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| A Peace Project was created in 2001 to mark the turn of the millennium. I began my work with the tactile process of transforming sheets of rice paper into long weaving strips. They were then woven to form an integrated whole. Woven into these large rice paper panels are words which I consider vital in fostering relationships: compassion, kindness, respect, understanding, patience, tolerance, gentleness and forgiveness. They are reverberated in over 35 different world languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Icelandic, Inuit, Russian, Sanskrit and more. Since it's premier exhibition at the Harcourt House Art Centre in Edmonton in 2001, this work has been shown at over 20 public galleries in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, Saskatchewan and Yukon. In 2004, A Peace Project was exhibited at The Doland Modern Art Museum in Shanghai and the Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre in Hong Kong. A Peace Project was certified as a Cultural Property of Canada in 2010. | ||||||||||||
| Excerpt from Murmur written by Joanne Marion, Curator Medicine Hat Museum & Art Gallery | ||||||||||||
| Amy Loewan has searched for – and found – an apt metaphor in the materials and methods used to create her installation, A Peace Project. Eight large suspended works are imbued with the eight values Amy Loewan considers vital to the creation of a peaceful world. The work involved in weaving these rice paper tapestries is just that – labour, and plenty of it – but as with much repetitive labour, there is also a spiritual element to it, a meditative focus, which speaks not so much of inspiration as determination and belief, carried through time. This laboriousness of construction requires time also of the viewer, in reading and tracing and decoding the messages. The harmonious simplicity of the hangings, when viewed from a distance, is like the order of chaos – the patterning of nature – revealing increasing detail and complexity the more closely it is examined. [more...] | ||||||||||||
Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, Ontario, 2008 | ||||||||||||
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