FREDERICTON, NB — The Beaverbrook Art Gallery is set to launch two new contemporary exhibitions Saturday, May 30, 2026: Document/ary: New Photographs from Atlantic Canada and Jake Kimble: My Bones Are Funny, Sometimes They Ache. Both exhibitions run through the summer and fall, offering audiences a wide-ranging look at photography and expanded image practices as forms of personal expression and contemporary documentation.
Jake Kimble: My Bones Are Funny, Sometimes They Ache | May 30 – October 11, 2026
Humour and grief meet in My Bones Are Funny, Sometimes They Ache, a new multimedia exhibition by Chipewyan (Dënesųłīné) artist Jake Kimble (he/him, they/them). Through photography, video, self-portraiture, beadwork, and prints, the exhibition explores memory, healing, and the complicated ways laughter can exist alongside loss.
The phrase “ache in one’s bones” carries both humour and grief, youth and age. The exhibition title captures this doubleness: the funny bone, known for laughter and pain, also points to the aching bone, a reminder of time passing, and the certainty of change. To ache is to feel deeply.
Originally from Treaty 8 territory in the Northwest Territories and a member of the Deninu K’ue First Nation, Kimble is part of a rising generation of Indigenous artists reshaping contemporary image-making through deeply personal and materially inventive work. Trained in both acting and photography, Kimble brings theatricality, wit, and vulnerability to a practice grounded in self-care, self-reflection, and survival.
Emma Hassencahl-Perley, Curator of Indigenous Art at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, says:
“This photography exhibition talks about the sometimes painful process of growing up and getting older. Growing old is a privilege, yes, and I think another privilege is the ability to reflect on one’s past behaviours, thoughts, and feelings with grace. What I love about Jake Kimble’s work is how vulnerable they are in sharing glimpses of painful experiences, and yet they still find joyful moments in the everyday. This is the artist’s very first institutional solo exhibition, and I believe viewers will see a real and raw side of the shining star that is Jake Kimble.”
Document/ary: New Photographs from Atlantic Canada | May 30 – September 6, 2026
Presented as part of the Photo East Festival’s core programming, Document/ary: New Photographs from Atlantic Canada brings together the work of 14 contemporary lens-based artists from, and/or based in, Atlantic Canada.
Curated by documentary photographer and educator Chris Donovan, the exhibition explores photography as both document, a record of artistic process, and documentary, a way of witnessing the world around us. Together, these approaches reveal how photographs shape our understanding of memory, place, identity, and everyday life.
Inspired by John Szarkowski’s influential 1978 Museum of Modern Art exhibition Mirrors and Windows, Document/ary considers photography as existing on a continuum between personal reflection and lived reality.
Bringing together a range of contemporary approaches, Document/ary highlights artists who use photography to document artistic practice alongside others exploring lived experience, community, place, and identity.
Chris Donovan, curator of Document/ary, says:
“I think this exhibition is an important step in reframing the ways we consider photography and lens-based art practice in Atlantic Canada. Photography from here is dynamic, diverse, and tells us so much about both our collective and individual experiences as east coasters. The national art institutions have been slow to catch up in terms of representing the breadth and depths of photographic language represented in Atlantic Canada and I hope this exhibition will serve as an example of what we have here. In addition to adding nuance to the national conversation around regionalism and photography’s social function, I believe that this exhibition will serve an important role in holding a mirror up to the audience. We often do not place enough value on the notion of being seen. I want Maritimers to see themselves and their stories on the walls represented through world-class photography. That experience holds power which is hard to quantify and it is an honour to play a small role in that by bringing together this group of exciting contemporary artists.”
Opening Day Events, Saturday, May 30, 2026: Celebrate the opening of both exhibitions with a full day of free public programming at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.
All events are free and open to the public. Regular admission applies to gallery exhibitions.
About the Beaverbrook Art Gallery: The Beaverbrook Art Gallery is New Brunswick’s provincial art gallery, located in Fredericton. As one of Canada’s leading public art institutions, it presents exhibitions and programs that engage audiences with contemporary and historical art from Atlantic Canada and beyond.
Rachel Forrestall, Marketing Specialist, Beaverbrook Art Gallery
Email: rachel.forrestall@beaverbrookartgallery.org
Phone: 506 230 3398 www.beaverbrookartgallery.org
