Xenia Benivolski

recent past

2011-09-16T09:31:00.001-07:00

Awesome news

2011-08-25T08:32:00.000-07:00

The Aleksandra Mir piece we commissioned at Mercer has gotten picked up by the Whitney Museum for this winter.

This film I was working on in 2009 is finally finished! So excited!

Going to Don Blanche residency This summer to work on a project.

ok thats it for now

new news!

2011-07-14T07:57:00.000-07:00

Summer has been pretty exhausting, But things are still happening!

Last week we Installed Brette Gabel's Piece, Tapestry at the window of Gallery 1313 for this series I curated, pretty nice!

Come Play with Us, Danny

JULY 6th to 31st, 2011

Tapestry by Brette Gabel
Curated by Xenia Benivolski

Brette Gabel is a not so recent graduate of the University of Regina. While avoiding schoolwork Brette began embroidering, quilting and watching horror movies. Following school, Brette moved to Toronto where she participated in the Toronto School of Art’s Independent Studio Program. After which she became a contributing member to the White House Studio. Currently Brette is researching farming accidents, taxidermy and organizing alternative community interventions. Brette’s work strives to connect love, fear, heartache and the grotesque with craft and social interventions.

Brette Gabel’s obsession with classic horror movies is explored through a series of quilted wall hangings. By softening the most frightening scenes Gabel invites the viewer to stare the monster head on. Handmade textiles connote warmth, safety, and the domestic sphere – when combined with uncomfortable subject matter, a productive tension is created: the work both comforts and provokes with empathetic humour.

In other news, I was helping Jon and Amy a little with the movie they're making

Buggy babes

Whoops

Bunny Party

2011-06-23T09:11:00.001-07:00

So the other day it was My friend Chris's birthday?? So Jeremy rented two Bunny suits and we went to surprise him at this show umm

Hello

Exactly

I'm the Little one!

Surprise!

Then we went to the moshpit

No you go first k

Aaaahhahah

Shit

Hahahahaha ok

Look at the 3 minute Mark! We're dying!

OK SO ANYWAY!

Tonight a show I've curated opens! Come ok!

10 Degrees Mouth:

A solo exhibition by jonathan edward mayhew

Curated by Xenia Benivolski
...
The Legend is Black: 10 Degrees Mouth at gallerywest is an exhibition of recent paintings by Jonathan Edward Mayhew. While Mayhew follows a self taught tradition of painting about sexual situations associated with a queerpunk aesthetic, his work projects a genuine quality that comes from a real possessive desire and a tenderness towards his subject matter. The paintings appear almost earnest, albeit gratuitous and hilariously didactic in their content: the dream-like palette betrays a sensitivity that mellows the sassiness of his subjects. This departure from aestheticised politics towards an emotional ground is a central theme in the curatorial project The Legend is Black, which encompasses the Butcher Gallery, the Whitehouse and gallerywest.

The Legend is Black is an independent Curtorial Project by Xenia Benivolski concurrent with This Is Paradise/Paradise Now.

http://www.mocca.ca/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions/

http://paradisenow.ca/

Paradise Now is supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, the City of Toronto, CARFAC and OCAD University.

For Information about Paradise Now please contact Rae Johnson, Artistic Director of Paradise Now at : info@paradisenow.ca

About the Gallery

gallerywest is a space for contemporary art, located at 1332 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. This project space is intended to facilitate exciting new contemporary art shows in the Parkdale area. Our programming direction focuses on works that are thoughtfully engaged in a contemporary geographical dialogue.

Gallery hours are Tuesday-Sunday 1pm-7pm.

For all media/pr inquiries please contact:
Kathryn Kyte
PR & Media Coordinator | gallerywest
E: kathrynkyte@1332queenwest.com
T: 416.909.2577

Also CLICK HERE to see Aleksandra new work commissioned by Mercer Union - The Seduction Of Galileo Galilei. It was the best time!

We went to a race track and tried to make a big pile of tires.

Other piles were also made

thar she blows!

Ok Bye!

Cold Cold Water

2011-06-17T10:33:00.000-07:00

Hi Friends!

Tonighth there is a screening of Jamie Ross's collective works - entitled Cold cold water, at the whitehouse. This sreening is part of THE LEGEND IS BLACK.

Cold cold water: a screening of complete works by Jamie Ross

The Whitehouse, 277.5 Augusta, 8 PM.

Curated by Xenia Benivolski.
THE WHITE HOUSE
277.5 AUGUSTA AVENUE
JUNE 17TH 8 PM – 10 PM

“When everything else has gone from my brain – the President’s name, the state capitals, the neighborhoods where I lived, and then my own name and what it was on earth I sought, and then at length the faces of my friends, and finally the faces of my family – when all this has dissolved, what will be left, I believe, is topology: the dreaming memory of land as it lay this way and that.”
-Annie Dillard, An American Childhood

Jamie Ross is a multi-disciplinary artist interested in personal psycho-geography, Land and Place. The ways in which people establish connections and meaningful relationships with their powerful places – their linkages to the landscape and topography and to the specific non-human persons who inhabit these landscapes drive his art practice.

Ross’ work deals with mythology, genealogy, storytelling and dreams; the numinous as is approached by a young, urban queer man largely isolated from the powerful magical cultures from which he sprung.
Creating and documenting queer community based on a sincere engagement with magic, grafting myself onto the rich artistic traditions of my cultural ancestors is fundamental. Overt references to things queer and punk are often present.

This show is Part 2 of THE LEGEND IS BLACK: a three-part curatorial project by Xenia Benivolski concurrent with THIS IS PARADISE/PARADISE NOW.

http://www.mocca.ca/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions/
http://paradisenow.ca/
PART 1: THE LEGEND IS BLACK
PART 3: 10 DEGREES MOUTH

Jamie Ross was born in a little house on Pendrith Street, just north of Toronto’s Christie Pits Park. He is a red haired film/video artist, working primarily in time-based media, working at the farthest-flung edges of narrative film and video. His work has screened in nationally and in Europe and Asia. His fiction has been anthologized, self-published in the form of a zine, and his most recent work, a novella entitled Coldwater, was published this year. Ross now lives in Montreal.

With generous support from the Canada Council for the Arts and CARFAC.
Paradise Now is a series of art, music, and theatre from the downtown Toronto art community. Paradise Now, although a separate entity, is intended to complement the historical exhibition at the MOCCA – This is Paradise, which runs from June 25 – Aug 21, by bringing emerging and established artists together, to connect the dots from our rich history from the early ‘80s on Queen Street West to today.

Paradise Now acknowledges the generosity of the artists, performers and musicians who have donated their time and creative energies to create programming that reflects the ecology of the street.
Paradise Now acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the City of Toronto and OCAD University.

For Information about Paradise Now please contact Rae Johnson, Artistic Director of Paradise Now at : info@paradisenow.ca

For information about the exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, This is Paradise | Place as a state of mind The Cameron Public House and 1980’s Toronto. And NGC@MOCCAThis is Paradise | From the National Gallery of Canada Collection, please go to http://www.mocca.ca/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions.

Stephanie Fielding was nice to write the follwoing essay for the screening:

FINDING ONES PLACE : The retelling of myth in the work of Jamie Callum Ross

Stephanie Fielding

Our thirst for the exotic and fantastic remains unquenched, humanity has created an amazing array of unseen or rarely seen creatures, forces and entities to populate the world and describe animate its mysteries. Taping into this thirst, weaving tales of myth and punk-rock absurdity, artist and writer Jamie Callum Ross presents a stream of videos that enter into our unconscious and conscious desires. Curated by Xenia Benovoski, Cold Cold Water: A Screening of Complete Works by Jamie Ross, gives us a view of the artist’s video work from the last five years.

Ross has a particular interest in the personal and psychological geography of land and place. The ways in which people establish connections and meaningful relationships with location, their link to landscape and topography, and to specific spirits who inhabit such landscape drive his art practice. There is a clear sense in his work of someone claiming their identity through their history and personal mythology. As a queer Metis man, Ross asks who has written his history, his identity? In Ross’ videos the supernatural is expressed in the vernacular of the everyday, recognizable locations and members of his social network link the work to actual people and events. His sequences, edited together rapidly and layered with streams of dialogue and imagery present striking but obscured narratives. Vivid, visually textured dreamscapes, shot primarily in super-8, are layered with sharp DV sequences, lending the videos an elusive poetry, especially to their most debaucherous scenes.

Ross’ films place great stress on sexuality, each film is punctuated with at least one cum-shot. The more perverse the sexuality, the more it strays from the norms of society, the more potent it is liable to be, and more disruptive of though patterns inhibiting the non-conformist. Sex and violence are used as forms of access to the spirits of chaos. As sex can, humour has the power to unlock the unconscious and release spiritual forces through its sudden associations of what the rational mind keeps separate; through its wild, anarchic amateurism and tongue-and-cheek, a certain sacredness is induced.

This body of work echoes the punky-transgressions of historically underground Queer filmmakers such as Kenneth Anger and Gregory Markopolous; each sharing a rebellious appropriation of ritualistic and humour-filled symbolism. Much like many of Anger’s films, Ross’ works are heavily influenced by esoteric systems of belief and the sacramental, although here there is a strong sense of a unified and affirmative self that isn’t necessarily present in his predecessors’ work. These rituals invoke vital forces that are sometimes symbolized and sometimes embodied in gods and goddesses; in this case, the figures are drawn from the artist’s Ojibwa and Scottish heritage as well as Nigerian and Greek folklore. As film historian Richard Dyer remarks, ‘Queer cinema often co-ops narratives involving supernatural forces of chaos and disruption, joyously celebrated but also actively employed to cause change in conformity.’ In The Bakkhai, 2008, Ross adapts the gruesome Euripides tragedy describing the vengeful return of the God Dionysus to the kingdom of Thebes. Like all of his work, the actors in the film are friends and the setting is specific and recognizable- in this case the Leslie Spit in Toronto’s east end. The video, part gruesome bloodbath, part hedonistic love-fest, retells the mythic story but also gives a mischievous real portrait of Toronto punk-subculture.

More recent work explores Jamie Ross’ personal genealogy, tracing his own connections to the myth and paths of his ancestors. Biboon Geamhradh, 2010, presents an earnest search for ones place in the lineage of oral storytelling. Cras Valde Facessite, 2009, created in collaboration with Derek Muehlgassner, combines myths of both filmmakers’ cultures, creating a hybrid tales of two fathers. By deconstructing the two myths, Muehlgassner and Ross re-claim their heritage and place their own visions within its rich history. Ross’ work is a cry for us to engage with our storytelling pasts and develop our own personalized sense of our heritages.

part 3!

2011-06-15T17:20:00.000-07:00

oh hey and this is the third part on my curatorial adventure at 1313, this month an installation by Anna May Henry!

Boredom Party Banner

Installation by Anna May Henry.
Curated by Xenia Benivolski

BORED BEYOND BELIEF

When we’re promised excitement and intrigue at every mall, nightclub, basement apartment and laptop, boredom is a pitiful shame. It is said that only boring people get bored. To state one’s ennui, then, is potential condemnation to a dull persona. The Boredom Party Banner acts like a celebration, but is perhaps a cry for help from behind the entrapment of windowpane glass.

“We don’t want a world where the guarantee of not dying of starvation brings the risk of dying of boredom.”

-Graffiti from May 1968

BIO

Anna May Henry works in a variety of mediums in an endless exploration of the co-existence of everyday life with the fantastic. She is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design. She lives and works in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Reception Saturday June 11 3-6pm

Gallery Hours are Wed- Sun 1-6pm

1313 Queen St. West 416-536-6778 www.g1313.org

Media call Phil Anderson 416-525-7688

The Legend is Black

2011-06-15T06:16:00.001-07:00

Hello!

at the Butcher Gallery

June 4-18 2010

there's more! but I'm at work.

This weekend we are screening the 2nd component of this show at The Whitehouse.

Cold cold water: a screening of complete works by Jamie Ross

Curated by Xenia Benivolski.
THE WHITE HOUSE
277.5 AUGUSTA AVENUE
JUNE 17TH 8 PM – 10 PM

“When everything else has gone from my brain – the President’s name, the state capitals, the neighborhoods where I lived, and then my own name and what it was on earth I sought, and then at length the faces of my friends, and finally the faces of my family – when all this has dissolved, what will be left, I believe, is topology: the dreaming memory of land as it lay this way and that.”
-Annie Dillard, An American Childhood

Jamie Ross is a multi-disciplinary artist interested in personal psycho-geography, Land and Place. The ways in which people establish connections and meaningful relationships with their powerful places – their linkages to the landscape and topography and to the specific non-human persons who inhabit these landscapes drive his art practice.

Ross’ work deals with mythology, genealogy, storytelling and dreams; the numinous as is approached by a young, urban queer man largely isolated from the powerful magical cultures from which he sprung.
Creating and documenting queer community based on a sincere engagement with magic, grafting myself onto the rich artistic traditions of my cultural ancestors is fundamental. Overt references to things queer and punk are often present.

This exhibition is Part two of THE LEGEND IS BLACK commissioned by THIS IS PARADISE. Organized by the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art and the National Gallery of Canada.

PART 1: THE LEGEND IS BLACK
PART 3: 10 DEGREES MOUTH

Jamie Ross was born in a little house on Pendrith Street, just north of Toronto’s Christie Pits Park. He is a red haired film/video artist, working primarily in time-based media, working at the farthest-flung edges of narrative film and video. His work has screened in nationally and in Europe and Asia. His fiction has been anthologized, self-published in the form of a zine, and his most recent work, a novella entitled Coldwater, was published this year. Ross now lives in Montreal.

With generous support from the Canada Council for the Arts and CARFAC.

New Thing

2011-05-30T08:41:00.001-07:00

Next week I am going to bike to Stouffville to help out Aleksandra Mir with her upcoming exhibition project for Mercer. EVERYONE PLEASE COME!

ALEKSANDRA MIR
ON LOCATION!Saturday 11 June 2011

The Seduction of Galilei Galilei by Aleksandra Mir is an action that will consist of building a tower of automotive tires as high as possible until it topples over, only to start over again. Several attempts will be made over the course of the day on Saturday 11 June 2011 from 10am to 6pm at Goodwood Kartways, situated 40 km northeast of Toronto.

ALEKSANDRA MIR
THE SEDUCTION OF GALILEO GALILEI
OPENING RECEPTION
Saturday 18 June 2011
Artist's talk at 3 PM, Reception 4-6 PM

For its banner summer exhibition, Mercer Union has commissioned international artist Aleksandra Mir for a new work titled The Seduction of Galileo Galilei. The event will take place at Goodwood Kartways in Stouffville, Ontario, and the resulting video documentation will be the centerpiece of Mir’s solo exhibition in our galleries. Mir is interested in the specific dynamics of popular myths and technologies, and she has proposed a directive for her work inspired by Galileo Galilei whose experiments with gravity are well known. As the apocryphal tale goes, Galileo dropped objects of differing mass off the Leaning Tower of Pisa in order to observe their rate of acceleration. In so doing, he discredited Aristotle's assumptions on the matter, giving us the Law of Falling Bodies. In The Seduction of Galileo Galilei, Mir ignites an intellectu al affair with the scientist, four centuries after the fact. Her proposed rendezvous takes place in a gravel lot adjacent to a racetrack, where she performs a gravitational feat of her own—the stacking of a single column of automotive tires that rise precariously to the heavens. Though the column may reach the height of the famed Tower of Pisa, Mir is more concerned with space of play that opens when failure is a permissible outcome. This impetus represents an inversion of the normal parameters and aims of construction. Though Mir relies on the highly skilled labour of the crane operator—his theoretical knowledge of physics combined with in-the-field experience of hoisting objects into space—her thrill is the tipping point between the expected results and the limits of control. For example, wind, the shape of the tires, the energy of the crew to gather the tires, all these determine at what point the construction will spill over. The impulse to stack is a primordial one, vis ible in the play of children handling building blocks, but also the most elaborate ancient architectural wonders. Mir’s experiment is experiment for experiment’s sake and, in The Seduction of Galileo Galilei, she indulges the delight of failure, making the tower topple over and over again, for the sheer joy of watching the fall.

2011-05-26T11:03:00.001-07:00

10 Degrees Mouth

2011-05-19T07:35:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of The Legend is Black is opening at Gallerywest June 23rd!

jonathan edward mayhew
"10 Degrees Mouth"
Part of the project: "The Legend is Black"
June-23-30, 2011
Opening reception: Thursday, June 23, 7-10 PM

The Legend is Black is a three-part curatorial project by Xenia Benivolski

Commissioned by the MOCCA for THIS IS PARADISE.

News news

2011-05-17T12:50:00.000-07:00

Hey I'm in this Auction friday!

XPACE presents: Ulysses Castellanos’ “Cult of The Contemporary” a Live Art Auction!
Friday, May 20th, 2011
Doors Open at 7:00 PM
Auction begins at 8:00 PM SHARP!--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
...
XPACE is taking the ever popular ‘art auction’ and flipping it on it’s head!!!

XPACE presents Ulysses Castellanos’ “Cult of The Contemporary” a Live Art Auction! The event will blend the traditional ‘art auction’ with that of the early 70’s cult phenomena, all under Castellanos’ art direction. Guests will become part of Castellanos’ fully immersive environment, featuring many interactive activities such as free face painting provided by Fish-head and video works by the artist. And, of course, there will be Spiked Kool Aid punch!

But most importantly “Cult of The Contemporary” is your chance to purchase the work of Toronto’s Up and Coming contemporary artists!

Each attendee will receive an inspirational artist multiple made by Castellanos!!!!!

This event is a fundraiser intended to raise funds to help pay student and young artist project fees for upcoming exhibitions. This auction will showcase artists who have exhibited with XPACE since our founding by the OCAD Student Union in 2004. Seven years later, the artists who have come through our doors have helped form the foundation for Toronto’s artistic communities. “Cult of The Contemporary” is your chance to purchase the work of Toronto’s Up and Coming contemporary artists! In continuing our commitment to supporting artists, we have given participating artists the option to collect 50% of the final sale price!

Participating artists include:
Geoffry Pugen, Stacey Sproule, Carolyn Tripp, Myung-Sun Kim, Derrick Hodgson, Georgia Dickie, Brad Tinmouth, Natasha Bailey, Alicia Nauta, Xenia Benivolski, Brandon Dalmer, Matthew Williamson, Tomas Del Balso, Bevan Ramsay, Jordan Charles Bowden, Jennifer Long, Lisa Neighbour, Emily Gove, Amanda Nedham, Adrian Forrow, Brett Despotovich, Cameron Lee, David Bender, Kate McQuillen, Lisa Visser, Tom Blanchard, Tara Downs, Alison Kobayashi, Gintas Tirilis, Pierette Durette, Zev Farber, Jennifer Sciarrino, Abby McGuane, Melissa Fisher

For a preview of artists and works available please visit: http://xpace-auction.blogspot.com/

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tickets are now available in advance at XPACE Cultural Centre for $20 each. Tickets include complimentary drinks and food!
If you are unable to make it into XPACE to pick up tickets in person, please email Derek at derek@xpace.info for reservations.

Also Thursday Night Vanessa and I are Hosting Paul Butler for GUESS WHAT?!

Thursday, May 19 · 6:00pm - 9:00pm
The White House (studio)
277.5 Augusta Ave.
Toronto, ON
Paul Butler’s art is not defined by medium, nor is his practice primarily studio based. Since 1998 he has hosted the internationally renowned Collage Party, a travelling experimental studio he devised as a forum for ideas, inspiration, and connections with a wide range of participants. Dozens of these events have been held across North America and Europe in public museums, commercial galleries, schools, and non-profit art centre...s. The informal sharing of ideas experienced at Collage Parties led to Butler’s subsequent interest in alternative pedagogies. In 2008 he organized the residency Reverse Pedagogy at The Banff Centre.

The creative and conceptual basis of Paul Butler’s work encompasses hosting the Collage Party and directing The Other Gallery - a nomadic commercial gallery focused on overlooked artists’ practices, established in 2001. Butler has exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, University of Toronto; White Columns, New York; and Creative Growth Art Centre, Oakland. Currently, He has a solo exhibition at Jessica Bradley Art + Projects. This June, he will debut The Collage Party Pavilion in the group exhibition “My Winnipeg” at La Maison Rouge in Paris.

On Thursday Paul will be at the White House to discuss his overall practice - collage party, reverse pedagogy residencies, and his participation with nuit blanch this fall.

Doors at 6pm
Lecture starts at 6:30
Limited seating, so come early.
Refreshments will be served.
PWYC

Guess What?! 2011 is curated by Xenia Benivolski and Vanessa Rieger.www.theotherwhitehouse.ca

www.theotherpaulbutler.com

Also this, opening in just 2 weeks!!

THE LEGEND IS BLACK
Part 1
Curated by Xenia Benivolski

04 JUNE 2011 - 18 JUNE 2011
OPENING: 04 JUNE 2011, 7 - 11 p.m.

The Legend is Black at Butcher Gallery examines the visual elements of punk rock culture in Toronto in the 80s. Often it feels like these elements are lost on us - or lost in a myriad of visual language relating to music, art and advertising. This exhibition will generate the feeling of the spirit and circumstance that inspired a new generation and defined street code.

Punk posters from Mickey Skin and Steve Goof's collection are drawings on cave walls, they are markings on three stumps, hobo trails, warnings, and testaments to the life of profits and of leaders, young people possessed by inspiration, ritual, sacrifice and defeat.

The work Girls of Prey by Jamie Callum Ross and Lezster Rott is a generous incarnation of that spirit. When gender identity politics and battles against authority cease to feel sacred, a new influence arises in an abandoned quarry, inspiring a dynamic where progress can be made. Rott and Ross's short film is an acutely staged atrocity that makes it feel like the future is now.

The Legend is Black is a three-part curatorial project by Xenia Benivolski commissioned by the MOCCA for THIS IS PARADISE.

With support of The Canada Council for the Arts.

Last thing: I curated a different installation in the window of 1313, by Vanessa Rieger!

Salivating Security and
The Revolution Will Be Web Streamed Live
Installation by Vanessa Reiger
Curated by Xenia Benivolski

Interested in the power dynamics of surveillance, Rieger explores the Egyptian revolution through the eyes of surveillance cameras. In Gil Scot-Heron's poem "The revolution will not be Televised" he ends with the line "The revolution will be live". Where television was a passive experience for the audience, the internet and web cameras can empower its viewers, giving them up to the second live coverage and sometimes the control to manipulate the camera. The Egyptian revolution is considered by some to be the first web-based revolution, since facebook and twitter played important roles in organizing the people. Rieger's two pieces placed together creates a dialogue between the camera (the act of watching/witnessing) and the video footage (the action/revolutionary event).

Vanessa Rieger was born and raised in Toronto. She earned a degree in Drawing and Painting from OCAD and currently runs her own framing business, VR Frames. Rieger also helps run and coordinate The White House Studio Project, an artist-run studio co-op based in Kensington Market.

Gallery Hours are Wed- Sun 1-6pm
1313 Queen St. West 416-536-6778 www.g1313.org
Media contact Phil Anderson 416-525-7688
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 12th at 7:00 p.m

Everything is so busy these days, no?

GUESS WHAT 2011

2011-05-16T11:03:00.001-07:00

This Summer Vanessa and I have Curated a 12 part talk series GUESS WHAT?!, a continuation of the one I did last summer.

Guess What?! is a talk series that engages local and international artists’ approach to the sharing of information in both formal and experimental ways.

Artists have been asked to submit material relating to personal theory, practice discourse and visual art making to create an accessible and relatable presentation that will come to life in a studio environment.
We hope that these talks inspire and motivate resident and visiting artists alike in creating a conversation between different practices and ideas. By encouraging alternatives in cross practice, the project will create new initiatives and productive collaborations.

This eclectic collection of talks presents a broad discourse of multi-platform contemporary art practices; reflecting the variety within in the Whitehouse in particular and the contemporary art community in Toronto at large.
The lectures will be documented and uploaded for pubic access. All door proceeds will be used to support the presenter, the Whitehouse studio project and the local community.

Guess What?! 2011 is curated by Xenia Benivolski and Vanessa Rieger.

2011 Program
March 24th
Otino Corsano: “Quick Draw” Artist InterviewerOtino Corsano is a New Genres artists who conducts “Quick Draw” artist interviews via Facebook’s IM Chat feature. Rather than compartmentalize his writing practice, Corsano sees these documented dialogues as integral to his work as a post-conceptual artist. Challenged by the traditional classifications of art criticism, Corsano will attempt to demonstrate through a live interview how these writings function as performative/collaborative works of art.

April 21st (two lecture night)Jess Cimo: The Ides of March; Self-preservation and the Art WorldThis educational lecture hopes to target the politics of art for emerging artists. It will involve everything from how pricing is established, to what to watch out for, along with true stories from the lack-luster offices beyond the viewing room and behind the white walls of the white box. To share the passion as creators and exhibitors is so important, but to live the reality can become taxing and at times complicated. We will compare notes from real life with what people like Thompson is saying in his $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art and Art/Work by Bhandari and Melber. Looking at the stream of commercial galleries and the power cycles that drive buyers and markets, attendees will be welcome to share their personal experiences and comments, as well as to ask questions in a Q&A session that will follow.

Sarah Friend: The Last Great Unregulated Market: Footnotes from the Ground Floor
This lecture would attempt to explain some of the polar economic perspectives that animated the twentieth century and accordingly shaped art history. This would involve a discussion of arts funding under different types of governments, likely covering the ideas of Karl Marx, Adam Smith, and John Keynes. It would introduce the idea of an
artistic practice as an “artistic mode of production,” and use specific artists to illustrate the relationship between art and economic structures. Examples might include but not be limited to Warhol, Koons, Malevich, Banksy, Caleb Larson, and the Yes Men.

My thesis is essentially that all art is political. It underlies every artistic act but is seldom confronted directly, only through symbols. Less theoretically, I will articulate how the art world as an unregulated market impacts the daily working lives of artists. Speculation, inflation, and advertising play important roles in the art market. What is the nature of the artist/dealer relationship, and how important is artistic branding?

April 28th
Matt Mincoff: “Seeing beyond looking through”Matt Mincoff is an artist/sculptor from Hamilton Ontario and has studied at OCAD (BFA 2007) and RMIT Melbourne (MFA 2010). His practice is an exploration of what is unknown and how can we communicate what should be unexplainable. With this focus on the unknown he has worked with the concepts of the mind, ghosts, identity, invisibility, spirit, relationships and n-dimensional geometry through various approaches to objects, installation, images, sounds and video.

The workshop will discuss various topics that Mincoff has been recently working on through his art practice with slide presentations of his work and relevant media to support the concepts under the title “seeing beyond looking through”.
(website: http://mattmincoff.blogspot.com/)

May 5th
James Gardner: Painting as EvilThe artist is heralded as a valued member of society, a cultural producer that contributes to the visual and conceptual ethos of the community that they inhabit. It has not always been this way. Historically and contemporarily, the artist, and the act of representation can be seen to fulfill a much darker role, and is aligned with the occult, sorcery and the devil himself. Peter Brown, for example, writing on the iconoclastic controversy of Byzantium in the 8th century, illustrates the stance the church took against artists and representation: “The artist, by forming a human image in stone or paint…is competing with God, is attempting to usurp God’s function. By so doing the artist becomes—in a literal sense—God’s adversary.” As David Freedberg reiterates, in his book The Power of Images “whatever [images] are made of, they are not of God, but of the devil. In What Painting Is, James Elkins also aligns the artist and the occult by comparing the painter to the alchemist. Closer to our own era, we see this illustrated in the autobiographical white hooded figure in the paintings of Philip Guston, and even in contemporary media.

This lecture aims to investigate the other side of the cult of the artist and representation in contemporary and historical contexts. The lecture will consider this malevolent reading of representation and the artist in relation to power structures, cultural beliefs, mythologies and fables. It is worth noting, that the lecturer himself, is a painter, and proposes this subject out of the belief that the subject is interesting and will be entertaining to talk about, and does not aim to discredit or shed a negative light the making of images. On the contrary, the lecture aims to highlight the magical potential of the act of representation, magical abilities of images, and the respective cultures attempts to undermine the power of representation by denoting the artist and his pictures as evil.

May 19th
Paul Butler: Artist Talk
Paul Butler’s art is not defined by medium, nor is his practice primarily studio based. Since 1998 he has hosted the internationally renowned Collage Party, a travelling experimental studio he devised as a forum for ideas, inspiration, and connections with a wide range of participants. Dozens of these events have been held across North America and Europe in public museums, commercial galleries, schools, and non-profit art centre...s. The informal sharing of ideas experienced at Collage Parties led to Butler’s subsequent interest in alternative pedagogies. In 2008 he organized the residency Reverse Pedagogy at The Banff Centre.

The creative and conceptual basis of Paul Butler’s work encompasses hosting the Collage Party and directing The Other Gallery - a nomadic commercial gallery focused on overlooked artists’ practices, established in 2001. Butler has exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, University of Toronto; White Columns, New York; and Creative Growth Art Centre, Oakland. Currently, He has a solo exhibition at Jessica Bradley Art + Projects. This June, he will debut The Collage Party Pavilion in the group exhibition “My Winnipeg” at La Maison Rouge in Paris.

June 9th
Roch Smith: Old School: GI Joe teaches us how to playDuring the 1970s, short comic books were enclosed with the play-sets that detailed the Adventures of GI Joe – examples include: Shark’s Surprise, Search for the Stolen Idol, Secret Mission to Spy Island. Even at the time, the concepts of scripted play were questioned by many parents and educators as lacking in creativity and imagination. Curiously, these comics promoted lightly veiled right wing views of cold war politics.

It seems quaint to look back to a more “wholesome” time and dismiss what was deemed problematic. I would argue that it is precisely by examining the past that we can better see what the present offers and how marketing and consumer inertia has allowed for ever increasing and rigorous levels of scripted play.

July 11th
Jürgen Dehm: Learning From Each Other: Underground Film and Mainstream Cinema in the 1960sEven more than avant-garde film in general, 1960s “underground” “art” movies are defined by a radical denial of strategies driven from mainstream cinema, in particular those from Hollywood. Since the beginning, the focal point of art films was not on complex stories or innovative plots, but on trying to explore “film as film” or on working on the physical material of the celluloid strip with techniques similar to traditional painting. In my presentation, I will try to take a closer look at the complex relationships of underground cinema and Hollywood in the 1960s from diverse perspectives: The Underground Superstar, New American Cinema and Avant-garde Aesthetics and “Underground incidents” and the Academy Awards.

July 21stFiona Smyth: Zines, Comics and Graphic NovelsTravels through inspirational cartoonists and zinesters who lead me to creating my first graphic novel: The Never Weres.

August 11th
Stacey Sproule & Elizabeth Underhill: The Three Tongues: A Curated Series of Pedagogical Exchangeswill expand on the idea of disseminating knowledge orally. Stacey and Elizabeth will choose three skills to be taught at the inaugural Three Tongues Meeting: both choosing from their beliefs about what are important skills to proliferate.

The event will consist of three invited guests, each teaching one of the “Three Tongues”, to a group of interested participants. The attendees will be sectioned off into three groups and each group will be taught a different skill simultaneously. At the end of the first 20 minute cycle the teachers join their groups and then the groups are divided and paired off giving the students the opportunity to teach each other the skill they just gleaned. When
the second 20 minutes has passed the pairs are then switched once more which completes the cycle and by the end of the last 20 minutes all the participants have had the chance to collect the three new skills and teach at least two of them. As a token to take away from The Three Tongues, and to help with the learning process, each participant will be given a handmade tag – so we can keep track of the groups and to also remember their experiences.

August 28th
Jeremy Schaller: Forming an Eventscape: a collaborative filming workshop
A video workshop based on a painting or drawing format (where everyone sits and paints the same model). In the collaborative filming workshop the model is an improvisational dancer and the participants each have a device that is able to shoot video. In the beginning of the session the participants arrange themselves in a circle around the dancer and start shooting her simultaneously. The dancer claps her hand so there is a slate synch point for all the videos. The dancer then improvises and begins to move. The participants are free to shoot whatever they like of the dancer, the surrounding space or the other participants while exploring the space and evolving situation, but they must shoot continuously. The improvisation last for about 15 minutes, usually signaled by the dancer. The resultant synchronized footage is then digitized and exchanged among the participants for future use. The footage can then be performed in a live cinema performance to music with a tool I developed that allows for the synchronous playback of the footage using layering and time based manipulation to music. The end result you see in the video above which was documented right off the screen.

September 15th
Maggie Flynn: The Pitch: A panel discussion with Brad Tinmouth, Piotr Adas and CN Tower LiquidationThe Pitch will be a panel discussion with artists who make marketing, sales pitches, and financial transaction an integral part of their work. Brad Tinmouth, Piotr Adas and CN Tower Liquidation have been brought together to demonstrate and discuss their practices as they relate to this topic. Points of discussion will include: the buyer-seller relationship, product values, the importance of actual financial transaction, and “the pitch” as performance.

October 21st
Dylan Riebling: Digital DecayOur transition into a digital age is a mythical one. The translation of all human knowledge, information and data into ones and zeros gives us a sense of stability; of absoluteness. No longer do we have to worry about photographs fading or paper disintegrating. Once we click “save”, we can keep something forever.

The promise is one of eternity. And it is a false promise. The reality is that information has never been more fragile. While a hand-written love letter will survive longer than the person who wrote it, a digital file has a life expectancy of five years. A hundred years from now, people will look back at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century as a digital dark age.

Gallery 1313

2011-04-13T13:52:00.000-07:00

Hello!

This month is the first of a 3 month curatorial project I am doing at Gallery 1313.
April's Artist is my own sister Yuula Benivolski!

FELL ASLEEP IN FRONT OF THE TV AGAIN! Gallery 1313
Even dummies fall asleep while watching the news.

The show had a little mention in Saturday's Globe and Mail. Apparently the police came to investigate the window after recieving reports of a dead body! Oy.

The article sort of focuses on Robert Hengeveld, whom I interviewed a couple of weeks ago....

Yuula and I also made a video last winter and its on this website now.

Sisters are the best!!!

mix mix

2011-04-08T10:48:00.000-07:00

discarded mixtapes

winterland

2011-03-23T12:01:00.000-07:00

Blurry photo closeup

2011-03-23T11:44:00.000-07:00

Also Palimpsest is still available in limited quantities. Its so beautiful.

2011-03-23T06:51:00.000-07:00

Hello I'm in this show next week

Wednesday, March 30 at 7:00pm - April 6 at 11:00pm
267 Brock ave, Unit 103

I was also part of this project but then I had this attempt at backyard ice cream and gave up.

Gnarly huh.

Don't give up on us

2011-03-21T19:11:00.000-07:00

Sad french 25 cent records.

S A

2011-03-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

I wrote this little essay commissioned by Xpace for William Andrew Stewart Findlay's show at Whippersnapper. It closes this Saturday and there's a party. You should go!

Tooth

2011-02-10T14:08:00.000-08:00

Palimpsest Issue/02

2011-02-10T13:59:00.000-08:00

Hello I have some multiples in the new Issues of Palimpsest Magazine, maybe you should get one?

PRE-ORDER
In anticipation of Palimpsest's Issue/02 MEDICINE launch February 26, 2011, we're offering 15 copies of the limited edition of 50 for pre-order through our website.

Palimpsest’s ISSUE 02/MEDICINE is an unbound collection of printed matter and multimedia work concerned with ideas of the body, illness, physicality and spirituality. ISSUE/02 MEDICINE incorporates video, text, illustration, photography, and other ephemera from Steven Beckly, Xenia Benivolski, Willie Brisco in conversation with AA Bronson, Maryanne Casasanta, Stacey Ho and Lindsey Nolan, Dan Joyce, Matthew King, Pierre Le Hors, Adam O’Reilly, the Parker Branch (Jason Hallows and Anna Madelska), Nickholis Planck and William Young. All pieces individually packaged in acid-free paper and collected in a handmade archival folder.Issues are $45.00 CAD plus shipping. Issues will be shipped after the release February 26.

Buy here.

Palimpsest is a collective of artists, writers, editors, curators and designers, endeavoring to create nonstandard venues for the exhibition and distribution of media and art.

Palimpsest Magazine is a heterogeneous anthology of multiples: a magazine in a box. Each issue is comprised of print, audio, textile, video, etc., and tied together via theme and design. Palimpsest is an alternative medium for artists and writers to disseminate their ideas – one which celebrates the tactility of the object in favour of the flattening effect of traditional print and screen-based media. Each issue exists as a traveling exhibition, an experiential object.

News

2010-12-28T09:40:00.000-08:00

I have been so inspired lately by these guys:

And in general

Inspired

2010-12-06T09:04:00.000-08:00

this winter we burn furniture.

Bitch Slap

2010-11-18T18:26:00.000-08:00

That Show Bitch Slap opens tomorrow, and this blog interviewed me after so many coffees on my lunchbreak. You can read it there... or you can read it here, whatever!

Thursday's Bitch Slap artist is Moscow-born Xenia Benivolski. A true artist of the world, Xenia studied her craft in Israel, Toronto, and Italy before founding the White House Studio Cooperative in 2008 - perhaps you've attended one of their legendary parties? Here Xenia explains her take on the show and why she loves doing laundry. Come to the Bitch Slap opening reception to check out her art in person on Friday, November 19 at the Thrush Holmes Empire (1093 Queen Street West).

What does the term BITCH SLAP mean to you?I don't know! I just googled it and urban dictionary says "suggests the slap was met with little resistance and much whining" so maybe there is some feminism in that context, I'm just going to assume there is. I wish it was called "Beach Slap."

What art will you showcasing at the show?I will be showing a tape installation inspired by Art Basel called "Miami Vice." Its made out of the Miami Vice soundtrack tape, and some more tape.

What interests you most in life?I really like thinking about parallel situations and metaphors come to life, lately I have been really into waiting: waiting for laundry or waiting in a waiting room, I feel like this is the only time you could really relax, you know? Cause you're doing nothing but you're still doing something, so you don't have to feel guilty about wasting your time, you're devoid of responsibility. This never happens in real life! I have made some of the most important decisions ever while waiting for something. Waiting rooms are introspective thinking rooms. Other things I think about are fashion, nature, sentimental feelings, culture, feminism.

I also think about conditioning, the other day I found a two dollar coin on the street and I have become obsessed with looking at that spot every day when I pass by, because for some reason your animal brain thinks this is a good spot for money to randomly appear at so now I just obsessively look at it. So I start thinking about how it would be a really good $2 advertising strategy, leave a toonie somewhere and someone picks it up and the next day bam slap an ad over there and the person will come looking at it and see the ad? will this work in real life? so $2 is the price of having someone look at something. Or maybe just have an ad on the side of the road that's a replica of the road and it looks like there's a toonie of there and when the person bends over to get it its just a print and it says "Buy Pepsi" or something, will this work? have an ad in the gutter and when someone fall into it, "buy Pepsi". Or maybe if your roommate keeps forgetting the garbage schedule just tape a toonie to it and see what happens.

What oddities do you cherish?I cherish all oddities. I can't really think of one right now. I like it when someone's phone calls you by accident and you hear them walking around about their day and stuff inside from their butt pocket, I can listen to this forever! like a fly on the wall, right? like a fly in your pants! eww.

Do you remember a perfect day? What did it look like?This is a concept I have been obsessing over since I was a kid, to have the most perfect day and usually something in the end ruins it. But lately I learned to accept the bad part as part of the perfect day. Isn't perfect balanced? I have an equal opportunity attitude towards days. Days are generally important. I know that if I sleep through one I really regret the loss of it. Yesterday was pretty perfect, it involved laundry, back pocket phone calls, $2...

What do you love most about being a woman?Everything, but the best part are woman friendships they are magical and precious and I value them the most. I know I don't want to get all travelling pants on this but it really is so special and genuine! I know guys have their own version of that and its just as good I'm sure, or not...whatever.

If you were a song on our stereo, what would be playing?I don't know, but my cats have been losing it to an instrumental track called After the Dance by Marvin Gaye, you should probably listen to it too! The saxophone is like Meeeeeoooowwwwwwwwwowwwowowwwmow.

BITCH SLAP WILL BE like a long walk on the beach with an old lover when you realize you'll always be in love but never be together. Ooooooh!

Western front

2010-11-09T09:56:00.000-08:00

This person wrote this thing about my Worm Island installation (from the homey show) for Western Front Magazine as part of a series called "Objects for a Silent World." This issue comes out December 1st.

The Underwater Book

The underwater book organizes itself. Cannot be read. Gravity rules and flotation is the
only effective promotional strategy. Ziploc, holds its breath for you, the last surviving
reader. Pages that hold and drift, thoughts without a thinker. Silence is a stronghold
between submersion and circulation but the underwater book drowns its own old-
fashioned form. Preserved, the prison-glow of amber, holding pattern of staystill. Perfect
for the stay-at-home reader, the underwater book comes with its own fish tank and
lamp, pages backlit, no tide, decomposition a thing of the past. Not available in eBook
format. No reader but a viewer, the underwater book is judged the the sway of waterlight
between you and its cover. Without pageturn, the book is ------------------. Thinktank,
cubist storydream. The underwater book is available at most independent bookstores
comes complete with accessories fishnet, verbhook, wordfilter. Harddrive overgrown
with old fibre, world's smallest suitcase, microforest of memory chips. Learn to breathe
underwater or the future is ------------------. To read, unzip the bag. The underwater
book flips out, quick slip, animal smart, its nonscreen a cornea hit. Every page is a gill.
Familiar fish, two cover paddlewheeling. Each sentence is a struggle. Swims, between.
Air and drowning. Air and drowning.

November 19th

2010-11-08T19:13:00.001-08:00

its so quiet there

2010-11-01T17:51:00.000-07:00

Slight Gestures

2010-10-13T06:40:00.000-07:00

Image by Nadia Berelique

Curated by Gregory Denton and Xenia Benivolski
The ten artists whose works make up Slight Gestures create objects and images that are strangely compelling, and they do so with relatively simple methods and with everyday materials. Certainly, these strategies are not new in art making, but these ten share a sensibility that deserves some direct attention. The pieces are marked by a sentimentality and reverence that offsets the straight conceptualism of some of the process-based work, and inspires reverence and curiosity in the viewer. Why do we keep some things while we throw others away? How do you decide which piece should be seen, what is worthy of an audience? what is the minimal requirement for a gesture?

Entropy and chance play a role here, as does humour:

By allowing technical flaws the artists are freed from the burdens of style and are guided instead by moral and emotional attachment to an absurd end. In an interview with Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Jörg Heiser once said "These stories of failure and collapse and then not failing after all – that’s also the heroic theme of slapstick: the hero who accidentally breaks something, but in so doing brings about a stroke of good fortune and knocks over the villain, etc. You laugh because something that cannot really work actually does work. It’s a kind of triumph."

In choosing these artists, we wanted to know if that sensibility could be made clear. We asked the artists for their own views about their practice and used their input to create the show’s title. In the transcription of that conversation, included here, Nikki Woolsey describes her sculptures as a collage of objects that speak to one another - their relationship is even described as a romantic one. In seeing these works together, we create a larger conversation between the diverse and thoughtful practices of these artists.

By using found and ready made objects, prints and collage, artists are building things that they feel warrant our attention and sentiment. Janis Demkiw is embellishing an embellishment, James Gardner rescued pieces of compositions from his studio floor otherwise headed for the garbage bin, Victoria Cheong presents a projection screen specific for video that has detached itself from its original function and Mark MacKinnon aesthetically alters his TTC Uniform in a minimal, performative gesture.

This exhibition features work by:

Nadia Belerique
Victoria Cheong
Lyndsey Cope
Janis Demkiw
James Gardner
Christy Kunitzky
Cameron Lee
Mark G. MacKinnon
Jennifer Rose Sciarrino
Nikki Woolsey

OPENING RECEPTION: Thursday, October 14 at 7:00pm.

The exhibition continues on Friday, October 15 and Saturday, October 16 from 11:00am - 6:00pm.

A commemorative publication Accompanied the Exhibition:

In an effort to open the curatorial process and help the artists themselves define the direction for the show, a private artist’s talk was held in advance of the show. It took place at Double Double Land on Tuesday, October 5 at 6:30pm. In attendance were the two curators and all participating artists with the exception of Nadia Belerique and Lyndsey Cope, who could not attend.
Below is that conversation.

Greg Denton: Thanks everybody for coming. This project came out of a series of exhibitions that we were putting on at the White House, but has become it’s own independent thing here at Double Double Land.
Xenia Benivolski: its just the way things turned out.
GD: So we wanted to talk a bit about where everyone is at with their work and give folks a chance to talk about what they've proposed - to see the space that the work will be shown in, and for the two of us to ask some questions about your practice.
XB: Yeah we have questions like....WHY would you make this? I think thats the one thing about the show is that the pieces are kind of puzzling which brings out the question: why would you make this? and so we kind of wanted to figure it out. So I’m not saying that there’s gonna be an answer but I thought we could talk about this.
GD: We both identify as artists first. So in those terms we didn’t come into the project with one straightforward role or theme that we have to force other people to do. So we thought about having this sort of mini artist conversation/talk first, that would help shape the way the exhibition will turn out.
Maybe you could just talk about the piece that you’ve suggested, maybe it has changed since we have decided to include you in the exhibition. Who will go first?
XB: Yes. Victoria, could you talk about your work?
Victoria Cheung: Yes, I’m going to show a screen, a projection screen. The idea is that it’s a screen that you could project on but there are no projections: it’s just the projection screen as an object, made out of white T-shirt material and suspended between two stands.
XB: what inspired you to do this?
VC: Well I was sort of thinking about the idea of making screens, since most of my art practice is in video and film. I was thinking about different ways of showing them...I feel like a lot of times when videos are in art galleries it’s either super stark, projected onto a plain wall or it is on a gross looking TV screen. It’s just not so nice, as an object to be exhibited. So I started thinking about different spaces and different ways of showing video work which would be more appropriate to the videos that I make and I was just starting to work with textiles and so it seemed appropriate to put these things together.
XB: So could you use it as a projection screen?
VC: You could, I could.
XB: But you don’t want to.
VC: I’m not sure. I was thinking about making specific screens for specific videos, so making a screen before making a video was an interesting thing for me, so I might try and make a video that works for the screen but for now I want to focus on the screen.
James Gardner: I think that’s great. I’ve been debating with my roommate lately about his video work and he was talking about how its easy for a video artist to just take the video and put it on a TV or a projector, they don’t think about the cord going to the TV and all of the other materials: it’s not just about what’s on the screen. So I think its important to think about these things and give them consideration.
Christy Kunitzky: Yeah, it feels really sentimental to me, to make a screen for a video. It sounds really warm.
VC: Yeah you could, like wear it you know
CK: Well no, I mean even the use of t-shirt material it feels very personal, like, tender.

Image and Installation by Victoria Cheong

Cameron Lee: It’s interesting that the t-shirt fabric and the light and if people are walking around it, a lot of this is about the form of it.
VC: Yeah, there is a dynamic element in the fringe pattern; it looks really nice when it moves. So it would be nice if people were close to it so that it could pick up that movement.
Cameron Lee: It collapses that space between someone viewing a screen and someone being on screen.
VC: It’s true: if you see a screen you tend to stay away from it.
CL: Stand back, so you don’t interrupt the movie. So there is distance.
XB: What are you making, Cameron?
CL: The work that I was making has a lot to do with knowing how to build something, it’s about skill: I come from a painting background and it can be very macho. I am interested in things that relate to that, like the tools. Or beers: a symbol of male bonding, so I relate these things to gender identities… but I don’t know if that is really obvious in my work.

Installation by Cameron Lee

Jennifer Rose Sciarrino: That is so interesting: the part about being good at something or making something “real”. I feel that with my work sometimes, I replicate things and I try and make them “perfect” and I spend so much time on the actual craft. For this piece I am doing something very similar, in a way of relinquishing control: taking something that I use and ‘making itself’ with it: I am taking pieces of plaster and putting them in solutions of acrylic and pigment and water, and then letting the water evaporate, leaving a mark. And I find it really hard because it’s so ugly, but I’ve decided that’s what it is: it’s just going to do that thing. I’ll have control over the shape, the materials but the rest of it us up to, I guess, how dry the room is.
CL: It’s sort of like that anti-Cartesian thing where you are letting the physical connect with your psychological intent: you are relinquishing control of your materials with a set of guidelines hoping that it will work, so there is a degree of luck involved.
JRS: And if it doesn’t work then I will just force myself to show it.

Installation by Jennifer Rose Sciarrino

XB: Does anybody else feel this way?
CK: I feel like that’s the whole basis of my practice, for example: I have three materials and a set of rules and whatever happens happens.
XB: But then it feels right for some reason?
CK: Sometimes it feels right but sometimes it’s like, why am I making this? Who cares about my stupid rules and who cares about whatever I end up with, if I don’t care that much about it. It’s hard cause you still have to have some control over it. You still have to decide if it’s “worthy”.
VC: Do you rectify the impulse to intervene?
CK: I would follow the rules but sometimes the results are just unsatisfactory, but I still feel that it warrants attention, and that it deserves to be shown, because that is part of the process and the rules were followed, so the whole process is the piece not just the end result.
VC: It sort of takes the idea of failure out of the equation, because if you followed everything exactly there is no reason to fail.

Installation by Christy Kunitzky

Janice Demkiw: Its interesting what you said about the object being worthy because in the process of creating it, its like you’ve given it life. For example, if you were doing a performance and it was either good or bad and it’s over and there is nothing you could do. So to take a process where there is something you could do, by not showing it, but to then let it arrive at its eventual destination: sort of to just let that exist.
CK: Yeah I think I think a lot about that thing Bruce Nauman said: You know, I’m an Artist so everything I do in the studio is art: I don’t really know if I believe it but sometimes it’s like, it’s getting there.
XB: I think that’s so interesting that you can take something, and you can mark it, and then you can put it on display and people will talk about it and then it becomes something else. I guess Nikki, that’s kind of how I feel about your work sometimes?
Nikki Woolsey: I guess I collect objects and I look for something in an object that appeals to me, when I make something it is based in the desire to explore how things are organized and put together and categorized in the world and try and find connections that might not be apparent. I guess that’s why I like to do collage. And I see my sculptures are kind of like collage too. One idea that Cameron and I might work on together or I might just do it, is make work on connecting objects to each other, so the object itself is longer physically than I’ve done before so it forms a more complete sentence. I’ve done things with maybe just two things and made them sort of talk to each other... So their original function isn’t really important, but it’s there, it should be recognized - and it forms a kind of romantic relationship. If I can look at something and kind of smile, if they’ve developed a relationship outside of their original function, then... I want to do that with a longer series of objects. It will take a lot of editing.

Installation by Nikki Woolsey

XB: Where you do find these objects?
NW: Some of the things are art materials, like plaster or sponges, or foam or styrofoam. I go to Value Village all the time and stockpile crap, or pieces of wood from the garbage or whatever. I guess the specifics of what I pick up change...
JD: I feel like I identify a lot with what Nikki was describing about her practice in terms of exploring relationships of things, especially things in space and how they relate to one another. I am really interested in framing, and in scale relationships. A lot of projects I do involve miniaturizing objects or enlarging objects and how they interact with space once they’ve been transformed. Like along the baseboards, building a miniature one that just fits in next to the real one, adding another contour.

Installation by Janis Demkiw

Mark MacKinnon: Kind of an embellishment on the embellishment.
JD: yeah, exactly. One of the things about framing is that I feel difficult showing in gallery spaces. I have a difficult time with the white void. My interest in framing is that it is like endless, like it doesn’t have to have an edge - you put an object in a space it should never end, almost. That’s why I like to create in the context of a space. And my interest in edging, the scale thing creates a sort of edge.
There’s an interview I read with the artist Charles Ray, and in it there is that piece - there’s a family and they are life scale sculptures, and they are naked and holding hands, but they’ve all been scaled so they are the same height. So there’s like a toddler and the father but they are the same height, so their proportions are totally fucked. He said that where that piece happened, was where their hands were being held because of the scale shift. So that was where the disrupt happened, so with my scale shifting, it’s that rupture of what your expectations are.
XB: Do you know why you do it?
JD: The why is that since I was young, it has been a compulsion, specifically with miniatures. It is a little more difficult to rationalise the why, because it is an impulse i’ve had for so long. I can talk about what I think happens, but the why is a reflex.

Installation by Janis Demkiw

I think there is something very approachable when someone can recognize something...so there’s definitely, having a compulsion about things that are tiny is widely shared.
CL: People love miniatures.
JD: When I think about the why, I always think about my parents, my mother. Like, when she used to come to shows she would ask “Am I going to get it?”. I remember her saying “I think I get it” - I was like, focus on the way it makes you feel and have a reaction to it.
XB: I think we are so concerned with asking why in this because Greg and I talked about how these works make us feel. We’d say “This is awesome” but not knowing why we felt that way.
GD: There’s been sort of an investigative approach to this thing (curatorial process). I think we identified something about everyone’s work that ‘sounded’ the same.
XB: There’s kind of a successfully intended failure to it all.
CK: Or an absurdity, to the actions, or...
GD: Yeah, It’s almost like there’s something you can barely hold on to with everyone’s work.. like not enough that you can say “everyone’s working in this sort of genre or trying to make this sort of statement”, but there’s enough in common with the work that I think it will make for a really great this room (show).
MM: That’s what makes the title of the show that much more meaningful, “Small Gestures”.
VC: I like the word gesture a lot though, it has this implication of something that is like a movement, or a reflex.
MM: I really took to the title.
GD: Mark, what did you mean? How do you see the title influencing your work? Or how did you react to it?
MM: What I did, was, I have these uniform work shirts and they have a collar, like a standard shirt with a collar, and I wanted to take the collar off and wear it at work. So that’s what I’ve achieved at this point. But I’m not satisfied with the neck. There is this sub-collar that remains when you remove the main one.

Installation by Mark Mackinnon

XB: Did you cut it off?
MM: No, i just took the stitches out, and I sewed back the seam. But I want it to look like this collar (shows collar of shirt he is wearing) - I wore some shirts for comparison. (laughter)
XB: Do the customers notice you are wearing it?
MM: I haven’t done it yet. I was going to do it on Labour Day, but that didn’t happen. I am going to wear it at work, and the shirt will be the piece in the show. I am going to spend my day tomorrow looking for an open minded tailor or seamstress on short notice. I think I can find that in Toronto.

Installation by Mark McKinnon

CK: Where do you work?
MM: For the TTC.
XB: Will you get in trouble?
MM: No, I don’t think anyone will really notice. And for documentation, I was thinking of cell-phone camera photos, I think that would be most appropriate for footage.
JG: So, for my proposed work. i have been making a lot of paintings recently, and there are some cannibalistic tendencies in the work, so i’ve gotten to the point where I had done away with the frame, the square and whatnot, and was getting to the point where i could take old paintings and rescue them and cut them up. It’s a long and grueling and complex way of building a painting. When i’m trying to create these things, there are a lot of scraps and cutoffs, and pieces that have been painted, and then added to another painting and cut off. Kind of like a woodshop with sawdust or whatever. Sometimes when i’m cleaning up, there are these pieces that are so perfect as they are that I can’t do anything with them - I can’t put them in a new painting. About a month ago or so I decided to put them on the wall, and they look nice to me but I felt like i needed something to show that they are important, so i made these handmade frames. I call them accidental forms… I didn’t want to go back to a square frame, so I made these ones specifically for the form inside. In a sense, all of the marks that are there, the marks have been layered through many paintings - there’s no marks that I intentionally put down.
GD: This is another example of some of the process-based work that we were talking about earlier, but you mentioned that you were excited to make new ones. If you actively try to make these, how will it affect the outcome?

Painting by James Gardner

JG: Oh, I will never actively try to make them, It will always be this, my painting practice leads to this - there are lots of scraps. I never want to go back to that canvas stage, so this is sort of self-generated. Hopefully there will continue to be interesting ones.
XB:I feel like a lot of the works in the show are about this sentimental attachment to objects.
JD: And kind of rescuing in this case.
GD: There sort of doesn’t need to be an explanation in the case of some of this work, which is why our “why strategy” might not have worked.
Mark: I was reading that in the 1950’s and 60’s North Korean doctors were encouraged to use their own skin to perform skin grafts. This kind of reminds me of that.
JG: Wow, for the paintings in the studio, I’ll take one down and put it next to another and it will look good together and then I can combine them,
GD: So, the other thing that i find interesting is that lots of people have lots of ideas about the process, and use rules to define the outcome, but still, everyone has ended up making an object.
XB: I guess James’ are paintings but are sculptural.
JG: They are.

The Museum

2010-10-13T06:23:00.001-07:00

Pencil Crayon Rubbings of the insides of my purse.

OMG SWAP 2

2010-10-06T09:40:00.000-07:00

Worn Journal Made a post about my upcoming SWAP!So check it out.

fashions await!

messenger

2010-09-24T14:50:00.000-07:00

I dyed my backyard pink

2010 Give Up The Things You love

2010-09-06T08:54:00.000-07:00

This is a piece I worked on at Don Blanche, I built 7 ladders over 7 days and then burnt them all.

All salvaged wood

VIDEO IS COMING UP

Thanks to:

Zach Porthal
Nick Pye
Ben Portis

Sept 17th

2010-09-06T07:05:00.000-07:00

Teeth

2010-08-24T20:40:00.000-07:00

Tooth and mouth cavity paintings with Volcanic ash from Eyjafjallajokul, Iceland

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

Parts of tongue.

I am hoping to paint my entire mouth eventually.

Worm Island

2010-08-24T20:30:00.000-07:00

For the Homey Show at Double Double Land, I filled an aquarium with a row of books in ziplock bags and then halfway with water.

The books organized themselves

Skry

2010-07-20T08:01:00.001-07:00

Girl you know its true

2010-07-20T07:48:00.000-07:00

Things in progress;

I'm removing objects from use by rendering them with a wax crayon then putting them back in use/grounding them by tracing shadows with similar crayon so that they become 'drawings'

1. Ceiling Fan

2. Watering Can

3. Beer

Ceiling fan, watering can, wax crayon, beer 2010

Mickey Mouse Scream

2010-07-20T07:34:00.000-07:00

Ink on paper 2010

Miami Vice

2010-07-20T07:28:00.000-07:00

tape on wall 2010

New news

2010-07-19T11:09:00.000-07:00

July 24 I have to get dunked for Art's sake. Will you come dunk me? I'm terrified of heights and surprises.

Dunk a Performance Artist Saturday July 24th!

Saturday / Jul 24 / 10
11:30 am - 9:00 pm

@ The New Bloor Festival
1277 Bloor Street West
(Just outside Toronto Free Gallery)

FADO Performance Art Centre proudly offers “Dunk a Performance Artist”
@The New Bloor Festival
Saturday July 24, 2010

Location: 1277 Bloor Street West (just outside Toronto Free Gallery)
Time: 11:30am – 9pm
Cost: $5 / 3 shots

Performance artists have some serious balls. FADO Performance Art Centre proudly gives you the chance to take those balls and throw them at your favourite performance artist. Join us at the FADO Performance Artist Dunk Tank at the New Bloor Festival on July 24th and take your best shot!

Dunk-able Artists:

Andrew J. Paterson
Chandra Bulucon
Christine Swintak
Darren O’Donnell
David Frankovich
Emma Baron
Gale Allen
Jennifer Matotek
Jeremy Bailey
Jon McCurley
Jon Sasaki
Keith Cole – Mayoral Candidate
Lo Bil
Louise Liliefeldt
Nayeon Kim
Risa Kusumoto
Ulysses Castellanos
Xenia Benivolski
Yumi Onose

**You can check out the final schedule of when your favourite performance artist will be sitting in the dunk tank on the FADO website, and at the booth on the day!

Proceeds go to future ballsy performance programming at Fado Performance Art Centre. Thanks to Heather Haynes, Toronto Free Gallery and the participating artists for making this event possible.

www.newbloorfestival.com

nownownownownow

2010-07-12T21:00:00.001-07:00

Hey this picture is of me on the cover of Sketch Magazine there is also a little interview inside ok! about best new talent or someshit!

photo by Helena Kvarnstrom

I have been in the studio. Its been so good.

2 shows this month..

2010-07-08T11:30:00.001-07:00

I got a new studio its so beautiful!

I've been swimming alot!

I've quit my job and found a new job, at a piano restoration place, so nice! surrounded by pianos! really very nice and fancy.

I have 2 Art Shows coming up: One this Staurday:

In Vincent Price’s visual autobiography he describes that his mother used to say, “I don’t know much about art, but I like what I know.” Unlike Vincent Price’s mother, I do know quite a lot about art, but in approaching this curatorial project, I have taken “I like what I know” –my own sense of aesthetics- as the basis for a show featuring many artists with varied practices. Understanding that each viewer approaches art and visual culture with their own innate sense of aesthetics related to things such as age or life experience, synthesizing the diverse selection of artists at the White House through this process instead of a thematic curatorial authorship allows me to be sure that I do not limit anyone’s artistic intention due to unknown themes, and instead approach their practice individually.

The intention of the exhibition was meeting with most of the practicing artists in the White House who wanted to discuss their art practice with me then curate one of their pieces that I like. Additionally I asked a select few outside artists to participate in the “I like what I know” process. Therefore the outcome of the exhibition presented itself in a multifaceted way that showcased the artistic intentions which is synonymous to the White House.

Derek Aubichon
Nadia Belerique
Xenia Benivolski
Emily Cook
Adam Cowan
Laura Curley
Greg Denton
Julia Dickens
Cameron George Lee
Jen Hutton
Christy Kunitzky
Jonathan Mayhew
Nitasha McKnight
Vanessa Bee Rieger
Liana Schmidt
Rebecca Fin Simonetti
Ceilidh Stidwill
Krista Buecking
Liz Knox
Jesse Harris
Amanda Rataj
Nikki Woolsey

And One Next Week!

_________The Homey Show}}}}\\\\----------------:)

**Opening reception:: Thursday July 22, 7pm-10pm**

We cordially invite you into our Homey Show, an exhibition of domestically-inspired sculptures, installations, drawings and crafts by 35 artists from Toronto and abroad.

The work assembled for exhibition recreates the domestic environment in its various forms, from functional home furnishings such as lamps made by Michael Comeau and Hugh Alexander Scott-Douglas, to reupholstered chairs by Jacob Horwood and ceramic dinnerware by Amy Bowles. The decorative, such as a handmade rug by Anthony Record and crocheted wall hangings by Eden Veaudry, are also included, as well as work that examines what makes a space a home, including family portraits by Adrienne Kammerer, and a blessing ritual performed in proxy by Mary Kidd.

The exhibition also features work by:
Cameron George Lee, Nikki Woolsey, Maryanne Casasanta, Mark Delong, Sebastian Butt, Tara Downs, Anna May Henry, Georgia Dickie, Sandy Plotnikoff, Laura McCoy, Matt King, Xan Hawes, Julia Kennedy, Life of a Craphead (Amy Lam + Jon McCurley), Xenia Benivolski, Romy Lightman, Liam Crockard, Vanessa Rieger, Terrarea (Janis Demkiw, Olia Mishchenko, Emily Hogg), Augustina Saygnavong, Abby McGuane, and Zeesy Powers.

All work is for sale.

_____________________________________________________________

On July 25th the Homey Show will also host an event as part of Double Double Land’s monthly FOOD series. Artists Agnieszka Forfa and Julia Kennedy will create a homey meal and atmosphere. Reservations will be required, and more info TBA.

_________________________________________________________________

The Homey show is curated by Sarah Butterill, Arielle Gavin, Jesjit Gill and Laura Mccoy.

______________________________________________________________

July 20-29, 2010
Opening reception July 22nd, 2010, 7pm – 10 pm
Gallery hours daily: 12pm-6pm
Double Double Land
www.doubledoubleland.com
209 Augusta Ave. (Down the Alley)

AA

2010-06-17T21:21:00.000-07:00

Anywhere the wind blows

2010-06-14T06:50:00.000-07:00

Installation for The House That masons built

2010-05-04T20:34:00.001-07:00

oh hello just a quick update ... tonight mark and I are going to be on CKUT in montreal,i have been here since friday and its been grand really, Mark is going to promote his amazing news shit and Im gonna talk about the Whitehouse project, and some other shit..

In other news Nadja published the final photos for that upcoming toronto artists article and here they are shit i gotta get to the radio station bye!

Birdcalls

2010-03-22T20:17:00.000-07:00

I found two huge identical aquariums? maybe 80-100 gallon ones? like 3x6 feet huge? aaa! we carried them in the rain, there were some big snails inside.

Now Mark and I are gonna record my sound installation for the show on Saturday! please come!

Except its on the 27th.

LIFE!

What's next?

2010-03-10T16:51:00.001-08:00

Hey come to this next friday!

Right? Awesome.
The Following day there is an Artist-Run Centre fair happening at the same place, sort of in conjunction with this event:

The Whitehouse will be represented, But I will be sitting on the Mercer Union table for this one.

Bring It! Toronto Art Critics Speak.

2010-03-10T16:40:00.000-08:00

I facilitated this Art Critics panel investigating the relationships between atists and critics in Toronto with Nadja Sayej - the moderator, this past fall of 2009.

DAVID BALZERs writing on visual art, film, and theatre has appeared in Toronto Life, Canadian Notes and Queries, Cinema Scope, Maisonneuve, and EYE WEEKLY, where he is arts editor and Galleries columnist. He recently finished a short-fiction collection entitled Artists in Peril.

OTINO CORSANO is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art, University of Toronto and Otis College of Art in Los Angeles. His art writings and artist interviews are published in artUS magazine and has taught at the University of Toronto and the Ontario College of Art.
http://otinocorsano.blogspot.com

ROSEMARY HEATHER is the former editor of Mix Magazine (2002-2003) and C Magazine (2004-2009).
http://rosemheather.wordpress.com/

CHARLENE K. LAU is a Toronto-based art writer whose reviews have been published in Canadian Art, C Magazine, Akimblog and Fashion Theory (forthcoming). She is curatorial assistant at the Textile Museum of Canada.

LEAH SANDALS is a freelance art writer and editor based in Toronto. She contributes regularly to the National Post and NOW, and is also associate editor for Canadian Arts website.
http://neditpasmoncoeur.blogspot.com/

MURRAY WHYTE covers visual arts for the Star. Hes also a feature writer for the Saturday and Sunday Star. He has written about art for the New York Times, Canadian Art magazine, the National Post and many others.

NADJA SAYEJ is a Gonzo journalist in the first order who has written about art for the Globe and Mail, the New York Times and is the host of ArtStars* TV.http://www.artstarstv.com

Parts 1 though 8:

Videos by Chris Healey of artlistpro

news!

2010-03-02T11:21:00.000-08:00

I am starting treatment for post traumatic stess disorder soon, finally living half a mile from lebanon for most of my life is paying off. I'll let you know how that goes.

Sunday Scene

2010-03-01T08:18:00.000-08:00

Katie Kehoe and I had to give this Sunday Scene lecture at the powerplant about their current exhibition so the night before we made these huge paper mache planets for the audience to carry and get annoyed with

This is me explaining passionately how awesome

Who put the moon down? pick it up bitch

This is the sun. See the protruding sunbeams? yes.

Awkward silence

After we explained everything we broke the planets and they turned out to be a pinata. Yes! Success! Delicious.

Bystanders were alarmed and delighted at this disaster of obvious cosmic proportions and display of brute POWER

ok thats it

Double Double Land Land

2010-02-26T17:19:00.000-08:00

In the Winter of 2009 a bunch of Artists realized a project by Jon McCurley and some other people who wrote a play of the same name.

Artist(s):
Xenia Benivolski
Jon McCurley
Zoe Barcza
Miles Collyer
Robin Fry
Matt King
Amy Lam
Cameron Lee
Bonny Poon
Sarah Richardson

Double Double Land Land is both a play written and directed by emerging artist Jon McCurley and an experiment in collaborative exhibition. Through a one-night live performance and responding exhibition, Double Double Land Land takes on a culture of fear and doubt, proposing a hopeful Revolution of Use towards productive mediocrity. With performance-demonstration, video projection, installation, theatre and set design, McCurley leads a team of collaborators to redefine the concept of quality, to create something out of nothing, and to liberate the counter productive as, in fact, productive. In Double Double Land, the Minister of Tourism builds the land’s best tourist attraction — a big spring that launches you right out of town; the mayor reinvents 'hard work' as hiding in a black cube and not thinking (because it's the hardest thing to do); a poor inventor builds an Opposite Progress Machine that doesn't do anything and is such a success he gets rich.

24 hour dresser

cross-eye-D

Relaxation stairs

Pyramid Utensils

Amy eating with pyramid fork

Jon watching with Cross-eye-D glasses

Jon wearing computer tent shirt

A sitcom starring decapitated people

Hedge Stairs

Extra Decorative cord tangle to put on top of your cords

Leonardo De Vinci's Memento

More meditation stairs

Helen Keller suit is full of mashed potatoes

Liberated floor

One tylenol dissolved in fudge so if you wanna fix the headache you have to eat the whole thing

You can be naked inside this nude shirt

A vase that covers the whole table

Anti-bacterial mural

Pyramid stuff

Unsafe uncle poncho

This subwoofer shits its pants

Emergency coffee table in case you need one

Sarah Richardson took all of these photos and I stole them from her flickr

!!OMG SWAP!!

2010-02-21T07:35:00.000-08:00

I organized this thing and today its happening!!

!! OMG SWAP !!

!!!!!!!!!!!!BIGGEST CLOTHING SWAP EVER !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bring your Gently Used clothing to Mercer Union for the biggest swap ever. EVER!

Get ahead of the springtimes, bring everything, take as much as you want!

Lets all wear each others clothes! Right?

A seamstress from The Make Den will be available on site to make alterations at reduced rates!

http://themakeden.blogspot.com/

No Stained, Ripped, or Smelly things,

$5 Suggested donation and leave with ALL YOU CAN CARRY!

**All clothing donations will be passed on to Sistering; A woman's place. www.sistering.org**

Sistering is a women’s agency serving homeless, marginalized and low-income women in Toronto.

Men's clothing will be donated to the Diabetes Association.
Drinks and Snacks and Mirrors will be available!

MERCER UNION, 1286 Bloor st. West, 12-6 pm,Today! sunday feb21st.

BE THERREEEE

GUESS WHAT 2010

2010-01-18T06:19:00.000-08:00

In 2010 I curated a pwyc artist talk Series that happened every Monday at the Whitehouse for a whole summer, called GUESS WHAT.

June 14 - Georgia Webber - Skillbuilding for Comics

June 21 - Jamie Shannon- Toronto

July 5 - Stan Kryzanowsky - Grafting

July 26 - Katie Kehoe - Fishing

August 9 - Amelia Ehrhardt - Dance 101

August 23 - Misty Dawn Mcmillan - Bette' Recognize You Gotta Organize Your Biz-Shiz

Sep 6 - Kate Miller - Expressive Arts Therapy: Fine Art's Embarrassing New Age Aunt

Sep 13 - Dan Browne - LOOP Collective

Sep 20 - Jesse James Ladroutte - Natural History

Sep 27 - Ulysses Castellanos - Buckminster Fuller's theory of Ephemeralization

2010-01-12T14:24:00.001-08:00

I feel awkward

2010-01-12T13:59:00.000-08:00

About Stuff

She Does The City
Sketch Magazine
Flight & Hotel
NOW Magazine
The Globe and Mail
Darling Magazine
Worn Magazine
EYE Weekly
ArtstarsTV*
EYE Weekly
BlogTO
The Varsity
NOW Magazine
Urban Planner
John Bentley Mays

News!

2010-01-05T08:03:00.000-08:00

I forgot to mention even but on new years day the lovely Sara Titanic had posted this interview she did with Vanessa and I about the Whitehouse on the NOW magazine art blog. I wish that it could run in print but NOW only dedicates a third of a page to its art section. Blahrg!

I'm working on a few panel/ presentations and a few grant applications that would be successful, I feel. Things are going along pretty well, actually, really well. This year is going to be the best!

ECNALUBMA

2009-12-10T08:17:00.000-08:00

I am curating the window space at Gallery 1313 for a few months this summer for a series about street traffic.

APRIL 2011

YUULA BENIVOLSKI
Fell Asleep in Front of the TV Again

The show had a little mention in Saturday's Globe and Mail.

Born in Moscow USSR, grew up in Northern Israel and currently live and work between Toronto and Montreal.
I work with photographs, projection, video and installation.
I'm interested in migration, tradition and ritual, comfort, acclimatization and survival, or stories and details from my childhood that shaped my views on important stuff like sex and death or any other transformative events.

MAY 2011

VANESSA RIEGER
Salivating Security and The Revolution Will Be Web Streamed Live

Interested in the power dynamics of surveillance, Rieger explores the Egyptian revolution through the eyes of surveillance cameras. In Gil Scot-Heron's poem "The revolution will not be Televised" he ends with the line "The revolution will be live". Where television was a passive experience for the audience, the internet and web cameras can empower its viewers, giving them up to the second live coverage and sometimes the control to manipulate the camera. The Egyptian revolution is considered by some to be the first web-based revolution, since facebook and twitter played important roles in organizing the people. Rieger's two pieces placed together creates a dialogue between the camera (the act of watching/witnessing) and the video footage (the action/revolutionary event).

Vanessa Rieger was born and raised in Toronto. She earned a degree in Drawing and Painting from OCAD and currently runs her own framing business, VR Frames. Rieger also helps run and coordinate The White House Studio Project, an artist-run studio co-op based in Kensington Market.

JUNE 2011

ANNA MAY HENRY

BORED BEYOND BELIEF

When we’re promised excitement and intrigue at every mall, nightclub, basement apartment and laptop, boredom is a pitiful shame. It is said that only boring people get bored. To state one’s ennui, then, is potential condemnation to a dull persona. The Boredom Party Banner acts like a celebration, but is perhaps a cry for help from behind the entrapment of windowpane glass.

“We don’t want a world where the guarantee of not dying of starvation brings the risk of dying of boredom.”

-Graffiti from May 1968

Anna May Henry works in a variety of mediums in an endless exploration of the co-existence of everyday life with the fantastic. She is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design. She lives and works in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

JULY 2011
BRETTE GABEL

Brette Gabel's amazing blog.

JULY 6th to 31st, 2011

Brette Gabel is a not so recent graduate of the University of Regina. While avoiding schoolwork Brette began embroidering, quilting and watching horror movies. Following school, Brette moved to Toronto where she participated in the Toronto School of Art’s Independent Studio Program. After which she became a contributing member to the White House Studio. Currently Brette is researching farming accidents, taxidermy and organizing alternative community interventions. Brette’s work strives to connect love, fear, heartache and the grotesque with craft and social interventions.

Brette Gabel’s obsession with classic horror movies is explored through a series of quilted wall hangings. By softening the most frightening scenes Gabel invites the viewer to stare the monster head on. Handmade textiles connote warmth, safety, and the domestic sphere – when combined with uncomfortable subject matter, a productive tension is created: the work both comforts and provokes with empathetic humour.

Gallery Hours are Wed- Sun 1-6pm

1313 Queen St. West 416-536-6778 www.g1313.org

Media call Phil Anderson 416-525-7688

Bio

2009-12-10T08:11:00.000-08:00

Xenia Benivolski (b. 1983, Moscow, Russia) is an artist and curator based in Toronto, Canada. She had studied Studio arts at the Ofek Arts Institute in Kibbutz Evron, Israel (1998-2000), as well as the Ontario College of Art and Design studio program in Florence, Italy (2005-2006). She is the founder and director of the Whitehouse Studio Co-Operative (2008), and the Cabbage Patch Skids Conceptual Gardening Collective (2009, Toronto), as well as a member of the Board of Directors of Mercer Union Artist Run Centre (2010).
As an independent curator, she had recently co-curated the show Small Gestures (with Greg Denton, 2010) at Double Double Land and a 3 month Talk Series entitled Guess What! (Summer 2010, various locations). She also facilitates workshops and panels such as the discussion panel Bring It: Art Critics Speak (2009)and Extreme Painting (2010)coordinated with Nadja Sayej of ArtStarsTV*. Upcoming projects include This is Paradise, (2011)in conjunction with the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, and Ecnalubma, at gallery 1313 (2011).

Xenia organizes seasonal massive clothing swaps at Mercer Union entitled OMG SWAP. In 2009 she had organized a fashion show of women wearing their mother's clothes for Fashion week 2009.

Xenia is interested in uncommon sensations, comfort, tradition, noise and repetition. In her own art work, she tries to replicate our less reliable senses such as puzzlement, nostalgia, delusion, paranoia and de-ja-vu.

Contact at xeniaster@gmail.com

newss

2009-12-09T06:25:00.001-08:00

Last week I had a brief interview with the globe and mail about that fashion show I did, MOM JEANS! I had sort of struggle on getting into this random category, family and relationships, but not as much struggle as I did initially when I thought the quip would be used for the 'life and style' section. Its kind of weird but I guess there are different degrees if irrelevancy, like we're all sort of in denial about wanting a lot of attention and wanting to be unknown, but whatever, old news?

The other day we had portraits taken by Norman Wong, and I love them!

here's Christy, Myself and Vanessa at the old white house

There were more group shots but they didn't turn out as well for some reason. Maybe cause we're all so awkward.

Call for Submissions!

2009-11-27T05:53:00.001-08:00

SOLID GOLD
Annual Member's Show & Sale!

December 17, 2009 - December 17, 2009
Opening Reception: Thursday 17 December 2009, 8PM

Mercer Union again delivers its big gift to small collectors in this year's SOLID GOLD rendition of the annual member's show & sale. Nothing but SOLID GOLD quality works, all priced at $149.99. Watch the gold rush when the sale begins at 8PM.

Artists: bring us your art and we'll split the dividends from the sale of the work. Feeling generous and love what we do? Give us 100% of the proceeds from the sale and we'll a) love you for ever and b) give you a tax donation for the amount. Partial donations are also accepted. To participate, fill out the PDF form, indicating your current membership status or sign up for a new one! Register by 1 December 2009.

GOLD 4 CASH!
Line up to get your own little nugget for just $149.99. Sale begins 8PM. Cash, visa and cheque accepted for payments. We will wrap the work for you and you can take it away same day!

email sarah@mercerunion.org for more details.

BRING IT

2009-11-26T08:54:00.001-08:00

THE WHITE HOUSE PRESENTS:

BRING IT: The Toronto Alliance of Art Critics says MAKE FACE

The newly formed Toronto Alliance of Art Critics steps forward to say BRING IT.

7 of Toronto’s bitchiest art critics fess up about what sucks about galleries, artists, art dealers, art fairs, art shows and press releases. Want to know how to crack the press code? Now is your time to raise your hand and CUSS THEM OUT at this first annual panel discussion.

Be it barking about how to pimp your CV or the new King Tut show at the AGO, hear them rant, rave and do your best to get a question in there.

FEATURING THE SUPERVILLIANS (dun dun dun):

David Balzer's writing on visual art, film, and theatre has appeared in Toronto Life, Canadian Notes and Queries, Cinema Scope, Maisonneuve, and EYE WEEKLY, where he is arts editor and "Galleries" columnist. He recently finished a short-fiction collection entitled Artists in Peril.

Otino Corsano is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art, University of Toronto and Otis College of Art in Los Angeles. His art writings and artist interviews are published in artUS magazine and has taught at the University of Toronto and the Ontario College of Art.

Rosemary Heather is the former editor of Mix Magazine (2002-2003) and C Magazine (2004-2009).

Charlene K. Lau is a Toronto-based art writer whose reviews have been published in Canadian Art, C Magazine, Akimblog and Fashion Theory (forthcoming). She is curatorial assistant at the Textile Museum of Canada.

Leah Sandals is a freelance art writer and editor based in Toronto. She contributes regularly to the National Post and NOW, and is also associate editor for Canadian Art's website. Her geekier free-associations are forever on view at http://neditpasmoncoeur.blogspot.com.

Nadja Sayej is a Gonzo journalist in the first order who has written for the Globe and Mail, the New York Times and is the host of ArtStars* TV: http://artstarstv.com

Murray Whyte covers visual arts for the Star. He's also a feature writer for the Saturday and Sunday Star. He has written about art for the New York Times, Canadian Art magazine, the National Post and many others.

Moderated by Nadka Sayej!

!!!This is going to be confrontational!!!

So bring your balls.

December 2nd
Double Double Land
209 Augusta
8 pm

PWYC
Suggested Donation $5

A Humming Tune ☁☁ (( drawing show ))

2009-11-21T08:56:00.000-08:00

a drawing show to celebrate the drawings of Sumi Ink Club (members of Lucky Dragons) and to act as a pre-show wiggle to this event http://www.facebook.com/#/event.php?eid=170576754219&index=1

with

VACATIONING PLANTS (some plants take a break at DDL)

TWO STORY CHAIR (higher than you)

DRAWING SHOW with work by

SUMI INK CLUB
http://www.hawksandsparrows.org/
http://www.glaciersofnice.com/blog/

JULIA KENNEDY
http://www.thecoast.ca/halifax/love-and-text/Content?oid=1064997

AMY BOWLES
http://cuckoocollection.com/bowles.html

MARK CONNERY
http://www.facebook.com/#/event.php?eid=170576754219&index=1

LISA CZECH
http://lisaczech.blogspot.com/

PHILLIPE BLANCHARD
(will do a projection accompanied drawing)

LAURA McCOY
http://lauramccoy.blogspot.com/

STEFAN WHITE
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefakn/

as well as

NO FACE NO PROBLEM ("performative"-reading event that took a hiatus. mcCoy and mcCurley curated event that used to happen at locations like train-tracks and chinatown stairway. an event for the everyperson)

with performances by:

Xenia Benivolski

Alicia Nauta

Mark Connery

William Davidson

Matt King

Joele Walinga

David Hanes

Jon McCurley

Laura McCoy

Scarlet Warning 666

2009-11-13T07:41:00.000-08:00

This is a piece I mounted for Roadside Attractions .

Scarlet Warning 666 presents itself as a large oval arrangement of flowers in tones of green, yellow and red. After a moment’s inspection, the apparently random grouping reveals the number 666 formed with flowers in various shades of red.

Wanting it to look like these guys----

It Follows Me

2009-11-11T12:08:00.001-08:00

Saturday November 14th
Double Double Land - 209 Augusta.

$3 @ the door starts at 8PM - videos start at 9 with an intermission at 10.

"It Follows Me" will be a continuation of the September26th event (Peripheral Redundance) that happened at DWG in Toronto. This new event will be at an entirely new space and with a somewhat different vibe.
This night will consist of primarily video works from the previous show, as well as, some new works and possibly some new performances; all of which reflect upon the original theme of: The Other In The Everyday.

Artists:

Derek Muehlgassner
Laura McCoy
Anna May Henry
Jubal Brown
Neelam Kler
Laura Paolini
SR Palm
Jamie Ross
Vanessa Rieger + Kevin Hainey
Minao Omi+ Anaeq

Performances by:

Jon McCurley
Yuula Benivolski

Curated by David F.M. Hanes and Xenia Benivolski

Please come support these artists - All profits are going towards a catalog compilation of the work.

Darling Magazine, issue 2

2009-11-11T11:22:00.000-08:00

Sylvana D'Angelo wrote this little thing here in her Magazine about the White house, so nice!
She is releasing a Video compilation of Toronto Video Artists (Selected by meeeee) in her next issue, and profiling a White House Artist, exiting!

Experience Synchronisity

2009-10-22T10:31:00.000-07:00

This was made with the Help of Dan Borins and Jennifer Marman for YYZ.

Experience Synchronicity is a project that tests whether everything mysteriously syncs up if you want it to.

These headphones play the Album Dark Side ofThe Moon by Pink Floyd on a loop.

Another one for good measure

Mom Jeans!

2009-10-17T14:21:00.001-07:00

I organized a fashion show where a group of my friends wore their mother's clothes.
This event happened at cinecycle, it plays out girls relationships to their mothers and the line between then and now.

Mom Jeans! from kevin marchand on Vimeo.

A special thanks to all of the models:

Gwendolyn Bieniara
Brette Gabel
Krysta-Lee Karenina
Amelia Ehrhardt
Yuula Benivolski
Alicia Nauta
Heather McTavish
Eva Kolcze
Lauren Bride
Helena Kvarnstrom
Zoë Alexis-Abrams
Sarah Bodri

Runway Beats by the Onakabazian and Carl Didur!

Part of MASSIVE SALE: YYZ MALL ; a series of events by Daniel Borins and Jennifer Marman concluding their residency at the YYZ artist centre.

Globe and Mail Article

Tomorrow Night !

2009-10-14T06:21:00.000-07:00

Hi Please come to this thing I'm doing tomorrow!!

MOM JEANS!

Are all mom Jeans the same? Are all moms the same? Did everyone in the 70s dress the same? Yes the answer is YES. Just kidding of course not, duh!
By wearing vintage and current borrowed from their mothers, in "Mom Jeans" young men and women are going to debunk your "mom clothes" myths. This fashion show will feature the following artists/models:

Gwendolyn Bieniara
Cameron Lee
Brette Gabel
Raymi Lauren White
Krysta-Lee Karenina
Vanessa Rieger
Amelia Ehrhardt
Yuula Benivolski
Anna May Henry
Alicia Nauta
Heather McTavish
Elizabeth Ewanchuck
Eva Kolcze
Lauren Bride
David F.M. Hanes
Helena Kvarnstrom
Zoë Alexis-Abrams
Sarah Bodri
Eric Shinn

Brainstormed and organized by guest artist Xenia Benivolski for MASSIVE SALE: YYZ MALL ; a series of events by Daniel Borins and Jennifer Marman concluding their residency at the YYZ artist centre.

This is not about making fun of moms! This is about embracing what you will become or will not become! Drawing a clear line between then and now rather than avoiding it! See for yourself.

8 PM!
THURSDAY OCTOBER 15
CINECYCLE 129 SPADINA
TORONTO

www.xeniabenivolski.com
www.marmco.com
www.yyzartistsoutlet.org

If not today...

2009-10-09T16:00:00.000-07:00

To accompany the all day performance art event "Peripheral redundance: The Other in The Everyday", one fictional event was scheduled for each hour of the event, rendering the unsuspecting guest as a performer, both viewer and subject.

I made the following posters and posted them around the city:

Other postings were made online.

This is Under Construction

2009-09-23T09:06:00.000-07:00

David and I organized this crazy performance show and its going to be amazing! and all day!

Poster by Alicia Nauta!

“The other in the everyday” as a concept posses a variety meanings. Each artist has taken a personal approach to this concept; Vanessa Rieger and Kevin Hainey approach the theme of theft and collection by providing a glimpse into a process that builds up in front of the viewer but begins at a Laundromat down the road, Rebecca Fin Simonetti poetically touches on the subject of insanity and addiction by building a “pill tent” that contains an “other self” ready to be let out at any moment, while Zoe Alexis-Abrams’ performance builds up a precarious structure that is erected only to be destroyed moments after its completion.

The notion of the 'other' can be seen as a difference and a presence, retaining a discourse of collective action, voyeurism, consciousness, cause and effect and even things like fate, luck, and fortune; interference or the requesting of interference with another entity or being. Peripheral Redundance: The Other In The Everyday will feature over 22 local artists at the DeLeon White Gallery, bringing visibility to an ever-changing subject in an ever-growing world.

The show is open to Toronto and vicinity residents on September 26th, 2009 beginning at 12pm (noon) and ending at 11PM.
The event will unfold idiosyncratically in the course of these 11 hours: The first 7 hours will contain more durational and object based works, while the following 4 hours will present more action and body based works.

Zoe Alexis-Abrams,
Amelia Ehrhardt,
Laura Paolini,
Jamie Ross,
Derek Muehlgassner,
Anna-May Henry,
Johnny Wheeldon,
Melissa Fisher,
Randall Gagne,
Vanessa Rieger and Kevin Hainey,
Xenia Benivolski,
Adam Cowan,
DaHye Kim and Lanie Chalmers,
Faye Mullen,
Rebecca Fin Simonetti,
Neelam Kler,
Jubal Brown,
Audrey Pagulayan and Robin Cook and Jennifer Weddell
SR Palm,
Laura McCoy,
Minae Om

Curated by David F.M. Hanes and Xenia Benivolski

Places

2009-09-23T09:04:00.000-07:00

The White House
Good Blood Bad Blood
Punchclock
Jamie's Area
Mercer Union
Roadside Attractions
Darling magazine
YYZ Artists Outlet
Gallery TPW
The Powerplant
Trampoline Hall
Poor Pilgrim
Gallery 1313

2009-09-23T08:47:00.000-07:00

People

Yuula Benivolski
Zeesy Powers
Christy Kunitzky
Jubal Brown
Daniel Borins and Jennifer Marman
Jon McCurley and Amy Lam
Brenda Goldstein
Jeff Garcia
Alicia Nauta
Brette Gabel
Joële Walinga
Onakabazien
Julia Dickens
Martha Mysko
Seth Scriver

Peripheral Redundance: The Other in The Every Day

2009-09-21T12:15:00.000-07:00

2006 Tiger Swans

2009-09-21T09:45:00.000-07:00

I made these in Italy. I'm going to make more. Still in Progress.

Acrylic on Canvas, BIG.

News!

2009-09-08T12:14:00.001-07:00

This is under construction.

The White House

2009-09-08T09:14:00.000-07:00

The White House Website

theotherwhitehouse@gmail.ca

In 2008, Christy Kunitzky, jon McCurley and I have founded a studio initiative in West Toronto called the White House.

The White House is a studio space initiative and a reaction to
the studio space issues in downtown Toronto. Since
commercial spaces are now popular for residential living,
studio prices have risen and most recent graduates and
practicing artists cannot afford a place in which to develop their
work.

By renting a large residential house and converting bedrooms
and common spaces into individual/shared studios, the White
House provides an affordable working environment as well as a
community centre for emerging artists within the city. By doing
this we claim back the functionality of residential space left
empty by condo dwellers.

"Turn around!" Performance by Laura McCoy

Our programming and event planning largely depends on the composition of current participants and artists in the project. We generally let things happen organically while trying to direct people in a direction that is new and interesting and to find different alternatives for common practice.

Installation by Sebastian Butt

Installation View by Donna Irvine

Installation by Peter Hamilton

The Project has relocated into an old Kung Fu studio in Kensington Market late in 2009, were is continues to serve as a studio and exhibition place. We host talks, lectures, workshops, screenings and launches. We also xurate quarterly exhibitions of the work produced by our studio members

For studio availability, please email theotherwhitehouse@gmail.com

The studio is located at 277.5 Augusta Avenue

2009 OMER

2009-09-08T08:20:00.001-07:00

My sister Yuula Benivolski and I collaborated on a video.

5 minutes

>

Full version is available upon request.

JJJ

2009-09-08T08:12:00.000-07:00

Installation View

Including Video Collaboration with Yuula Benivolski.

Rainbow Cake

2009-09-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

My friends and I made a rainbow cake and a Jackson Pollack cake.

Pollock Cake couch.

Thanks to Melissa, Jess, Jonny, and Gwen.

Sad Houses

2009-09-08T07:54:00.000-07:00

I painted some sad houses in a sad looking town. Ink on Paper.

Polaroids

2009-09-08T07:38:00.000-07:00

These 2 by Christy Kunitzky

Graveyards

2009-09-08T07:30:00.000-07:00

This is an ongoing thing where I paint graveyards. Small acrylic on canvas.

Ghosts of Hippy Past

2009-09-03T12:10:00.000-07:00

This is a site- specific installation for Poor Pilgrim on Toronto Island. The Installation was mounted near the haunted. lighthouse at Gibraltar point. 2009.

Recycled sheets and tie-dye, paper mache.

Special thanks to Mark Roberts, and Yuula Benivolski, who also took these 2 pictures.

In Progress:

(in Yuula's Studio)

Complete CV

2009-09-03T12:02:00.001-07:00

XENIA BENIVOLSKI
609 Bathurst Street Toronto, ON, Canada 416 889 3852 Xeniaster@gmail.com

Curriculum Vitae

Education

2002-2007 Bachelor of Fine Art: Interdisciplinary, Ontario College of Art and Design, Toronto, ON, Canada.
2005-2006 Participated in an International Residence Program in Florence, Italy
1997-2000 Ofek Institution for the Arts, Kibbutz Evron, Israel

Professional Experience

2011 Curator: "Canadian Mystic", Museo de la Ciudad, Santiago de Querétaro, Querétaro, Mexico
Guest Curator: “This is Paradise – Paradise Now”, Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, Toronto, ON
Production Assistant, “Bugs”, Life of a Craphead, Xpace, toronto
Window Box Curator, Gallery 1313, Toronto, ON, Canada
2010 Artist Assistant to Bill Burns, Toronto, ON, Canada
2009 - 2012 Board of Directors, Mercer Union Artist Run Centre, Toronto, ON, Canada
2009 - Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery; Curatorial/Publications Intern.
Founder of the Cabbage Patch Skids collective, Toronto, ON, Canada
Production Assistant ; No Media Kings, Toronto, ON, Canada
2008- Present Founding Member and Manager of the White House Studio Project, Toronto, ON, Canada
2007-2008 Volunteer, Mercer Union Artist -Run Centre, Toronto, ON, Canada
2006-2008 Volunteer, 7A11D Performance Festival, Toronto, ON, Canada
2001-2003 Director's Assistant, Art System Cultural Centre, Toronto, ON, Canada

Selected Public Exhibitions/Screenings/Talks

Upcoming
Curtain Show, Double Double Land, Toronto, ON
Intrusive Thoughts, Gully Stinton Holdings, Berlin, Germany
2011 Palimpsest Magazine Issue/02 Medicine Launch
Don Blanche Summer Residency exhibition, Don Blanche, Shelburne, ON
Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) Montréal QC
Cult of the Contemporary, Xpace, Toronto, ON
Snowday, Labspace Studio, Toronto, ON
2010 Don Blanche summer residency exhibition, Don Blanche, Shelburne, ON
Summer Ashes, Toronto , ON Canada
Bitch Slap, Thrush Holmes Empire, Toronto, ON
The Homey Show, Double Double Land, Toronto, ON, Canada
I like what I know, TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada
What's Next? (panel), Xpace, Toronto, ON, Canada
MirrOrriM , The White House, Toronto, ON, Canada
The House that Masons Built, Prince Charles Dr. Toronto, ON, Canada.
2009 No Face No Problem, Double Double Land, Toronto, ON, Canada
Scarlet Fever 666, Roadside Attractions, Toronto, ON, Canada
Ghost Hole, The White House, Toronto, ON, Canada
YYZ Mall, YYZ Artist Centre, Toronto, ON, Canada
Trampoline Hall(Lecture), Sneaky Dees, Toronto, ON, Canada
Sunday Scene,(Artist talk) The Power Plant , Toronto, ON, Canada
Midnight screening, Gallery 47, Toronto, ON, Canada
Nuit Blanch Devreaux, Various Locations, Toronto, On, Canada
The Blind Leading the Blind, TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada
Poor Pilgrim, Toronto Island, Toronto, ON, Canada
Peripheral Redundance: The Other In The Everyday, DeLeon White Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
Extermination XII, The Don Valley, Toronto, ON, Canada
Lunar landings, Gallery 1313, Toronto, ON
HIGH HOPES , The White House, Toronto, ON, Canada
Extermination XI, The Kodak factory, Toronto, ON, Canada
Double Double Land Land, TPW gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
2008 The Circular Exhibition, Hun Gallery/Ho Gallery, New York, NY / Seoul, South Korea
Welcome to the White House, The White House, Toronto, ON, Canada
Summer Showcase, Whippersnapper Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
Resident Artist Exhibition, Takt KunstProjektraum Residence, Berlin, Germany
2007 Summer Splash, Christopher Cutts Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
7 Via Nazionale, Xpace Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
Love Songs, Performance, Abandoned Nunnery, Toronto, ON, Canada
2006 The Moss Project, Installation, Great Hall, Ontario College of Art and Design, Toronto, ON, Canada
Uni-Brow-Corn, Freedom Clothing, Toronto, ON, Canada
Blackout, OCAD Studios, Florence, Italy
2005 SuperFack, Mayday, Florence, Italy
23, OCAD Studios, Florence, Italy
The Lost Boys, Xpace Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
2005 Vendart Exchange Unit · Parsons School of Design · New York City NY
2003 The Worst Ever, Gallery Death, Toronto , ON, Canada.
Mr Who's gonna back me up and the hey here's backup, (Performance), The Culture Vacuum, Toronto, ON, Canada
2002 The Destroyers, Art System gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
Death Fuck, Art System gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
2001 The Lady Show, Art System Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
Sell or Die, Art System gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
2000 Annual Exhibition, Ofek Institution for the Arts, Kibbutz Evron, Israel

Curated/Developed

2011Canadian Mystic, Museo de la Ciudad, Santiago de Querétaro, Querétaro, Mexico
Paradise Now, Museum of contemporary Canadian Art and other locations, Toronto, ON
The Legend is Black, Butcher gallery, Toronto, ON
10 degrees Mouth, Gallerywest, Toronto, ON
Cold Cold water: A screening of Complete works by Jamie Ross, The Whitehouse, Toronto, ON
Guess What? a 10 part artist talk series co-curated with Vanessa Rieger (forthcoming)
Toronto Art Critics Discuss Nuit Blanche, featuring Leah Sandals, Murray Whyte, Rosemary Heather, Charlene Lau, Otino Corsano, David Balzer, and John Bentley Mays. Monitored by Sky Gooden. The Whitehouse, Toronto, ON, Canada
ecnalubmA, 3 part exhibition Series, gallery 1313, Toronto, ON, Canada
2010 Slight Gestures, Double Double Land, Toronto, ON
Guess What : a 16 part workshop and lecture series featuring Jamie Shannon, Katie Kehoe, Amelia Earhardt, Ulysses Castellanos, Stan Kryzanowski and more. Various Locations, Toronto, ON
Extreme Painting; Ben Klein in conversation with John Bentley Mays, Shary Boyle and Sarah Milroy. TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada
MirrOrriM , The White House (curated with the whitehouse board), Toronto, ON, Canada
Internet Workshop for your Personal Edification Vol II featuring Zeesy Powers, TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada
2009 BRING IT: discussion panel by the Toronto Alliance of Art Critics, Featuring Leah Sandals, Murray Whyte, Rosemary Heather, Charlene Lau, Otino Corsano, David Balzer, Hosted by Nadja Sayej, Double Double Land, Toronto, ON, Canada
It Follows Me Jamie's Area, Toronto, ON, Canada
Mom Jeans, Cinecycle, Toronto, ON, Canada
Grant Writing Workshop featuring Amy Lam, Jamie's Area, Toronto, ON, Canada
Internet Workshop for your Personal Edification featuring Zeesy Powers, TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada
Peripheral Redundance: The Other In The Everyday Co-Curated with David F.M. Hanes, DeLeon White Gallery, Toronto, ON, Canada
The Blind Leading the Blind, Members and friends of TWH, Toronto, ON, Canada

Fellowships and Awards

2011 Artist in Residence, Don Blanche, Shelburne, ON, Canada
2010 Artist in Residence, Don Blanche, Shelburne, ON, Canada
2008 The Zeesy Powers Foundation Grant, Toronto, ON, Canada
2007 Artist In Residence - Takt KunstProjektraum Gallery, Berlin, Germany
2005 Lisa Brown Memorial Scholarship, Toronto, ON, Canada
John Alfsen Award, Toronto, ON, Canada
Curry’s Art Store Prize, Toronto, ON, Canada

Publications and Reviews:

Palimpsest Magazine, 2011
‘’Cycle: Andrew Findlay Stewart” , Commissioned by Xpace/Whippersnapper, 2011
One Hour Empire Spring 2011 (forthcoming)
Hunter and Cook Magazine (Don Blanche Review), Fall 2010
Western Front Magazine, Fall 2010
Worn Magazine Summer 2010
Darling Magazine, Issue 2 2010
Sketch Magazine, Summer 2010
She does the city, 2010
Darling Magazine Issue 1 2009
This Magazine, 2009
NOW Weekly, 2009
BlogTO, 2009

There is a light that never goes out

2009-09-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

This is a site specific installation for Extermination XI which was held at the abandoned Kodak Building. 2009.

Two Chandeliers are painted black and combined into one and their lights are replaced by laser pointers. Light may be made visible by smoke, darkness, or a combination of both.

In light

In the dark

In Action

Closet Monsters

2009-09-03T11:10:00.000-07:00

These potatoes took over my cupboard and my life. Digital photos, 2008.