A to Z

"The Alphabet Line," the railway that stretches from Winnipeg to Edmonton, is the focus of this exhibition by Saskatoon-based artist Heather Cline.

Additional Information

Heather Cline, The Royal Tour, 2000, mixed media/construction

Since the late 19th century, the railroad has played a central role in the political, economic and social life of Canadians. In Saskatchewan (following the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) mainline) the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway (GTP), as a requirement of their contract for laying track in the East, built a line through the prairie. "The Alphabet Line," which stretches from Winnipeg to Edmonton, is the focus of this exhibition by Saskatoon-based artist Heather Cline. During her research, she accessed pioneer records at the Saskatchewan Archives and Saskatchewan's regional histories. In contrast to the accounts of railway personnel, which was preoccupied with business issues, the stories that sparked Cline's interests were those that resonated with personal experience of how the railway impacted on everyday life. For Cline, A to Z continues an abiding interest in rural culture. An omnipresent railroad is an apt metaphor for passage - the never-ending adaptations of life. In her densely articulated assemblages of found objects, wood, plaster, and painterly surfaces, Cline creates allegorical pieces that seductively engage the viewer with their infinitely varied and layered material transparencies. At times, Cline embeds a carefully chosen fragment of text, whether an account of a phenomenal experience - such as an encounter with lightning - or a propagandistic government utterance. Between the lines, she constructs an image of rural life that encompasses a broad range of experience.