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<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nInstallation view of Jake Kimble, Make Yourself At Home, 2023, digital photo composites<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is a relatable feeling: losing someone or something close to us requires work to begin recovering. It can be a grievous process, heavy and daunting. Yet Kimble embraces the weight with humour, employing his \u2018funny bone\u2019 in his work to add levity. Take, for instance, Heavy Operator Equipment (H.O.E.),<\/em> which features a nude Kimble posing on a large tractor wheel. The tongue-in-cheek title speaks to his humour, and the image speaks to themes of contrast and unity. The hard, unyielding metal and solid rubber juxtaposed with the soft and lithe posture of Kimble\u2019s body should not work as well as it does. Yet somehow, despite the duality, the tractor and man are unified \u2013 they are as one, both creatures of home.<\/p>\n\n\n Jake Kimble, Heavy Operator Equipment (H.O.E.), 2023, Archival Pigment Print, 40 x 40 in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Beside it on the gallery\u2019s wall, in a similar maple frame, is When the Lights Come On That Means It\u2019s Time To Come Home,<\/em> a visually stunning photograph of Kimble and the Northern Lights. In this image, he has tamed the ever-morphing aurora borealis while rendering himself in constant movement, dancing with and reaching for the lights of his home\u2019s backyard. The theme of physical, mental, and spiritual unity with his home emerges in this triad of photos, with the third being potentially the most resonant. Bath Time<\/em> shows a face-down Kimble in crisp and undisturbed snow. As though he has readily fallen into its cold embrace, he is purified and cleansed in the mid-winter snows.<\/p>\n\n\n Jake Kimble, When the Lights Come On That Means It\u2019s Time To Come Home, 2023, Archival pigment print, 40 x 40 in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Adjacent to the gallery\u2019s entrance is another triad, with its theme of home centred on physical settings. In this excerpt of photographs, the protagonist is Enterprise (the hamlet in which the photographer\u2019s community is located) near the border of Alberta along the Hay River. Home Sweet Home<\/em> captures a snow dune, the saturated pink reflecting a setting sun offset by the deep blue of the darkening sky. It\u2019s a striking piece, with its colour and depth rendered almost reverently by Kimble. 12\u20194\u201d<\/em> features a group of trees standing strong, their limbs made colossal by the green and violet northern lights stretching across the star-speckled sky. Nowhere in the light-polluted suburban and urban areas of Southern Ontario can one see the night like this. Finally, Playing with the Ground and the Lake<\/em> contrasts the playground\u2019s primary colours against the stark white of the snow and sky. These are glimpses into the details that make Kimble\u2019s home so unique. How difficult it must have been to lose it; how heartening to have reclaimed it.<\/p>\n\n\n Jake Kimble, Home Sweet Home (left) and 12\u20194\u201d (right); both 2023, Archival pigment print, 22 x 22 in<\/p>\n\n\n\n Switching walls, the immediate draw is a diptych of the artist and his grandmother in DNA Holy You Ever Act Like Granny<\/em>. The resemblance is obvious: both have kind and inquisitive eyes, with a humorous glint that catches the light in Kimble\u2019s grandmother\u2019s home. The \u2018funny bone\u2019 mentioned can be found here too. The hands in each image belong to the other \u2013 the two were playing when this was taken, experimenting with perspective and their alikeness.<\/p>\n\n\n Jake Kimble, DNA Holy You Ever Act Like Granny, 2023, Archival pigment print, 25 x 39 in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Similarly, in the triptych Setsune, ?ama, Sekui, Kimble dons the identities of his grandmother, mother, and self by wearing their coats and photographing himself from behind. Aaccording to the artist, the three of them cannot be told apart from the back. His family is clearly synonymous with home \u2013 they are the safety and stability only home can provide.<\/p>\n\n\n Jake Kimble, Setsune, ?ama, Sekui, 2023, Archival pigment print, 20 x 20 in<\/p>\n\n\n\n The last section invites us into Kimble\u2019s past, his Chipewyan ancestry. Funny Looking Raven<\/em>, which features Kimble donning an imagined ceremonial Chipewyan shawl, draws inspiration from artist Cheyenne Rain LeGrande, whose artwork aims to bring her ancestors along with her. Kimble, here, with his outstretched arms and makeshift shawl spreading across his back like a wingspan, seems to be embracing his home: both the physical surroundings of his present and the cultural visualizations of his tribe\u2019s past.<\/p>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n