Opening Reception: Saturday, May 9, 2-5 pm
Remarks: Saturday, May 9, 3:00 pm
Exhibition Dates: May 9 – June 27, 2026
Stephen Bulger Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of work by Spring Hurlbut (b. April 11, 1952, Toronto). Hurlbut studied at the Ontario College of Art (OCAD University) from 1971 to 1973, and at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (NSCAD University) from 1973 to 1975. A multidisciplinary artist, she has long been recognized for her exploration of the relationship between sculpture and architecture, as well as themes of mortality.
In the mid-1990s, Hurlbut began photographing cremated ashes. In 2008, she released Airborne, a slow-motion video work documenting the release of human ashes entrusted to the artist by relatives of the deceased, including her own father.
The photographic series Dyadic Circles, 2019–2020, which will be shown with other works from Hurlbut’s Shut Up and La Bouche series, was inspired by a 1920 painting by Hilma af Klint titled No. 1, Starting Picture. Hurlbut was captivated by the work and by the idea of the circle, traditionally a symbol of unity, being divided into two parts, suggesting a duality within a whole. Her ensuing series comprises photographs of funerary ash derived from both humans and animals, with the focus predominantly on domestic animals. As with Airborne, family members or friends of the deceased gave the artist permission to work with their ashes.
Each of Hurlbut’s compositions presents a circle divided vertically into two parts. In some instances, the two-part composition is made up of a single individual’s ashes, and in others, it depicts two subjects. The tonal variation of the ash is determined entirely by the temperature of the cremation process. The two half-circles share a common division. There is a magnetic attraction when the left and right sides of the orb come into contact with one another—a unifying configuration conveying both a synthesis and a tension between the two parts.
Exhibiting internationally since the late 1970s, Hurlbut's work is in many private and public collections including the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal; McMaster Museum of Art, Hamilton; Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina; and Buffalo AKG Art Museum, Buffalo, USA; among others. Hurlbut was awarded the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts in 2018.
