Dirty carrots take over Yellowknife’s Gallery on 47th Street

Have you ever pulled a leggy-looking carrot out of your garden? What about one intertwined with another, holding it in a passionate embrace?

Do they sometimes come out of the ground looking a bit… phallic?

Yellowknife’s Gallery on 47th Street’s newest exhibition – Not Just the Birds and the Bees – celebrates suggestive produce.

The gallery’s owner, Ainsley Dempsey, said a member of a gardening collective, Lindsey Cymbalisty, came up with the idea for the exhibition.

“She came forward and just said: ‘You know how your vegetables sometimes grow kind-of sexy?’ And I immediately knew what she meant,” said Dempsey.

The vegetables were harvested and photographed by people who unearthed them last summer, then the images were submitted to Cymbalisty and printed on canvas and paper.

“Some of them are just carrots you wouldn’t necessarily look twice at, but some of them they’ve staged, and even just the lighting, it’s really creative. I’m surprised, actually, at the composition of some of them,” said Dempsey.

Olivia Williams was one of the first patrons to purchase a piece of art at the exhibition’s opening night on Friday.

“I am constantly following the gallery’s Facebook page and seeing what’s coming up next,” said Williams. “When I saw the title of this one, I said, ‘I should probably come in and check,’ and it’s definitely been worth it.”

Gleeful, she said she didn’t have words to describe what she witnessed.

“It is definitely something that is leaving a long-lasting impression, and I’m taking art home with me today,” she said, “because I want everyone to experience what I experienced today.”

Williams said she’ll be hanging her new piece of art – titled Scarlet Nantes by Jen Potten – in her kitchen, so she can admire it while she cooks items from her own garden.

Pertice Moffitt admired one piece in particular, titled This Knotty Showgirl Leafs Nothing to the Imagination by Heather Scott, which showcases two round carrot ends between plume-like pieces of kale.

“I like looking at what they’re called, like the Pocket Rocket, Dirty Damsel. They’re really good,” said Moffitt.

“I think we’ve all seen vegetables like this and for someone then to take it and put it like this… I mean, it’s great. I love it.”

Not Just the Birds and the Bees runs until Wednesday, June 10.