Ottawa art show casts animals in a new light

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The Canadian Museum of Nature isn’t usually the first place you think of in Ottawa when it comes to art exhibitions. However, its new installation of artworks by Lorraine Simms, Shadowland, will make you think again.

The show features 15 large-scale drawings of the shadows cast by animal specimens from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. To create each drawing, Simms followed a meticulous and time-consuming process, which included placing bones on drawing paper, using lights on stands to cast interesting shadows, photographing the specimens, tracing the shadows, taking lots of notes and then heading to the studio to produce the final pieces.

“It’s a perfect combination of art and science,” said Ailsa Barry, the Canadian Museum of Nature’s vice-president of experience and engagement, at the show’s preview. She added that the show appealed to the Ottawa institution because it might attract visitors who don’t normally come to natural history museums. “We’re always looking for new ways to engage people.”

The drawings are difficult to describe in words; even photographs don’t do them justice. You really have to see them to “get” them. The textured nature of the drawings—many done with graphite pencil on white paper, others with white conté crayon on black paper—is crucial, as it reveals shadows in all their ghost-like detail.

“We have a misconception about shadows,” said Simms at the opening, explaining that many people think shadows are just solidly black. “Shadows always have light in them.”

In and of themselves, the pieces are compelling—the shadows of a polar bear skull and of a North Atlantic right whale vertebra, for instance, are both scientifically detailed and eerily abstract. However, they become even more evocative when you realize that each focuses on an endangered or vulnerable species, such as the narwhal or the hammer-headed bat. It made me shiver, as if these animals were fading to shadows before my eyes as I observed the drawings.

Simms said that working on these pieces was “one of the highlights of my life.” The opportunity to study and capture these specimens in such an immersive way is rare, as the New York museum doesn’t usually work with artists. However, it gave her extensive access to its collection—so she found herself working with whale bones in the freezing basement and elephant specimens on a stifling upper floor inside a turret.

In the video below, Simms provides more detail on her process for creating the drawings.

At the Canadian Museum of Nature, the exhibition is on display in a third-floor room that leads directly into the museum’s extensive Bird Gallery, where you can learn about hundreds of avian species. The juxtaposition works really well, as I found myself looking much more closely at the shadows thrown by the taxidermied birds in the display cases. Simms’ work made me look at the museum in a whole new way.

If you go

Shadowland runs at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa (240 McLeod Street at the corner of Metcalfe) until April 18, 2022. Admission is included with general museum admission, and you’ll need to buy a timed ticket online in advance; no tickets will be sold at the door. Proof of vaccination and masks are required for entry.

The map below shows you the location of the museum and also highlights nearby hotels and other accommodations.

Note that the museum is closed on certain days during the holidays (December 24, 25, 26 and 31, and January 1), and is also closed from January 9 to 14 for its annual cleaning.

Admission is free on Thursdays from 4pm to 7pm, but you’ll still need to go online to reserve your timed entry; those tickets are released at 8am on Monday (with a smaller number released at 8am on Thursday) each week.

As COVID-19 restrictions continue to evolve, please confirm the latest opening hours with the museum before your visit.

Looking for more ideas for things to see and do in the Ottawa area? Subscribe to my free weekly newsletter or buy my guidebook, Ottawa Road Trips: Your 100-km Getaway Guide.

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