Laird Campbell’s studio practice in the Cowichan Valley on the east coast of Vancouver Island, is one of sustained attention — to the wood, to the process, to the slow accumulation of meaning that happens when you work with your hands over time. He builds his assemblages piece by piece from reclaimed and found wood, each fragment chosen for what it carries: the marks of age, the memory of use, the particular way light moves across a weathered surface. His aspiration is to work with wood as freely as a pencil — to scribble and doodle until something worth keeping emerges. 'Working' is a title that holds its own quiet irony. It names the act — the ongoing, never-quite-finished labour of making — and it names the result: a work that works, that holds together, that does what art is supposed to do. There is something honest and unguarded about this piece, a sense of the studio still present in it, the hand still visible. It is a small work in scale but not in presence. This original work is a Wood Assemblage: a hand-built composition of reclaimed wood pieces, displayed with a thin wood frame that allows both the front and the back of the artwork to be seen — an invitation to understand the work from all sides. Medium: Original Wood Assemblage (reclaimed and found wood)Dimensions: 28 × 22 cm (11 × 8.5")Framing: Thin wood frame; front and reverse both displayedAuthenticity: One-of-a-kind original; signed by the artist Exhibited: Federation of Canadian Artists Gallery, 2023 On the Edge Exhibition
