The exhibition presents the original conté illustrations book French Ending and surveys the process of involvement of creating and publishing multi-lingual books, the collaboration through the love of language as a platform for understanding.

The title French Ending alludes to the concept used in cinema and literature. Unlike the closed resolutions typical of an “American Ending,” the “French Ending” functions as a narrative strategy that invites the audience to complete the ending of the work from their own experience and interpretation. The book’s theme setting of France, a collaboration between Kyla Bourgh (Vancouver, Canada) and Viviana Maidanik (Buenos Aires, Argentina) presents the multi-faceted process that happened worlds apart, yet remains connected and cohesive.

This concept aligns directly with the multi-lingual book, which conceives writing, art and translation as open practices in constant dialogue with each other. Illustrations add another layer of hints towards unspoken narrative and visual expression. The book compiles illustrations and a series of meta-narrative stories written by Bourgh. In these stories, the author explores the experience of living in a country where only partial mastery of the local language generates estrangement and a sense of identity displacement. From her English-speaking perspective, a language often considered “universal” within the framework of cultural globalization, she reflects on the impossibility of fully expressing herself, to her artistic peers, the discomfort of not recognizing her own words, and, simultaneously, the powerful bonds formed despite fragmented language.

FRENCH ENDING BOOK

Kyla Bourgh – Artist/Author/Illustrator

Viviana Maidanik – Publisher/Book Design/Translator (Spanish)

ARTIST BIOS

Kyla Bourgh is a visual artist, writer,  curator and educator. A graduate of the Master of Visual Arts program at Emily Carr University of Art and Design in 2020, Bourgh engages in a range of projects. She was co-editor of The Post Feminist Post (2015-2017) with Leela Blaney.  She was director and curator of a hidden art gallery called Atelier 8.18 (2020-2025) which hosted 3 world collage days and promoted numerous local and international artists. Bourgh is running and facilitating a supportive critique group called CRIT since 2021 and she mentors artists through art coaching.

Bourgh fuses her writing and visual arts practices to create artwork with a deep thread of social engagement. The events she organizes events and brings people together to facilitate conversations around themes of cultural location and belonging.  Bourgh’s family beginnings reach both South Asia and Scandinavia. In 2018 she collaborated with photographer Geoffrey Wallang in a series called “What are you” which explored ambiguous cultural identity. She encounters and contends with the visual ambiguity of her roots, and explores this through her artistic practice. Her work also encourages insight through pushing perspectives about the topics of gender and racial inequality.

As a writer, Bourgh published a series of short stories and poems in France in 2025 under her pen name with publisher Jean-Eude Masy –Placenta Sous Le Manteau. She published her first illustrated book French Ending, a meta-fiction inspired by her experiences that summer during her art and writing residency. French Ending is bilingual in French and English with a version to be released in 2027 in English and Spanish. The book was created collaboratively with book designer, illustrator and graphic designer Viviana Maidanik, from Argentina and her publishing house Claraquel Edicione.  The collaboration combined collective skills sets and connections. The book will tour France, Canada (Montreal and Vancouver) and Argentina (Buenos Aires)

Kyla Bourgh loves to travel and finds her home Vancouver BC Canada where she lives and works as a teacher.  She exhibits both locally and internationally.