How Could I Know If No One Ever Told Me

SNAP is pleased to present How Could I Know If No One Ever Told Me, featuring new work by Callum McKenzie, recent SNAP Emerging Artist in Residence. The exhibition will be in the gallery from September 2 – October 6, 2023.

How Could I Know If No One Ever Told Me explores the frustrating and often ambiguous dysphoria of navigating the world as a queer ADHDer. Through their work, Callum McKenzie seeks to create an outlet for this dysphoria while holding space to embrace the confusion, contradictions and euphoria inherent in their neurodivergent queer experience.

Opening reception: Saturday, September 2, 2023 from 7-9PM
Artist talk October 3rd: https://snapartists.com/product/events/callum-mckenzie-online-artist-talk/

How Could I Know If No One Ever Told Me explores the frustrating and often ambiguous dysphoria of navigating the world as a queer ADHDer. Through their work, Callum McKenzie seeks to create an outlet for this dysphoria while holding space to embrace the confusion, contradictions and euphoria inherent in their neurodivergent queer experience. 

Specifically, this exhibition reveals the hidden costs of masking, a process of concealing emotions, behaviours, and symptoms in the pursuit of broader social acceptance and conformity. As a queer person with ADHD, I have tried to hide parts of myself that might lead to rejection; suppressing hard feelings and other behaviours to make myself palatable and loveable. This act of masking disconnects us from our emotions; suppressing core parts of our authentic selves makes them harder to access and experience. The work in this exhibition unearths and embodies these suppressed feelings, giving them an undeniable tangibility. Through this embodiment, these emotions can be seen, acknowledged and accepted, reconciling them with the parts of ourselves that we’ve hidden.  

This process of embodiment and reconciliation is not straightforward; it is driven by intuition and impulse. Brené Brown uses the term “excruciating vulnerability(1)” and, in a way, that’s what this process feels like; this excruciating, terrifying act of making our feelings visible, of being open and honest with ourselves as we explore our emotions. I seek to emulate this intuitive, impulsive and exploratory vulnerability in my work. Using screen monotype, I build up layers of colours, textures, marks and text on a silkscreen. As each print is pulled, elements may fade or become present as the medium interacts with the materials. While certain parts of the process can be controlled, there is always an aspect of unpredictability. 

1 The power of vulnerability | Brené Brown, uploaded by TED, January 3, 2011, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCvmsMzlF7o&t=352s&ab_channel=TED

Callum McKenzie (he/they) is an Edmonton-based emerging artist and printmaker. They earned their Bachelor of Design in Printmaking from the University of Alberta in 2022 and completed an Emerging Artist in Residence program at SNAP Gallery in 2023. Callum has a penchant for impulsively purchasing paper and figuring out what to do with it later. Their work draws on their experiences as a queer ADHDer and they explore themes of masking, grief and dysphoria through repetitive print-based practices. Callum has shown their work in a number of curated shows and exhibitions including Inner Space in FAB Gallery and Incidental Folds in SNAP Gallery.