OUT OF CONTROL: The Control Group (Stephen Gibb, Sandie Collins, Judy Chappus & Rebecca Draisey)

The Control Group are four Windsor artists who had the distinct pleasure of access to the grimy and deliciously untethered environs of the Lebel building in the 1980s and have joined forces to explore and share with each other experiences and discoveries from the past 35 years.

We came of age at the threshold of the last days of punk and the end of the industrial revolution. The decay, rage and diaspora were as much an influence on our development as young artists as were the abstract expressionists, the Dadaists, conceptualists, performative and environmental work, the list goes on. There was so much for us to consume and reconfigure into our own sense of rationality. What we have carried forward is a distinct view of the world, an internalized turmoil of freedom vs. rebellion — a profound dichotomy from which to leap into the unknown.

What we most markedly share is the use of the figure. The existential vessel, the human archetype enduring the pain, and suffering experienced by all, but grappling with contemporary issues of feminism, equity, restitution, justice, heresy, consumer culture, political corruption and social upheaval.

We have consistently been on the precipice of something. Being open to and trusting our perceptions. Moving forward in a world that has so much to internalize and make sense of, we embody the myth, pathos, eros, we are the Control Group. We offer you our subjective observations and findings.

July 16 – Sept. 7

Reception Aug. 9, 6-8pm