Peter Yuill is a Hong Kong-based Canadian artist, whom The Cat Street Gallery held a highly successful pop up solo exhibition ‘Fading Glory’ in April, 2012. In this exhibition, through his rich tapestry of energetic ink bursts and considered, detailed lines on paper, Yuill assimilates the industrial age of the 19th Century, which prompted aggressive societal and economical expansions. His labyrinths of fantastical phantasmic cities adorn an array of vehicles, each pinpointing an important historical development. The result is a series of work that documents the importance of empires from whence we hail and the machines that attributed to their ascent.
In 2014, Yuill moved on to a new direction where his work represents a mental ideological shift for him. In Yuill’s words, “I have taken the first step down a long path of self discovery and self evaluation. I am trying to discover who I really am, and where I came from, my spirituality, my beliefs, and my ideologies. I am exploring a lot of pagan religious traditions, Viking traditions, and the traditions of my people. Coming from Canada, which is a country heavy with wilderness, I have always had a strong connection with nature, with the cold north, and with the wild. For me it has often been a source of spiritual energy for me, there is a power in the forest that speaks to me. I can feel them.”
With this first triptych, the cycle of life is expressed cosmically, spiritually, and physically.
The first piece ‘Journeys’ (the globe) is in reference to the cosmos and the universe, from the original origin of who we are and where we come from. Yuill finds it really fascinating that human beings and the stars and universe were made of the same atoms and particles.
The second piece ‘Gateway’ (the eye) portrays the second stage - life. In the center their is a medieval style halo that encircles the eye showing the holy divinity of ourself, not that of a god above. The eye itself has always been considered the gateway to the soul. There is a translation of the Norse saga written around the edge that first describes the Valkyrie, who would fly above the mortal souls of men until they deemed someone brave and honorable enough to join the gods in Valhalla, the great hall in the sky.
The third piece ‘Destiny’ (the deer skull) is death, which is one of the few things shared by all living creatures. The deer skull has always a powerful symbol of life and death, especially in Canada. The inscription around the outer rim is a quote from Shakespeare's ‘Hamlet’.
The three pieces are all set within differing forms of armillary spheres, which were early models of the solar system and the cosmos. They are visual icons of the age of reason, when mankind began to think outside of what religion has told them. For Yuill, the armillary sphere is a sort of halo for his own religion, that of logic and reason, and of science.
