Artist Statement

I create performances, textiles, and installations rooted in collective and personal rituals . My work often begins in conversation — over meals, while mending, cleaning, or simply sitting with others. I have spent the last 20 years working in rural Newfoundland, drawing on the tradition of women gathering together, working with our hands, and speaking freely. Through this, I make space for stories that have been hidden, forgotten, or erased — the kind of histories you feel in the body more than recall with the mind.

Humour plays a central role. It is a tool I use to process pain and invite intimacy. My work often walks the line between laughter and discomfort. I want people to feel just off-centre enough to reflect, to recognize something true. Out of these gatherings, I have created two performance personas — the Jinker and the Wise Gossip — both channel the power of the woman who has been dismissed, shunned, or silenced. They speak the truth, unfiltered, and invite others to do the same.

Projects like Branks and Disciple reimagine violent histories through collective acts of softness and joy. My Branks respond to a 16th-century torture device used to silence women by crafting delicate versions that can only be worn with the help of others, like adorning a bride. Disciple explores the dignity of women working in Newfoundland fish plants, reframing discipline not as punishment but as quiet devotion.

My work asks what we could become if we centred kinship, consent, and communal joy instead of control.

Bio/CV

Robyn Love (b. 1965) is an American-born, Canadian artist who lives and works in Elmastukwek, Ktaqmkuk (Bay of Islands, Newfoundland), Canada. She received a BFA from Cooper Union in New York City in 1988. She has exhibited at galleries and museums internationally and has received numerous project grants to create new work from foundations and public agencies.  Her work is in collections around North America. Love’s site-specific projects include a New York City Percent for Art commission for the High School for Law Enforcement and Public Safety in Jamaica, Queens, NY, a five km-long handmade installation in Cheongju, South Korea, and a large-scale, multimedia installation titled The House Museum in Ktaqmkuk. In 2017, THM transitioned into BARDO-29, an experimental contemporary art space hosting residencies and annual public programs.

Love received ArtsNL Project Grants in 2018, 2020, 2022 and 2024 and a Canada Council Project Grant in 2009. She has presented her participatory performance piece, SpinCycle, at The Brooklyn Museum in New York City, Northern University in Aberdeen, South Dakota, the ICCA in Inverness, NS, and as part of the Hold Fast Festival in St. John’s in 2021.  In 2017, she launched an online video series titled Small Things Brought Together, which has long-format conversations exploring the creative process with artists from all disciplines. In 2021, Love presented Unhistoric Acts, a site-specific installation on two fish flakes in Bonavista, NL, as part of the Bonavista Biennale, curated by Matthew Hills and Patricia Grattan. Her current project is Jinker, a multidisciplinary project in Newfoundland and Scotland.

A full pdf version of her CV can be viewed or downloaded here.