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Joyce Wieland:
Crafting a New Political Art


Curated by Johanne Sloan

Mixed media piece by Joyce Wieland of stacks of multicoloured plastic sleeves encasing various images and small objects ranging from snapshots and mementos to newspaper clippings about the Vietnam War.

Joyce Wieland (1930–1998) created powerful art that was politically engaged with issues of war, gender, ecology, and nationalism, while also maintaining a humorous sensibility. Highly original in her approach, Wieland utilized a wide range of materials, media, and subject matter in her work to generate new forms of meaning and aesthetic impact. She was a pivotal figure in Canadian art during the 1960s and 1970s, and her art continues to be influential. For more on Joyce Wieland read Johanne Sloan’s Joyce Wieland: Life & Work.



About the Curator: Johanne Sloan

Johanne Sloan is a Professor of Art History at Concordia University in Montreal. She has written extensively about Joyce Wieland, the visual culture of Expo ’67, and landscape art and aesthetics. She is the principal investigator for the collaborative research project Networked Art Histories: Assembling Contemporary Art in Canada.



Banner Image: Joyce Wieland, Stuffed Movie (detail), 1966, mixed media, 142.2 x 36.8 cm, Vancouver Art Gallery.

Gallery

Framed mixed-media piece by Joyce Wieland of a loosely hanging canvas, resembling a crumpled bedsheet, with red stains and cut-out canvas hearts applied on top.

Heart On, 1962

Painting by Joyce Wieland divided into a grid of squares, 3 x 3, that are read as a sequence like a film. Starting in the top left, a woman's profile changes backgrounds between a sailboat and a flag, a large number 2 appears, then a car drives by and gets smaller in subsequent frames. Below the grid is the number 8 and another sailboat.

The Battery, 1963

Painting by Joyce Wieland of the faces of a white woman and a black man coming in for a kiss. Below them is a horizontal sequence of squares, like a film strip, showing a moving sailboat, heads in profile, and speech balloons.

First Integrated Film with a Short on Sailing (detail), 1963

Mixed media piece by Joyce Wieland of stacks of multicoloured plastic sleeves encasing various images and small objects ranging from snapshots and mementos to newspaper clippings about the Vietnam War.

Stuffed Movie, 1966

Quilt by Joyce Wieland divided into four quadrants in various shades of purple and yellow surrounded by a border made of orange fabric with a multicoloured heart pattern and a smaller yellow border. Over top are the words "REASON OVER PASSION" made of red, orange, yellow, and pink fabric.

Reason over Passion, 1968

Frame of a colour film by Joyce Wieland showing fruit and a blue teapot on a table along with a tall white pitcher with the text "RAT LIFE AND DIET IN NORTH AMERICA" on the side.

Rat Life and Diet in North America, 1968

Print by Joyce Wieland of rows of red female lip prints, some more open and some more closed, on off-white paper.

O Canada, 1970

Photograph of an open book, made by Joyce Wieland, showing a spread of black and white photographs. On the left-hand page are photocopied fragments of text in several small frames arranged with paperclips overtop illustrations of different leaves. On the right-hand page is a photograph of a trail of footprints in snow leading into a forest.

True Patriot Love, 1971

Still of a colour film by Joyce Wieland showing a man sitting up and looking down at the sleeping figures of a woman. They are in a tent being held up on one side by a white aspen tree.

The Far Shore, 1976

Framed mixed-media piece by Joyce Wieland of a loosely hanging canvas, resembling a crumpled bedsheet, with red stains and cut-out canvas hearts applied on top.

Heart On, 1962

Painting by Joyce Wieland divided into a grid of squares, 3 x 3, that are read as a sequence like a film. Starting in the top left, a woman's profile changes backgrounds between a sailboat and a flag, a large number 2 appears, then a car drives by and gets smaller in subsequent frames. Below the grid is the number 8 and another sailboat.

The Battery, 1963

Painting by Joyce Wieland of the faces of a white woman and a black man coming in for a kiss. Below them is a horizontal sequence of squares, like a film strip, showing a moving sailboat, heads in profile, and speech balloons.

First Integrated Film with a Short on Sailing (detail), 1963

Mixed media piece by Joyce Wieland of stacks of multicoloured plastic sleeves encasing various images and small objects ranging from snapshots and mementos to newspaper clippings about the Vietnam War.

Stuffed Movie, 1966

Quilt by Joyce Wieland divided into four quadrants in various shades of purple and yellow surrounded by a border made of orange fabric with a multicoloured heart pattern and a smaller yellow border. Over top are the words "REASON OVER PASSION" made of red, orange, yellow, and pink fabric.

Reason over Passion, 1968

Frame of a colour film by Joyce Wieland showing fruit and a blue teapot on a table along with a tall white pitcher with the text "RAT LIFE AND DIET IN NORTH AMERICA" on the side.

Rat Life and Diet in North America, 1968

Print by Joyce Wieland of rows of red female lip prints, some more open and some more closed, on off-white paper.

O Canada, 1970

Photograph of an open book, made by Joyce Wieland, showing a spread of black and white photographs. On the left-hand page are photocopied fragments of text in several small frames arranged with paperclips overtop illustrations of different leaves. On the right-hand page is a photograph of a trail of footprints in snow leading into a forest.

True Patriot Love, 1971

Still of a colour film by Joyce Wieland showing a man sitting up and looking down at the sleeping figures of a woman. They are in a tent being held up on one side by a white aspen tree.

The Far Shore, 1976

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