Uprooted from her home in New York City by the events of September 11, 2001, Heather Nicol’s subsequent work uses spare, simple materials (paper, monofilament, pins, a video camera and monitor) to reflect on deception, surveillance, memory, aggression, manipulation, seduction and beauty. In the downstairs space, squadrons of ornate, colourfully patterned origami airplanes hang suspended from a webbing across the ceiling. Many are bedecked with jeweled and military hardware, their bright prettiness a direct contrast to the inherently masculine and ponderous machines deployed in recent all-too-real acts of surveillance and attack. Inspired by the Japanese paper-folding tradition of "One Thousand Cranes," this memorial, pacifist process has been appropriated for use in another cultural and historical context. The work is at once seductive and unsettling, contrasting the ennoblement of aggression with a delicate symphony of form, colour, and movement. The strong theatrical lighting and the presence of a video camera add an additional level of signification, with references to television’s manipulative presentation of war imagery. The work is the result of creative processes that are repetitive, even obsessive, and in themselves a manifestation of the human response to cataclysm, and of the anxiety and helplessness of the early months of 2003, as the world witnessed the relentless justification and glorification of the attack on Iraq. In an attempt to overcome the sense of isolation of this period in time, the artist invited other women and groups of children to join in the origami-making, organizing evenings (reminiscent of quilting bees) in her home, and a lunchtime "origami club" at a local school. Upstairs, a space comparatively devoid of spectacle is set aside for contemplation. A series of stuffed and sealed envelopes are pinned to the walls, each simply marked with a hand-written record of time and place, accounting for the passing of days in the life of one individual from September 11, 2001 to the present. This second mass of uniform, yet varied folded paper objects creates a rhythm with the lower level of the gallery. The days of a life unfolding, the suggestion of souvenirs or documentation, evokes in the viewer a sense of the heft and weight of personal history, and of the need for both patience and optimism. The work reflects on the passage of time, and the slow recovery of purpose following life-changing upheaval. The inaccessibility of the envelope’s contents raises issues of privacy, as do a video monitor and chaise lounge that invite the viewer to spy on the space below, a second sly reference to acts of trespass and invasion. Innocence and deception are called into question. These complex and sometimes somber themes are precisely considered in Heather Nicol’s work, with a disarming fragility and beauty. Jane I. Stewart