Adrift a New Sculpture by Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero at VPL’s Central Library
VANCOUVER, B.C. – The City of Vancouver Public Art Program in partnership with Vancouver Public Library unveiled a new public artwork for downtown Vancouver. Titled Adrift, the sculpture by Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero is suspended in the double-height, sky-lit space between Levels 8 and 9 of the Central Library.
Made of polished cast stainless steel and translucent cast resin, the sculpture suggests the skeletal form of a vessel or boat fashioned from pieces of driftwood. The cast resin ribs of the boat’s hull also conjure the notion of fossilized bones. Seeming to float in the vaulted space, the new artwork is viewable from multiple vantage points – from below on Level 8 and from above and the sides on Level 9.
“The unsettling nature of this sculpture hangs in the air, resting somewhere between our limited understanding of our ancient past and our inability to predict what is to come in time,” said artists Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero.
The artists gathered driftwood from sites on Vancouver Island, selecting pieces with a similarity to bones in order to fashion the skeletal form of a boat. The stainless steel spine of the work was cast at Maker Sculpture in Toronto, a foundry and metal fabrication studio that works with contemporary artists and organizations. The driftwood/bone forms were cast in translucent resin at Maker Sculpture from molds made in the artists’ Vancouver studio.
“We are pleased to add this significant sculpture by internationally renowned artists Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero to Vancouver’s art collection,” said Branislav Henselmann, Managing Director of Cultural Services for the City of Vancouver. “We appreciate the opportunity to work with Vancouver Public Library on this project, and hope this beautifully crafted piece, situated in the elegant domed space in the upper floors, will engage and stimulate audiences for years to come.”
The installation of Adrift marks the final piece of VPL’s Central Library expansion, which opened to the public in fall 2018. Designed by the original architects of the building, Moshe Safdie & Associates, with local partners DA Architects and world-renowned landscape architect Cornelia Hahn Oberlander, the Central Library offers the perfect gallery space for Adrift.
“We created Levels 8 and 9 to help bring Vancouverites together, and are delighted to see how well they are being used every single day since opening,” says Christina de Castell, Chief Librarian of Vancouver Public Library. “With the installation of Adrift, we celebrate the completion of Central Library’s expansion. Public art promotes conversation, and Central Library was a natural fit for Adrift to help build connections among our community.”
Funding for artworks at the Central Library was established as part of the early planning for the space when it was built in 1995. A reserve was established to facilitate future artworks at the library.
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About the City of Vancouver Public Art Program
The City of Vancouver’s Public Art Program works with artists, communities, City departments, and developers to commission new public artworks across the city. Contemporary art is incorporated into city planning and development through public art plans, civic commissions including artist-initiated projects, public art requirements for private development, non-profit partnerships and temporary projects. Since 1991, the program has offered a range of opportunities, supporting significant public art projects in various media resulting in over 300 artworks.
About Vancouver Public Library
Vancouver Public Library has been dedicated to meeting the lifelong learning, reading and information needs of Vancouver residents for more than 100 years. Our vision is an informed, engaged, and connected city. Our mission is a free place for everyone to discover, create and share ideas and information.
Last year, VPL had more than 6.4 million visits with patrons borrowing more than 9.8 million items. A 2018 Insights West survey found that 95% of Vancouver residents agreed “VPL is one of the most valuable services that the City of Vancouver has to offer.”
Backgrounder: The Artists
Rebecca Belmore (b. Upsala, Ontario) and Osvaldo Yero (b. Camaguey, Cuba) lived and worked in Vancouver for fifteen years and are currently based in Toronto. They have independent practices but have also collaborated in life and art for the past twenty years, based on their “mutual interest in the material nature of art and its relationship to the body.” They have collaborated on previous public artworks for the Canadian Museum of Human Rights, Winnipeg (Trace, 2014) and for the City of Richmond (Upriver, 2016). They recently received the 2019 Hart House Centennial Commission at the University of Toronto, to be unveiled in November.
A member of the Lac Seul First Nation (Anishinaabe), Rebecca Belmore is an internationally recognized artist. Her multi-media works in performance, video, sculpture, installation and photography are “…rooted in poltical and social realities of Indigenous communities, …making evocative connections between bodies, land and language.” (rebeccabelmore.com) She represented Canada at the Venice Biennale in 2005 and participated in documenta 14 in Athens, Greece, and Kassel, Germany, in 2017 and the Istanbul Biennale in 2019. In 2018, the Art Gallery of Ontario presented a major solo exhibition, Facing the Monumental, travelling to the Musée d’Art Contemporain in Montreal in 2019.
Osvaldo Yero works mainly in sculpture and installations. He came to prominence in the 1990s in Cuba, with work exploring vernacular culture and nationalism there. He has exhibited internationally since 1994 and participated in the first Johannesburg Biennale (1995). Yero immigrated to Canada in 1997 and was included in the US touring exhibition Irony and Survival on the Utopian Island in 2001. He has since exhibited in Canada and his work is in collections in Cuba, Germany and Canada.
Backgrounder: Adrift
Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero describe their project as, “… a sculpture, a skeletal form of a boat seemingly made of metal and bone.”
“Adrift, suspended beneath the light of the sky silently asks the question – a boat or a carcass? The disparity between these two entities, a boat as an empty vessel and a carcass as evidence of death is a signal of the uncertain future that we all face together.
The unsettling nature of this sculpture hangs in the air, resting somewhere between our limited understanding of our ancient past and our inability to predict what is to come in time.”
Adrift is a visual icon, a metaphor, encompassing our histories as well as the current vulnerability and troubled connection to the earth.
- A vessel, site of working, warring, displacement, a life raft, survival
- Adrift, at sea, afloat; a site of stories, imagination, dreams, troubles and transformations
- A means of conveyance, between places, states of being, a connection between the water and the land
- A skeleton, carcass, spine. ribs; a fossel from the ancient past; a withered vessel holding time, history, culture, nature, life and death
- A harbinger, a warning, a hope
Fabrication and installation
The artists gathered driftwood from sites on Vancouver Island, selecting pieces with a similarity to bones in order to fashion a skeletal form of a boat.
The stainless steel spine of the work was cast at Maker Sculpture in Toronto, a foundry and metal fabrication studio that works with contemporary artists and organizations. The driftwood/bone forms were cast in translucent resin at Maker from molds made in the artists’ Vancouver studio.