Jaspal Birdi

Jaspal Birdi is a Canadian artist who combines photography and painting by experimenting with modern technologies. Through programming, print and paint, her practice reconstructs and examines boundaries in virtual and physical worlds. Birdi completed her BFA in Drawing and Painting from OCAD University 2010, a Museum Internship at The Peggy Guggenheim Collection 2011, and a Master of Arts Management from Istituto Europeo di Design (IED) 2013.

Her works have earned recognition from the Ontario Arts Council and Canada Council for the Arts, as well as several awards. In 2017 Birdi co-curated the exhibition Command-Alternative-Escape for the opening week of the Venice International Art Biennale. During the 2018 Berlin Art Week, her works were presented in Transferred Recall, a curated solo exhibition. In 2020 Birdi presented Can I Play Outside? a solo exhibition supported by the RBC Foundation Emerging Artist Residency at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery. In 2022, she exhibited Eyes Looking Without Seeing, a solo show at the Women’s Art Association of Canada in Toronto. For the 2023 Capture Photography Festival in Vancouver, British Columbia, Jaspal Birdi’s public artwork 11h02m was visible at the Canada Line Lansdowne Station, presented by Richmond Art Gallery.

11h02m

11h02m is a lens-based painting I created in my Brampton backyard during the 2020 lockdown. The work captures one of the very few movements I could document while in isolation, the clouds in the sky through my windows. It is the very first work I created on a thermal blanket: A resistant material innovated for keeping objects cool in outer space, but also to retain heat when seen on marathon runners after a race, or with asylum seekers.

The pandemic displaced and shifted the lives and paths of all. I myself was working in Milan, Italy when forced to leave the country in a state of emergency. In this piece, I reflect on sacrifices and risks taken on by migrants who seek to build a sustainable future in new and foreign lands.