As part of the new In Residence program, five creatives from around the globe took over Canada Goose’s storefront windows in five major cities, creating five unique works of art designed to reflect the spirit of each city and foster a sense of community.
In Residence is Canada Goose’s international artist residency program taking place in our stores across the globe. Officially launching Summer of 2020, the program will evolve and grow year after year with the singular objective to donate prominent Canada Goose spaces to artists around the world to share their story and express the spirit of their community through the development of an art installation.
In Paris, Milan, Montreal, London, Shanghai, and Berlin, six different local artists have taken over our storefront windows, expressing the spirit and resilience of our global community through their artwork.
Here, we’ll introduce you to this year’s In Residence artists.
Julia Benz, Berlin
Julia is a contemporary artist working and living in Berlin. She paints on paper, canvas, as well as murals, and combines different materials allowing the viewer to connect with known forms so they fall into a cosmos of colour. “For me, colours are emotions, she says. “They shock and fascinate me at the same time.”
Working mostly in large formats, Benz manages to imbue the exciting and
complex worlds she creates with great dynamism. “I feel challenged when composing in multi-dimensional,” she explains, “When it gets bigger than me, I have no idea how to tackle it at first, but then it grabs me and I create.” Through the communities in Berlin, she naturally came into contact with bright colours and bold compositions found in graffiti, as well as contemporary and low-brow art, too. All of which gave her the freedom to explore her visual voice, while informing her work as an artist. Also of important note to Benz: being female. “To be a woman working in the contemporary art world, there is an inherent challenge in that you have to be twice as loud to be seen, and noticed. To me, it’s important to keep pushing these boundaries, even if it makes me uncomfortable,” she says. “I like the idea of going past the point of my emotional boundaries because then you realize your potential.”
Dominique Pétrin, Montreal
Dominique is a multidisciplinary visual artist living in Montreal. Her practice has been concentrated for several years in the creation of immersive installations of screen-printed paper. She explores the interface between materiality and virtuality by developing a corpus whose hypermateriality is developed by analogous processes in an architectural representation of the virtual.
“This summer will be very special as we feel exhilarated to be outside, and with the people we love,” she explains. “I wanted to illustrate the importance of interconnectedness between humans and their environment, and our need for body stimulation. My installation is about a transition from our virtual experience of the last few months to a reconnection with the real world. Inspired by textile art forms such as the geometric abstraction of the Bauhaus tapestries, the northern practices of quilt-making and the Expo 67, the patterns embody our perception of the world and translate brilliantly to the process of human cognition.”
See her installation in person at our Rue Sainte Catherine store.
L+L, Shanghai
L+L are multimedia artists from Shanghai, known for their playful intricate patterns and large-scale murals. A lot of L+L’s works are inspired by their observation of traditional Shanghai culture. Their work is often humorous, fascinating, filled with mythological imagination, involving graffiti, folk art, and creative expression.
“The windows give a building a breath of life. Without windows, a building is just a block made of several walls. There is something special about the Chinese window, as it has been through a long history. The craftsmen of all generations gave life to the architecture through their craftsmanship. The epitome of each era can be seen through it, and the world outside the window can only be explored by us.”
See L+L’s installation in person at our store in Shanghai IFC Mall.
Saroj Patel, London
Saroj is a British Indian artist creating sculptures and installations, reimaging worlds of unidentified organisms and inviting viewers to engage in non-human narratives that evoke imaginative and sensory experiences and generate possibilities in which new relations, ideas and connections can emerge. She plays with concepts of reality, as physical things are in a constant process of changing and evolving, she examines how interrelated events, relationships with each other and objects constitute reality.
“My installation represents the idea that we are living in a new world and the need to transform into a new way of living. All species are equal and we need to think about inclusivity with each other and all living things. Through collaboration with nature and our communities, we can learn and educate ourselves, form new relationships, live in harmony and metamorphose into a more ecological way of living”.
See her installation in person at our Regent Street store.
Daco, Paris
Daco is a French artist from the southern suburbs of Paris. After attending art school, he reinvented himself in graffiti. After honing his skills for more than 20 years he has created a strong and disruptive visual identity recognizable for its colourful and geometric graphic style. His large scale work appears in both public and private spaces and he has collaborated with brands ranging from Monoprix to Agnés B.
See his installation in person at our rue St Honoré store.
Mila Leva, Milan
Mila Leva is a visual designer who works in the communication field. Originally from Russia, she studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts by day and engraved tombs by night. She decided to move to Italy to study fashion and graphic design and graduated from Istituto Europeo di Design. Mila is keen on old cars and motorcycles and many of her illustration projects are dedicated to these subjects.
“Taking inspiration from Kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery, individual pieces representing Milan’s compassion, togetherness and nature, weave together in my installation to create a meaningful composition. Each piece works in harmony to illustrate a return to real values, retrieval of forgotten emotions, and rediscovery of true passions.”
See her installation in person at our Via della Spiga store.
Alexis Eke, Toronto
Alexis is an illustrator and designer based in Toronto, Ontario. Her work is inspired by traditional Renaissance portraits and Japanese art and showcases women of colour in a contemporary light. Grounded by the foundation of her Caribbean upbringing and her faith, she designs a unique space for audiences to view her work.
“Living in the open is about getting lost in the beauty of nature and discovering something new about yourself in the process. This piece showcases bubbles filled with a beautiful part of Toronto that, at any moment, could burst to expose the characters to a majestic environment to get lost in. The proverb “Just as water reflects the face, so one’s life reflects the heart” illustrates how we can use nature to better understand ourselves and each other.”
See her installation in person at our CF Toronto Eaton Centre store. Plus, download her digital art here so you can take your own artistic skills to task.
