Galerie de Bellefeuille is currently showing a complex, yet viscerally and intellectually challenging exhibition, focussing on humankind's unending fascination with the landscape.

Paul Béliveau Cantus LVII

In the West, we've been contemplating the wonder of the natural order since the beginning of the Biblical world. The "original landscape in Western culture is the book of Genesis: the notion of a monumental fresco created as the backdrop to an idealized, timeless existence."

Since we were cast from the Garden of Eden, we've been attempting to reconnect with that pastoral idyll and reconstruct something even greater with our imaginations. Think of the endless texts and paintings appealing to the sublime. Humankind is always trying to recreate the promise of the perfect landscape we once inhabited.

During the Enlightenment we took a more bottom up approach, examining the natural world in minutiae, to better understand the natural world and how we fit into the larger landscape. Maps and mountains were categorized. Seas and clouds were meticulously studied. Drawings and paintings of tiny insects and flowers etc were commonplace during this period. For a cinematic comparison, think of Angels and Insects.

David Bierk Eastern Townships River, Stormy Sky

The Industrial Revolution and Modernity presented us with a new way to think of our connection to the natural world. It was becoming something we could define, develop and control. Paintings from this period indicate a distinct shift in landscape representation. No longer is nature "a simple object of veneration. The representations of the modern landscape often pose difficult, but vital, questions."

Whether we're worried about reconnecting with God, reveling in our power to recreate the natural order, or just trying to make sense of our place in the vast scheme of things, one thing remains the same; artists and humans are fascinated with the multifoliate mysteries of the outer world. Contemporary Passages shows a group of Canadian artists conducting a 21st century contemplation of the connection between humanity and nature. It's a distinctly contemporary show, borrowing from the "varied history of the pictorial tradition of the landscape."