Dainesha Nugent-Palache

Through her performative video works and photographs, Toronto-based artist Dainesha Nugent-Palache explores the dichotomies and paradoxes inherent in representations of Afro-Caribbean femininities and Black diaspora through portraits and still life-works that present an exuberant approach to colour and display. 

Through her recent investigations in still-life, Nugent-Palache explores how interaction with apparently ordinary objects, plants and other household items informs her daily life experiences. Her 2022 Smokestack Quarterly spring issue, Enduring Ephemeral (the last bouquet) exemplifies this new direction of her practice. In response to the subject portrayed in this work, she writes:

The last remaining flowers from my garden before all the colour starts to fade—a vibrancy that’s perennial and also cruel.

Not long before the first frost hits, grounds grow dormant spirits dim.

If it’s not possible to suspend a moment let it be memorialized while becoming vapour.

Nugent-Palache holds a BFA in Photography from OCAD University. Her work has been featured in numerous exhibitions across Canada and internationally in New York, Finland, and Vienna including presentations at the Gladstone Hotel, Toronto ON; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa ON; Koffler Gallery, Toronto ON; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Younger Than Beyoncé Gallery, Toronto ON; and TRUCK Contemporary Art, Calgary AB. She has been the recipient of several awards including the the Scotia Bank New Generation Photography Award in 2021, and the Dorothy Hoover Award and OCAD University Photography Faculty and Friends Award upon her graduation from OCAD University. Her work can be found in many private collections and those of The Wedge Collection, Toronto Dominion Bank Art Collection, and EQ Bank Art collection. Nugent-Palache is also a founding member of Toronto artist collective and gallery the plumb.