b'Bear Essentialsan essay by Robert Enright2019In 2013 I curated Everything is going to be okay again soon, a 15 year survey exhibition of Dean Drevers work for the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie in Alberta.What struck me then was the subtle manner in which his art seduced us through a combination of surface and finish, only to repel us when we became aware of the implications of the very subjects with which he had initially attracted our attention. He was a master at producing elegantly designed objects and figures whose meaning was freighted with a considerable degree of menace. What I recognizedwasyoucouldneversettleintosimpleaestheticpleasurewhen experiencing Drevers work. His special gift was to understand what it was in the formsofpopularculture,(everythingfromHeavyMetalmusictosports,and from religion to gun and biker culture), that made them emblems of desire and from there to persuade us to question how easily we were won over by what they offered.Drever divides his work into categories that he calls volumesthere are now three of themand each volume contains particular kinds of subject matter. It is useful to keep in mind that his naming always begins with Black/White, a pairing that underlines the essentially binary way in which he conceives of and makes hiswork.Thefirstvolumewascomprisedofsculpturesandwallmounted pieces, including a pair Ku Klux Klansmen, one black and one white (each was madefrom7800laser-cutsheetsofstackedpaper),aswellaspaintingsof Heavy Metal band logos and back-to-back black and white masks. The second volumeinvolveddifferentthemesbasedonmilitaryimagery,theStarsand Stripes and more colour was utilized in the masks. He used the work in these two volumes as a way of exposing the complexity of our reaction to conditions ofangerandviolenceandtothehypocrisythataccommodatedoursocial acceptance of those reactions. He also used the work as a safe way of channel-ing and exorcizing the anger that was a persistent presence in his life. What is different about volume 3 is that in choosing his subject matter, a pair of enam-oured anthropomorphic bears, he has reconciled the contradictory nature of our tendency to act out both the dark and the light sides of human nature.16'