"I’m graduating from a research institution, so I figure people want to see the research," notes Sky Glabush on his final show as a MFA student in painting at the U of A, Provisional Structures. "It’s maybe not as coherent as a typical gallery show, but it speaks to being here and struggling through."

With Provisional Structures, Glabush has given us the opportunity to see how an idea is worked through a medium–the circumlocution of a painter exploring a premise–within the context of an academic environment.

"The title of the show refers to the pieces themselves, which are kind of temporary and useless," he says, pointing out a streak of day-glo orange spray paint that likely will degrade relatively quickly on top of his more long-lived oils. "They will break down. It’s also about the institution too–passing or failing–and the structure of going to university to make art; being told to do it, and what a different thing is it to believe in when it feels like an exercise and you are getting a grade."

Additionally, Provisional Structures relates to the environments the artist builds to serve as subjects of his paintings, and also to Glabush’s unquestionably grand springboard notion, which examines how we view and use the spaces we live in, and how the ideals of revolutionary and Utopian movements corroded and withered into the likes of South Edmonton Common and monster houses that poorly imitate architecture that actually comes from a certain place, time, and value system.

Earlier this year, Glabush showed part of this body of work at the Douglas Udell Gallery. Living Together was a series of paintings that sought to rigorously discuss these themes.

Part of the difference between that show and his grad exhibit is that Glabush is now confident in what he is saying, so the focus becomes more on how he is saying it. The FAB show contains pieces that highlight his aesthetic choices and illuminate different aspects of his art-making process. It’s a playground and a proving ground for both the ideas and methodology he’s developed during his U of A career.

The process is extensive. Glabush first builds an architectural model from whatever he has in his studio–duct tape, Astroturf, cardboard boxes. There’s a naïve, child-like optimism to the structures, rickety and gleeful. He photographs the completed model, then prepares the canvas with an underpainting that is purely abstract and dense. Over the chaos, he imposes order, reproducing the photo of the model and insinuating that into a painted environment that draws on, but is not exclusively comprised of, real life.

Painterly references abound. A Constable landscape asserts itself in one, structuralist forms jostle with each other in most, Modernist sensibilities appear throughout.

"You get tired of doing the same thing," he observes. "Working with the same idea is fine, it’s just when you get mannered it becomes a problem. I’m taking what was in Living Together, but upping the ante."

The artist has helpfully included two pieces that display the early iteration of his themes, and they work to contextualize the dramatic leap he takes between those an his present practice. Within those later works, he articulates his concept while punching up various aspects of painting, and more so than in previous work is pointing out the camera middleman between his model and the finished piece, experimenting with pulling the gaze out or zooming closer. In one piece, form is king. In another, colour rules. Another tangles with scale and a myriad of art history nods.

"Once I had my cast of characters I knew what to try," Glabush relates. "I wasn’t thinking overtly about issues of architecture and planning, and the process became intuitive and fun again." He pushed himself to complete work quickly, adding, "That kind of composite energy compounded these."

The final piece integrates his object lessons and seems to be focused on joy–the delight of expressing an artistic narrative in a medium loved faithfully and fully by the artist.

SKETCHES

n Local artist/designer/illustrator/bowler Jeff Sylvester wed longtime ladyfriend Sarah Clement on Fri, Sept 8. We’ll be watching for wedded bliss to creep into his graphic, ornate work.

n If you wish to bow to the back-to-school impulse that grips us all this time of year, there are plenty of new programs through SNAP, Harcourt House, and the AGA. Check their web sites for courses and workshops on printing, drawing, and more. Lots of lectures and stuff coming up for non-hands-on types too.

n Opening at Latitude 53 on Fri, Sept 15: The Honky Arts Association presents Robert Harpin in the Projex Room, while James Prior’s Family Fables: Masculine Interpretations in a Post-Feminist Era is in the main space.