Hubcap Quilt

"With his Hubcap Quilt, a patch-work marvel measuring about 7' x 8' and composed of 56 one-foot squares including pieces of crazy quilts, tartan flannel, industrial packing and fabric with First Nations imagery, Coupland broke-up the static grid and picture plane by inserting automobile hub-caps and dream catchers of assorted sizes. The visual effect was powerful and the implication unmistakable: the quilt, a longstanding European domestic object of comfort and survival became a sign for the nation as a place of habitation where the simultaneous collision and elision of cultures marks its emergence. With the shiny hub-caps from Canadian Tire and the lacy intricacy of the catgut dream catchers, Coupland's quilt speaks to the relationship of original inhabitants and immigrants, tradition and modernity, spiritual and material asperations, and the complications of postcolonial co-exstence." —excerpt from Michael Prokopow's essay, "Coupland's True North Strong and Free," included in the catalogue that accompanied the exhibition Douglas Coupland: everywhere is anywhere is anything is everything, published in 2014 by Black Dog Publishing and the Vancouver Art Gallery.

Through a wide range of media including assemblage, installation, painting, photography, sculpture and quilts, Coupland has persistently investigated Canadian cultural identity, both benign and menacing. Using imagery and objects latent with symbolic meaning for Canadians, he delineates what it means to be Canadian, offering a “secret handshake” not easily understood by others.