Mike Gough: Except the Run of Rivers

Apr 12

Written By D Witte

April 25th - May 17th, 2025
Opening: Friday April 25th, 7-9PM

Mike Gough, Except the Run of Rivers, Acrylic on Panel, 36” x 36”

Dianna Witte Gallery is pleased to invite you to Except the Run of Rivers, Mike Gough’s first solo exhibition with the gallery. Please join us on Friday, April 25th from 7–9 PM for the opening reception. The artist will be in attendance.

The exhibition will be on view from April 25 – May 17, 2025. We look forward to welcoming you.

Exhibition Artworks

Except the Run of Rivers

Except the Run of Rivers presents a series of quiet, reflective paintings that move between unadorned interiors, solitary figures in vast landscapes, and houses nestled within rural terrain. These works explore the subtle emotional weight of stillness and the impermanence of memory, inviting viewers into spaces where silence and contemplation shape the atmosphere. Whether depicting the intimacy of a room or the quiet presence of a house in the distance, each image holds a sense of reverence for what is felt but not always seen. These works speak to the universal experience of holding on and letting go, of sensing time not in grand gestures but in its most tender, passing moments.

The exhibition borrows its title from a line in Wisława Szymborska’s poem Tortures, in which the external world appears unchanged “except the run of rivers.” In a similar way, these paintings reflect the quiet shifts in the landscape of the self—how time and memory flow quietly through our lives, even as the surface seems still. Each work becomes a meditation on what lingers and what fades, how the most unassuming spaces can hold deep emotional resonance. As in the poem, there is a gentle tension between movement and stasis, the seen and the felt—offering viewers a moment to pause, reflect, and dwell in the quiet currents of their own inner landscapes.

The artist gratefully acknowledges the support of the Newfoundland & Labrador Arts Council.

— Mike Gough