Fermata brings together three artists united by an interest in the subconscious and its psychological terrain as a site of discovery. Working across painting, sculpture and ceramics, each practice emerges from a different entry point into this interior landscape, sharing among them a fixation on what lingers: the traces of past selves, identities worn and discarded.

The word fermata derives from the Italian fermare, meaning “to stop” or “to hold.” In music, it refers to a notation indicating a note held beyond its expected measure, to, quite literally, hold time.

Here, three practices occupy that sustained pause. What emerges are gestures layered and erased, reflections distorted, objects caught between preservation and decay. The exhibition becomes a held breath, inviting viewers to linger within the act of recollection, where the self is repeatedly lost and, simultaneously, recovered in the act of looking.

MEDIUM

gouache on paper, debris, sugar, clay

ARTIST BIOS

Kristina Kozlitina (b. 2000) lives and works in Vancouver, Canada. She holds a BDes from the University of British Columbia. After studying architecture, she shifted her focus to painting, combining an interest in graphic design with a reverence for early 20th century figuration. Influenced by the distilled geometry of early-aughts cartoons and the decisive brushwork of modernist giants like Modigliani and Marsden Hartley, Kozlitina returns to the figure with a 21st-century female sensibility. In her paintings, women and objects are suspended in tension between contours of modelled form and flat planes of colour, unaware of, or unbothered by being perceived. Kozlitina’s work has been exhibited at Portal Gallery (Vancouver, CA) and BothKinds Projects Space (Vancouver, CA), and she will present a three-person exhibition with THIS Gallery (Vancouver, CA) in spring 2026.

Jing Xia trained in industrial design at Emily Carr University of Art + Design (Canada) and Lund University (Sweden), Jing Xia grounds her practice in process-based experimentation across sculpture, installation, and painting. She approaches making as a form of exploration, testing ideas, methods, and conditions that allow work to emerge as an evolving record of its own formation. She is drawn to moments when intention loosens and the unforeseen enters through interruption, deviation, or peripheral actions. These moments redirect the work, opening unexpected pathways. Uncertainty operates as a generative force, sustaining openness within the process. Her work has been exhibited at CICA Vancouver (2024), North Van Arts (2025), and Surrey Art Gallery (2025), among others. She was most recently an artist-in-residence at GlogauAIR in Berlin.

Kylee Burt is a Vancouver-based ceramic artist raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Growing up near the ocean shaped her fascination with organic systems that feel both intimate and alien, a curiosity that extends to the body, the mind, and the living world. She holds a BFA in Ceramics from Montreal. Working primarily through handbuilding, her practice explores abstract forms inspired by the human body, biological structures, and natural systems. Through an intuitive process, she engages themes of personal narrative, the subconscious, sexuality, identity, and the human experience. Texture plays a central role in her work, emphasizing tactility and the physical presence of the material. She approaches surface treatments with intention, selecting and experimenting with glazes to respond to each form and project, creating a dynamic tension between material, form, and finish. These forms feel both bodily and otherworldly, suggestive yet ambiguous, existing in a space between organism and object. She has exhibited in group exhibitions in Montreal and Vancouver.