Together with Method Media, we have produced a film to accompany the 2022 Bermuda Biennial, in which the jurors discuss their approach to curating the exhibition. The theme of this year’s Biennial, A New Vocabulary: Past. Present. Future., asked artists to reflect on the past two years and to imagine what the future might hold.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Bermuda National Gallery and, for the first time, submissions were open to poets as well as visual artists as a way of celebrating Bermuda’s rich poetic tradition and the written word’s intersection with visual form. Over 100 submissions were received, and 32 visual artists were chosen to participate, alongside 11 poets.
2022 Biennial Jurors: Claire Gilman, Chief Curator, The Drawing Centre, New York Alexandria Smith, Head of Painting, Royal College of Art, London Richard Georges, Poet Laureate, British Virgin Islands
Click the image below to watch the video.
The Bermuda Biennial is sponsored by Bacardi Limited and is on display through to January 7.
The gallery was a hive of activity last week as the mid-term break brought in two camps, along with Bermuda’s primary and middle school art teachers for a day of professional development.
BNG Narrative Art Camp
In the BNG Narrative Art Camp, ten students aged 8 to 12 explored the possibilities of narrative art making. Under the direction of Rehana Packwood, the Bermuda National Gallery’s Education Officer, students created comics and wrote stories from which they sculpted scenes with clay.
In celebration of Halloween, students also painted mini pumpkins inspired the Yayoi Kusama artworks displayed in the 2019 exhibition What’s Poppin: Pop Art and Its Influence.
BNG camp students pose in the 2022 Bermuda Biennial artwork The Birdcage by Jacqueline Alma.
Students wrote stories (left) which they then illustrated with clay. Sculpture (right) by Leilani Carpol (age 11), Nalini Minors (age 12), and Georgina Dunkerley (age 9).
Kaleidoscope Arts Foundation
With 3 of their teachers exhibiting in the 2022 Bermuda Biennial, Kaleidoscope Arts Foundation turned their attention towards the Biennial as the inspiration for their October camp. Students explored the exhibition with the BNG team and were able to learn more firsthand from featured artists and camp teachers Jahbarri Wilson and Cheryl Hastings, while also discovering work by KAF teacher Corrina Rego.
Students then worked on a variety of mixed media projects inspired by the artworks they had encountered in the gallery.
2022 Bermuda Biennial artist and KAF teacher Jahbarri Wilson takes students through a drawing exercise inspired by the exhibition.
Artwork by Tucker Champion, age 9 (left), inspired by Corrina Rego’s Biennial artwork Phoenix (right).
Ministry of Education
After a 2-year hiatus on school field trips imposed by Covid-19 restrictions, we worked with the Ministry of Education to devise a day of professional development for primary and middle school art teachers.
BNG trustee Mitchell Klink guided the group through a “slow looking” exhibition tour and Education Officer Rehana Packwood shared all of the online resources available for teaching, including BNG’s virtual walkthrough and downloadable kids activity books.
Mitchell Klink leads the group through a “slow looking” tour.
Left: Rehana Packwood takes the group through BNG teaching resources. Right: BNG Kids activity books are produced to accompany each exhibition.
BNG endeavours to enrich the lives of all school children through free school tours, supplementary art classes, art camps and workshops, as well as at school presentations. For further information please contact education@bng.bm.
