Main Gallery:
Liminalities
Curator: Emily Nestor
Eva Birhanu, Anastasia Ferguson, Jera MacPherson, Yvonne Niegas, and Carolina Vasquez-Lazo
February 7 – March 28 | 2026
Opening Reception: Saturday – February 7, 2025 | 7-9 PM
In liminal states, past beliefs linger with the prospect of new ways of being. These quiet lingerings structure our habits and rituals. Maybe you keep a rosary tucked in a vanity drawer, not for use, but as a gentle reassurance that it’s there. Maybe you’ve hung on to fabric scraps that once made up a childhood blanket, as its remnants still offer some sense of security that a past belief assured you it had. Culturally and individually, we exist in states of in-betweenness. It is in this threshold of ambiguity that we can question or begin to situate our connection to what once was and what can be. Liminalities considers what we hold on to as we navigate transitions of identity, culture, belief, and place. Artists Eva Birhanu, Anastasia Ferguson, Jera MacPherson, Yvonne Niegas, and Carolina Vasquez-Lazo invite viewers into these beginnings, endings, the places in between, and portals to connections or ways of being we might not yet know.
Artists
eva birhanu is an interdisciplinary artist born and raised in Calgary, Alberta and currently living and studying in San Francisco, California. She focuses on understandings of identity, home, distance, and wholeness in her work. eva is primarily a weaver, and works in mediums of fibre and sculpture, exploring abstraction and metaphor through natural entities and formal qualities. eva graduated with distinction from Alberta University of the Arts in 2020 with a BFA in Fibre, and has attended international residencies. She held various roles including Co-Director at Stride Gallery from 2020 to 2025. Currently, she is pursuing an MFA in Fine Arts at California College of the Arts, expecting to complete her studies in spring 2027.
Working with the idea of liminality, portals, and feelings of disconnection, we waited here for you (2024) and on the periphery of things (2023) are at the cusp of an idea of relationship to place, identity, and home. Determined through the use of text, visual shapes and signifiers, each textile is working through ideas of familial forms and poetic gestures to in-betweenness. Each work is handwoven, on a floor loom or on a TC2 loom, and shows representation of the artist’s gesture in the weaving. The inclusion of woven or embroidered text is a direct gesture to poetic abstraction and the inclusion of a reading and listening practice that informs much of the work.
Instagram: @evabirhanu
Website: evabirhanu.com
Anastasia Ferguson is a Treaty 6/Saskatoon based independent mixed media artist. She holds a BFA in Film Production and MFA in Studio Arts from Concordia University. Her practice involves hand-processing film using both photochemistry and eco-solutions. Using plants to develop film and create phytograms, her practice capitalizes on the colourful alchemy of caffeic acid and film emulsion.
The Garden of Curiosities is an on-going video series that draws from theories found in Satanic Feminism. Opposing Eve’s “fall from grace” when tempted with the apple, The Garden of Curiosities re-conceptualizes this scene as being an allegory for female empowerment. Lilith, the serpent, extends to Eve the apple – a gesture – signifying the passing of intuition, knowledge, and power from one female generation to the next. Eve becomes the heroine and Satan becomes the ally – a feminist liberator – aiding women in the fight for emancipation. Invoking the spirits ofLilith and Eve, The Garden of Curiosities series culminates in a poetic investigation of their stories in the Garden of Eden.
Jera MacPherson (she/her) is a cultural worker, happily tangled in the arts ecology of the prairies—specifically Treaty 4 and Regina. Motivated by feminist themes of class, craft, and religious rebellion, she has been published with BlackFlash, Capilano Review, Galleries West, and Peripheral Review. Her visual art practice explores the same themes through textile, video and performance. Of euro-settler ancestry, her great-great grandmother came (pregnant with her great-grandmother) from Denmark in 1927.
While the ritual of baptism for the dead is unique to the LDS faith, Jera MacPherson uses her ex-Mormon experience of the ritual to explore structures of power and themes of labour, community, and purity culture.
Pop culture references in but if the dead… nod to how baptism for the dead is commonly performed by teens as an aspect of the LDS coming-of-age experience. The title references 1 Corinthians 15:29, interpreted in the LDS faith as the apostle Paul’s quippy endorsement of baptism for the dead.
with all your might and zeal relishes in the church’s borrowing of industrial labour aesthetics, such as the case with the LDS baptismal jumpsuit. Titled after a lyric in the pioneer-era hymn “Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel” which parallels union labourforce with the responsibilities LDS members had to contribute to their community economically, socially, and spiritually.
Website: jeramacpherson.com
Yvonne Niegas is an emerging multidisciplinary artist based in Regina, Saskatchewan, who primarily works in printmaking. Their practice explores materials and processes through experimentation with unconventional approaches, pushing boundaries to shape bold and evolving visual narratives.
Born and raised in the Philippines, Yvonne’s work is rooted in the intricacies of human experience and connection that have shaped their life, using these connections to explore and engage with the emotional resonance of events. Their work navigates themes of identity, belonging, and uncertainty through visual narratives.
At the core of their practice is exploring interpersonal connection, by capturing moments of vulnerability, humanity, and quiet intimacy.
These works explore self-definition, resistance, and the radical act of existing unapologetically. The first piece, If Hell Means Heaven, began as a zine and transforms a deeply personal fragments into a book — a reclamation of space and narrative. Through self-publishing, fragmented moments become whole, each page asserting identity and authenticity beyond imposed boundaries. The second piece, a copper plate etched with an excerpt from the zine, extends this dialogue. As viewers see their reflection in its surface, they move from observer to participant, confronted with both their image and the words: love transcends race, gender, and every constructed limit — and if that defiance condemns us, we choose hell over a heaven that denies us. Together, these works create a space where experiences resonate, prompting viewers to internalize, face the discomfort they may evoke, and engage with their own humanity—an invitation to see, feel, and exist without apology.
Instagram: @yvniegas.studio
Carolina Vasquez-Lazo is a multidisciplinary artist based in Mohkinstsis. She graduated with a Bachelor of Design in Photography from the Alberta University of the Arts (AUArts).
Her work focuses on themes of play and impermanence in relation to memory. She is interested in the tension between decay and soft imagery.
The title, sentimento pesado translates to “heavy feeling”. The drawings from this ongoing body of work are focused on the fragments that remain when memories are forgotten. Portraying softness and nostalgia as a mask, capturing reflection of childhood and the intangible. The found imagery and text placements work to re-contextualize a fading sentiment. This process explores how play can be contrasted with decay to explore lived experiences and identity. Through careful curation of objects and materials there is an emphasis on the passage of time and a dream-like narrative that lives between recollection and loss.
Instagram: yammroll
Website: carolinavasquezlazo.com
