Corina Kennedy’s window installation is a dedication to her friend and McClure Gallery colleague Barbara Wisnoski, who passed away on December 23rd, 2025, following a short illness.
Started the first week of winter and continued into the first weeks of summer, For Barbara is a meditation in textile on work, place, friendship and loss. Throughout this time, large pieces of burlap (a material that lines the walls of the McClure Gallery) were hand-dyed and cut into small patches portable enough for Corina to take with her and work wherever she went. Each piece was knotted, stitched, felted, and eventually quilted back together to form one large colour gradient textile, and to fill the gallery window. This labour of love was in part inspired by Barbara’s own, long-standing art practice.
While the work draws on cultural mourning customs such as colour-codes in Victorian mourning dress, the covering of mirrors during a traditional Jewish Shiva, and community memorial quilting, For Barbara is, at its core, an ongoing conversation between two friends.