kostuik gallery, sculpture, west coast lifestyle, art world, canadian fine art gallery, helen siwak, folioyvr, yvr, bc

Kostuik Gallery‘s fall season opened with the launch of Against the Grain, a duo exhibition celebrating the work of sculptors Marianne Lovink and Katja Zubkova. Guests attended the Yaletown gallery for an evening that brought together longtime collectors, first-time visitors, and a noticeably diverse crowd drawn by the exhibition’s central idea: two women, two very different career paths, and one shared material.

Lovink, who has been carving wood since 1984 and holds public art commissions across Toronto and Philadelphia, stood alongside Zubkova, who joined Kostuik Gallery’s roster in 2024 after a career on Canada’s High-Performance Biathlon team. The pairing gave the room a sense of range rather than repetition, with guests moving between Lovink’s pattern-driven, Modernist-influenced pieces and Zubkova’s binary-coded wall sculptures, each one quietly encoding a piece of her own story.

“Against the Grain is exactly the kind of show I love building,” said Jennifer Kostuik, owner and director of the gallery. “Two artists who couldn’t have more different starting points, brought together around one material. Katja and Marianne aren’t just exhibiting together, they’re in conversation, and that’s what makes this pairing so compelling.”

By the end of the night, the exhibition had done what it set out to do: put two very different practices, and two very different careers, in genuine dialogue with each other. Against the Grain remains on view at Kostuik Gallery through October 11.

A photo gallery from the evening follows with a selection of pieces by both artists. Visit the gallery to learn more about which artist carved which piece!

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Kostuik Gallery Celebrates ‘Against The Grain’ With Artists in Attendance