NOVA SCOTIA.- The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia presents A Sculptural Installation by Graeme Patterson, on view through April 9, 2007. What would Halifax look like as a ghost-town? We don't have to answer that question about this city, but the fear of one's home ceasing to exist is very real for many people living in rural Canada, people who are watching their towns wither before their eyes. Woodrow, an exhibition of sculpture and video by Saskatchewan-based artists Graeme Patterson, we get a glimpse of how someone in that position might feel.

The title of the exhibition is taken from the name of the small town in Saskatchewan where the artist is currently living and working. Like many small towns cross that province, and across the country, it is rapidly becoming a shadow of its former self as its economy dies, its inhabitants move away, or themselves age and die. Woodrow was a thriving farming community, and it still hangs on, but the writing is on the wall - it will soon join many other small towns and villages as a virtual ghost town.

Woodrow consists of nine large sculptural works incorporating video and animatronic elements. The exhibition features a video by the artist, Monkey and Deer, presented in a theatrical setting. The sculptures in Woodrow reflect the key elements of local culture, the sites that define the town: a farmhouse, a barn, grain bins, a workshop, the church, the hockey rink, the grain elevator, and finally, the road into (and perhaps more importantly, out of) town. The buildings represented are run-down and neglected, some virtually ruined, though none are actually abandoned: they are inhabited by a series of "ghosts," presences that hark back to the histories of the sites and their importance to what was once a thriving community. Through his use of stop-motion animation and robotic figures, Patterson infuses new life into what at first glance is a dead town.

This exhibition was curated by AGNS Curator of Contemporary Art Ray Cronin, and is a co-production with the Mendel Art Gallery in Saskatoon. It will also be included in the Montreal Biennial this Spring.