Meet our new ‘Filtered’ artists!

We’re thrilled to announce that emerging Ottawa artists Sarah-Mecca Abdourahman and Laurena Finéus will be working together to complete a mural commission in our current exhibition Filtered! 

Successful candidates of an open call process hosted in partnership with the OAG and the Ottawa Black Art Kollective (OBAK) in early 2021, Abdourahman and Finéus have undertaken a mentorship with Toronto mural artist, Curtia Wright, and they are currently working to complete a mural work in our Stonecroft Gallery on the OAG’s fourth floor.

Abdourahman and Finéus’ collaborative mural work is currently slated for completion this summer and will then be on view in Filtered until the end of the exhibition on December 19th, 2021. Stay tuned for more exciting updates about this project!
 
Filtered mural artists

Sarah-Mecca Abdourahman is a visual artist based in Ottawa and Montreal. In 2016, she participated in an exhibition at the Trinity Art Gallery at Shenkman Arts Centre. Through Young at Art, she had the opportunity to exhibit at Eugène-Racette Art Gallery in 2017.

Her practice involves painting and video art. Her work examines topics of identity, family, and current societal issues through the use of the figure and portraiture.

Abdourahman is now a graduate from Concordia with a BFA and a studio art major. Since graduating in 2020 her video work has been featured in CBC Arts: Exhibitionists. She designed an eight-panel mural for the Vanier Community Service Centre. She is now starting a new mural project with Lansdowne and the Glebe.

Laurena Finéus is an emerging Haitian-Canadian visual artist specialized in painting. She was born and raised in Gatineau, Québec but is currently based in Ottawa, Ontario. Finéus is a graduate from the University of Ottawa with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and a minor in Communication.

In her practice, Finéus has been concerned with the third-space, representations of Haiti and its Canadian dyaspora. She has exhibited at Karsh-Masson Gallery (2021), Art mûr (2019), Galerie Annexe (2019-2020), Galerie 115 (2019-2020) and Paradigme (2020), among others.

Recently, The City of Ottawa Art Collection acquired a selection of her works and she is part of a range of private collections nationally and internationally.

Mentor

Curtia Wright is a multi-disciplinary fine artist and mural artist based in Toronto, Ontario.  Her works delve into the spiritual and mental wellness of peoples of the African diaspora; linking to mythology/folklore while disseminating what ‘fantasy’ means. Her work questions societies’ indoctrinated beliefs of what femininity and blackness are in relation to gender. http://www.curtiawright.com/

Links

https://oaggao.ca/filtered
https://ottawablackartskollective.wordpress.com/home/about/
http://www.curtiawright.com/
https://oaggao.ca/open-call-submissions-filtered-mural-commission-and-mentorship-opportunity