appear to move outward from the centre of the image. A pale blue oblong shape seems to be the source of the emanating movement, and the overall effect is of something bursting, captured in space. The print is comprised of two identical adjacent images, with one flipped, creating a kind of reflection. Indeed a motif of reflection and oscillating movement runs throughout the exhibition, visually as well as conceptually, beginning with the title of the show, Origin Returning, and underscored by what Fischer indicates is the inspiration for her work–an 11th century, reversible verse Chinese poem.

Sustaining the notion of reflection, Fischer‘s ambiguous landscapes lend themselves to be open to viewers’ contemplations and interpretations. Psychoanalyst and theorist Jeanne Randolph uses the term amenable to describe this openness of artwork, stating that a work’s ambiguous elements allow leeway for the viewer’s impulse to play with the illusion that has been created. Fischer’s work, like a palindrome, moves in two directions – towards the viewer and then back again as the viewer contemplates.

A rhythm is generated in Fisher’s exhibition through repeated imagery and palindromic motion. From the movement of nature and landscape within the images, to the reflective interactions viewers have with the work, the exhibition pulsates with a subtle but constant peaceful energy.