Kelly Grace | Silver Lining
November 7-28 at Wall Space Gallery

WALL SPACE is proud to present Silver Lining, an exhibition of works by Toronto-based painter Kelly Grace. Renowned for her twilight hour patina and suspenseful storytelling, Grace commands the space with her art. Kelly Grace has been a featured gallery artist since 2011, and this is her third solo exhibition with us.

Kelly Grace’s paintings might be described as close-up views of faraway feelings. Appearing by turns like stills from a classic film, anonymous Polaroids in a found album, or half-remembered flashes of a recurring dream, these paintings wander the misty spaces between memory and fiction. Painting these scenes has led Grace to imbue her work with a sense of autonomy, often using themes of mystery, desire, and strength to portray women in the leading roles of their own lives. Other symbolic and cinematic cues — the cold reflection in a pair of reading glasses, a closed hand on a rotary phone receiver, a sidelong glance through a rearview mirror — are narrative openings. They are road signs we might follow to image the story unfolding beyond the frame. Whether mnemonic, melancholic, or both, Grace’s painted worlds are all about perception: the lenses through which we look backward, forward, and inward.