HOLDING STILL
Michelle Bui & Kuh Del Rosario
March 5 – April 12, 2026
McBride Contemporain presents Holding Still, a duo exhibition bringing together the works of Michelle Bui and Kuh Del Rosario. Through their respective practices, both artists create moments suspended in fragile equilibrium, where the image takes shape just long enough to be perceived. Holding Still lingers on this dance where materials unravel, fold back upon themselves, and transform, leaving in their wake the trace of their alchemies and the marks of their affinities. Whether fragments of memory rising to the surface or elements negotiating the weight of their proximity, forms remain in flux, composing harmonies that can only be held momentarily.
Echoing the public art projects unveiled over the past year, Michelle Bui’s new works pursue a continued refinement of the image, deepening her attention to the subtle gestures that animate matter. Three works reveal long, slender forms: grasses, fibers, and nets that seem to drift on a shifting surface. The slightest breath of air is enough to displace them, to make them coil or stretch, tracing fleeting trajectories through space. Within two large-scale works rise precarious assemblages of ceramics, minerals, and textiles – fragile materials that sometimes bear the imprint of the hand that shaped them. Elements brush and lean onto each other, finding balance in a tenuous, bodily poise. In these compositions, matter carries a haptic memory: the weight of a petal, the softness of an embrace, the warm shimmer of sunlight.
Kuh Del Rosario presents a new series of wall works and freestanding sculptures in which malleable materials crystallize beneath deposits of salt while ceramics vitrify under the action of heat. Central images act as focal points around which a collection of objects and materials orbit. Together, they evoke a diffuse memory that feels both intimate and imperfect. These fragments of memory become the ground of a personal mythology, a space where the artist’s imagination takes root and unfolds freely. Past and present coexist without hierarchy, and fiction and lived experience fold into one another. The elements composing Del Rosario’s works retain the marks of their transformations and the narratives that have moved through them. As if carried by the force of a river, images flow, dissipate, and coalesce into new configurations.
If Michelle Bui’s works capture moments of harmony held in suspension, those of Kuh Del Rosario evoke the quiet whirlpool that forms beneath the surface of the water. Together, their practices trace the contours of a space suspended between movement and stillness, between what fades and what endures. Holding Still invites us to extend this delicate balance and linger in the fleeting moments that live and dissolve in matter.
Michelle Bui is a visual artist based in Tiohtià:ke/Montreal, QC. Recipient of the 2022 Pierre-Ayot prize, she has presented numerous prestigious solo exhibitions, namely at the Esker Foundation (Calgary), Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver), Franz Kaka (Toronto), Parisian Laundry (Montreal), and Galerie de l’UQAM (Montreal). Bui holds a master’s degree from the Université du Québec à Montréal and the Beaux-arts de Paris, as well as a bachelor’s degree from Concordia University. Her work is included in numerous collections, including those of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, City of Montreal, Caisse de dépôt et de placement du Québec, RBC Art Collection, Scotiabank, Collection Desjardins, TD Bank, and Global Affairs Canada (Government of Canada). Bui recently unveiled a major public artwork for the REM Sainte-Dorothée station.
Kuh Del Rosario is a visual artist based in Tiohtià:ke/Montreal, QC. Born in Manila, Philippines, she immigrated to Calgary, AB, where she earned a BFA in Painting from the Alberta College of Art and Design before completing an MFA in Sculpture and Ceramics at Concordia University. She has received numerous grants and awards, including the prestigious Claudine and Stephen Bronfman Fellowship in Contemporary Art in 2024 and the Peter Thompson Family Graduate Scholarship in 2020. She is currently an artist in residence at Fonderie Darling (2023 – 2026), a residency supported by the Collection Desjardins. Recent exhibitions include a solo exhibition at B-312 in 2025, as well as group exhibitions at Contemporary Calgary in 2025 and at Fonderie Darling in 2024. Her work is currently on view in a curated group exhibition at the Musée d’art contemporain de Baie-Saint-Paul as part of Manif d’art 12e édition, La biennale en art actuel de Québec.