Gary Lee-Nova

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Gary Lee-Nova, "Travel Diary I," 2007

digital collage on paper, A/P, 23" x 35" (City of Burnaby Permanent Art Collection, gift of the artist)

As a founding member of the Image Bank collective and a leading figure in the Vancouver art scene of the 1960s and 1970s, Gary Lee-Nova is known for his painting, printmaking and digital collage. A selection of his work, from 1966 to the present, is featured in the solo show, Oblique Trajectories, at the Burnaby Art Gallery until April 18.

At first glance, his works may seem oblique. There’s a lot going on and although Lee-Nova hates the term “conceptualist,” he acknowledges his creations are embedded with intellectual content that "may appear to be buried in a mysterious location.” 

Nor does he subscribe to one particular medium, choosing them instead to suit the ideas he's planning to explore. And he has many ideas.

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Gary Lee-Nova, "Side Effects," 1967

acrylic on canvas, 71" x 40" (collection of the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver; gift of Kenneth and Joyce Morton)

Nevertheless, several trajectories dominate the exhibition.

The first is Lee-Nova’s penchant for measurement and precision. His '60’s-era hard-edge paintings, Side Effects and Silent Switch, reveal his early interest in patterns and repetition. 

His sculpture, Out to Metric, created in 1975 to acknowledge Canada’s switch from Imperial measurement to the metric system, is another nod to mathematics. Comprised entirely of 1,500 yardsticks, in feet and inches, of course, it’s Lee-Nova’s witty nod to obsolescence.

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Gary Lee-Nova, "Out to Metric," 1975

mixed media, 102" x 82" x 99" (collection of the Vancouver Art Gallery; gift of J. Ron Longstaffe)

The ruler motif would appear again throughout his career. It's particularly dominant in the digital collage Abandoned Home at Sunset, a dense work inspired by the financial crisis of 2008. Yet two other pieces, Light Box and Travel Diary 1, completed at the same time, are light and airy experiments with digital technology that worked so well he decided to refine them. It speaks to Lee-Nova’s dexterity.

“He’s someone who really likes to really push himself," says curator Jennifer Cane. "How well can I do this? How well can I do this other thing?” 

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Gary Lee-Nova, "Light Box," 2007

digital collage on paper, A/P, 23" x 35" (City of Burnaby Permanent Art Collection; gift of the artist)

Lee-Nova’s love of collage – taking images apart and reconstructing them to create a new narrative – is another dominant trajectory, inspired, he says, by the works of German artist Max Ernst. 

“I thought that it was very brave of him to savage a publication physically and cut it up for the purpose of realigning whatever the engraving was about to what it became,” he says. 

But it’s his take on American cartoonist Ernie Bushmiller’s character, Nancy, that really shows Lee-Nova’s mastery of the medium.

At first, his Nancy series looks like ordinary cartoon panels. But, in reality, he has carefully pulled text and images from other Nancy comics and digitally rearranged them to construct an entirely new story. It speaks of Lee-Nova’s fascination with “getting non-verbal content into negotiated relationships with the cognitive content.” 

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Gary Lee-Nova, "Celestial Mansion," 1969

photolithograph on paper, 24/50, 17" x 25" (City of Burnaby Permanent Art Collection; gift of the artist)

For me, that sums up Lee-Nova’s art. It’s clever, cerebral and pleases the eye. His messages may appear oblique at first, but he is clear about his purpose and methodology.

“I don’t really have a lot of chatter in my mind when I’m working on something,” Lee-Nova says. “I’m exercising my intelligence, which, for me, is a mix of literal and intuitive thinking. I operate with both.” ■ 

Gary Lee-Nova: Oblique Trajectories at the Burnaby Art Gallery from Jan. 29 to April 18, 2021.

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