Shannon Garden-Smith's 'Dust Jacket' Exhibition at MKG127 Explores Material Traces

Shannon Garden-Smith presented her solo exhibition 'Dust Jacket' at MKG127 gallery in Toronto. The show featured installations and works using materials like sand, dust, and stone to explore themes of time, memory, and environmental impact. Specific pieces included 'Sand Silhouette' (2021), 'Snail-work (for the lake)' (2024), and the 2025 series 'Leaf, recueil de cartes I-IV' with variations in marble and dust. Another work, 'Tracks and traces and changes (Sand Prints)' from 2024, documented sidewalk imprints for York University's Goldfarb Gallery. The exhibition's title installation involved a curtain of vertical blinds with marbled surfaces that changed based on viewer position. Garden-Smith's approach references Victorian-era crafts and seashells, with materials acting as records of human activity and ecological concerns. The artist's method involves iterative, research-driven practices that engage viewers through sensory experience rather than direct interpretation. Photographs by Toni Hafkenscheid documented the exhibition, which positioned environmental issues as inherent conditions rather than overt themes.