Species Life

Zavisha Chromicz, Marlene Creates, Barbara Klunder, Jeanne Randolph, Nell Tenhaaf, Carol Wainio, Natalie Wood

group exhibition
June 12 - August 8, 2026
Opening Reception Friday June 12, 7-10pm

from Larch, Spruce, Fir, Birch, Hand, Blast Hole Pond Road, Newfoundland 2007–2026

The larch off the southeast corner of the house – the largest larch here. 2007 & 2018 from Larch, Spruce, Fir, Birch, Hand, Blast Hole Pond Road, Newfoundland 2007–2026

The fir below the path up the Tolt whose top half cracked off. 2007 & 2018 from Larch, Spruce, Fir, Birch, Hand, Blast Hole Pond Road, Newfoundland 2007–2026

The birch with shaggy bark in the clearing between the Rattling Brook Path and the bottom of the Tolt. 2007 & 2018 from Larch, Spruce, Fir, Birch, Hand, Blast Hole Pond Road, Newfoundland 2007–2026

Tortoise & the Heir (We are all descended from the rabbit)

Mother Load: The challenge of suturing the mitochondrial tear

Mother Load: The challenge of suturing the mitochondrial tear (detail)

Species Life
installation view , 2026

New publication launch and reading by Jeanne Randolph
Nature Gives Me the Willies
Saturday June 20, 1-3pm, reading at 2pm.
Join us as Jeanne Randolph reads from her new book Nature Gives Me the Willies at PPCA. Reserve a signed copy here.

Paul Petro Contemporary Art is pleased to present two group exhibitions, Species Life and Standing Ground IV, Dreaming of You, that straddle the digital divide and offer composites for remembering the past, channelling history, and building futures.

Species Life takes its name from the title of a photo-based light-box work from 1989 by Nell Tenhaaf, produced through an InterAccess artist-run centre residency in Toronto in 1988 and using a TARGA video capture board and computer image manipulation. In that pre-internet time Tenhaaf was posing the question: how deep does social formation go when considering how humans are shaped? And this, before social media platforms and the spectre of AI.

In a decidedly analogue manner Zavisha Chromicz constructs the fibre-based work Mother Load: The challenge of suturing the mitochondrial tear in 2022 in an elaborate effort to stem the flow of intergenerational trauma. Natalie Wood's reconstructed cardboard Acoustic Warrior alludes to African oral traditions and the reverberations of (bass) culture through the Middle Passage to the streets of the Americas. Marlene Creates captures the passage of time as she photographs her hand on a tree in her forest, once as a black and white fibre-based silver print, and then eleven years later as a colour digital print.

Barbara Klunder's evolutionary oil paintings in burnished gold frames allude to a variety of primordial fauna and the cycles of life. Carol Wainio's painting And the small bird did sing #2 captures a boy experiencing a moment of wonderment while looking through time, and through slow viewing returns the viewer to that childhood state. And by summoning no less than Lucretius (c. 99-55 BCE) from De rerum natura (On the Nature of Things), Jeanne Randolph begins her new book, Nature Gives Me the Willies, with a quote from the Roman poet and philosopher, "in every direction everywhere there are on every side, above and below, through all the universe, no limits, and thus does truth radiate, and the essence of the deep shines clear."

Standing Ground IV, Dreaming of You is the fourth in an ongoing series of group exhibitions that remember Will Munro (1975-2010). This fourth edition emphasizes Wendy Coburn (1963-2015), an instructor of Will's at OCAD who helped ignite his activism, and Robert Flack (1957-1993) whose Chakra photographs helped sage-smudge the West Queen West Beaver Cafe which Munro helped open in 2006 as a transformative queer alternative space for music and performance, dining and drinks, and meeting up.

Munro's mantra, to (hashtag) 'know your queer history' meant that he was always pointing to the trailblazers that came before him or attracting acolytes and trailblazers-to-be to shine. The social aspect of his practice led to monthly club nights such as Vazaleen that had the effect of moving the margins to the middle while moving the needle in socially progressive ways that are felt to this day. And yet, he rarely took the spotlight. Standing Ground IV captures that sprit in an elaborate install of tweaked t-shirts and sweaters from Munro's personal wardrobe, readied for exhibition by his mother, Margaret Munro, and extends to the artist friends and allies whose work has been assembled here.

Species Life features work by Zavisha Chromicz, Marlene Creates, Barbara Klunder, Jeanne Randolph, Nell Tenhaaf, Carol Wainio and Natalie Wood.

Standing Ground IV, Dreaming of You features work by Will Munro, with Stephen Andrews, Zavisha Chromicz, Wendy Coburn, Keith Cole, Francisco De la Barra, Michel Dumont, FASTWÜRMS, Robert Flack, Andil Gosine, Matthias Herrmann, Zachari Logan and Natalie Wood.

Further text forthcoming.

Species Life

Zavisha Chromicz, Marlene Creates, Barbara Klunder, Jeanne Randolph, Nell Tenhaaf, Carol Wainio, Natalie Wood

group exhibitionJune 12 - August 8, 2026 Opening Reception Friday June 12, 7-10pm

group exhibition
June 12 - August 8, 2026
Opening Reception Friday June 12, 7-10pm