https://www.comoxvalleyartgallery.com
Artwork by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image courtesy of the artist.
Viewers enjoying "The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Rhea Whitehead.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
Artwork by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image courtesy of the artist.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
Artwork by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image courtesy of the artist.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.
"The Shape of Care", accumulating exhibition project by Taryn Goodwin, 2025. Image by Taylor Robinson.

The Shape of Care

CVAG GATHER⋮PLACE

ACCUMULATING EXHIBITION PROJECT | CREATIVE RESEARCH + COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT + RESIDENCY

Taryn Goodwin

The Shape of Care emerges from a deep commitment to honouring the mind and body through material and relational practices. As a neurodivergent, disabled social practice and visual artist and community organizer, Goodwin’s work celebrates the radical potential of care — not as a sentiment, but as an active, creative, and collective force.

Rooted in the ethos of crip time¹ and community interdependence, Taryn’s practice embraces slowness, rest, and adaptability as essential tools for sustainability. Studio becomes exhibition, and process becomes product — dissolving traditional boundaries in favor of accessible, inclusive modes of making and being. This work is both a reflection and an enactment of the support structures that allow care to take shape — in relationships, in environments, and in ourselves.

Care is not a solitary act. It is co-authored, continually negotiated, and held together in community. The Shape of Care is not fixed — it bends, stretches, and reshapes itself around the needs and offerings of those involved. It is built slowly, intentionally, and collectively. Nothing important is work we do alone.

Together, we build The Shape of Care.

Taryn will spend time in GATHER⋮PLACE throughout the duration of the program undertaking ongoing artwork development in response to the onsite creative research that will be part of the residency aspect of The Shape of Care.

The artist welcomes the community to drop by for conversation and spontaneous art-making:

Now that the exhibition is drawing to a close, Taryn will be offering

FINAL PAINTING SESSIONS on WEDNESDAYS August 20  + 27 from 2:00 – 3:30pm!

During the run of the exhibition, Taryn has welcomed the community to drop by GATHER⋮PLACE on Wednesdays and Saturdays during the gallery’s open hours (10:00am – 5:00pm) or make an appointment to share time one-on-one with Taryn by messaging directly via their Instagram or Facebook (@Taryn.Goodwin.Projects). Contact info is also available at the CVAG Hub/SHOP⋮MADE welcoming desk.

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Taryn Goodwin (she/they), BFA, is a Queer, Neurodivergent, award-winning Canadian abstract artist, writer, and educator whose visual practice explores the intersection of identity, emotion, and materiality. Known for their joyful approach to art making through the use of color, fluid composition, and intuitive mark-making, Goodwin’s work invites intimate, sensory engagement through abstraction as a transformative and communicative language.

A graduate of Emily Carr University of Art + Design, with a BFA in Critical and Cultural Studies and a minor in Social Practice and Community Engagement, Goodwin’s work is deeply informed by their lived experience as a Queer and Disabled artist. Working across painting, drawing, and installation, their process balances spontaneity and control — layering washes, rhythmic lines, and bold color groupings to create dynamic, tactile compositions that resonate with feeling and movement.

In parallel with their studio practice, Goodwin is committed to education, access, and collective care. Their work often extends into community-engaged projects that center LGBTQ2S+ experiences and challenge systemic barriers in art and academic spaces. Through teaching, organizing, and advocacy, they reimagine learning environments that affirm all bodies and identities.

Goodwin is the recipient of multiple awards, including the 2022 Lieutenant Governor’s Medal for Inclusion & Democracy, ECU Alumni Association’s Graduate Award for Community Engagement, a 2022 BC Arts Council Community-Engaged Arts Scholarship, and a 2020 Sobey Art Award nomination.

They are currently leading a two-year community-research initiative through the Canada Council for the Arts’ Sector Innovation and Development Grant, focused on supporting artists receiving Persons with Disabilities (PWD) benefits and building long-term systemic change in the arts.

Based on the unceded traditional territory of the K’ómoks First Nation, Goodwin creates from a posture of rest, contributing to community-rooted, care-informed online arts spaces. Their work is held in private and institutional collections and has been exhibited across Canada and Europe.

1. What is ‘Crip Time’?

  • Crip Time: A concept arising from disabled experience that addresses the ways that disabled/chronically ill and neurodivergent people experience time (and space) differently than able-body-minded folk. In her essay on Crip Time, Ellen Samuels quotes her friends Alison Kafer, who says that crip times means: “rather than bend disabled bodies and minds to meet the clock, crip time bends the clock to meet disabled bodies and minds.”
  • MedHums:Waht is Crio Time?

The Shape of Care is part of the convergent program because • not despite.

Download Publication PDF - 12.4 MB

Acknowledgements

The Comox Valley Art Gallery is grateful to operate on the Unceded Traditional Territory of the K’ómoks Nation.

This program is made possible through the support of our FUNDERS: City of Courtenay, Canada Council for the Arts, BC Arts Council, Government of Canada, Province of BC, Comox Valley Regional District, Town of Comox | SUPPORT: ABC Printing, Hitec Screen Printing, SD71 Printshop, Shine-Eze Ltd, Paintbox Painting.

                       

Gratitude

CVAG is grateful to the artists for sharing vital information that informed the installation and access supports for because • not despite. Special thanks to Terri McCormak, who knows some sign language; Della McCreary for helping along every stage of Persimmon’s project; Melissa Moore of Hornby Island Arts for introducing us to Zsofin; and Tangled Arts + Disability who “cultivate Disability Arts in Canada and enhance access to the arts for artists and all audiences”.

The Comox Valley Art Gallery is committed to creating spaces where everyone can participate.

CVAG spaces are accessible.

Programs are barrier-free (no cost). DONATIONS are appreciated and contribute to ongoing community interactive programming.

CVAG strives to reach all and to that end offers, programming descriptions in print, descriptive recordings, on demand videos, and through in-person welcoming orientation. When it can, CVAG offers materials in languages other than English.

PUBLIC HEALTH CONSIDERATIONS: we ask that visitors choose not to visit if they are experiencing symptoms of colds and flus. Hand sanitation dispensers are available at CVAG. Wearing a mask is at the discretion of the visitor.