Author: artoronto

Daisuke Takeya, Kesennuma, 2011. Colour photogragh. © Daisuke Takeya

February 4 – April 1, 2012
Opening: Saturday, February 4, 2:00–5:00 p.m.
MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY CANADIAN ART
Media/Retail Space
952 Queen Street West
Toronto, ON, M6J 1G8
T: 416.395.0067
E: info@mocca.ca
www.mocca.ca/
Hours: Tues–Sun 11:00–6:00 p.m.

God Loves Japan is a time-sensitive installation memorializing the earthquake/tsunami disaster that took place in Japan on March 11th, 2011. This installation intends to raise awareness of Japan’s long-term recovery needs and will encourage viewers to re-evaluate the meaning of love and empathy in our time.

Sarah Anne Johnson, Explosions, 2011.

February 4 – April 1, 2012
Opening: Saturday, February 4, 2:00–5:00 p.m.
MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY CANADIAN ART
Project Room
952 Queen Street West
Toronto, ON, M6J 1G8
T: 416.395.0067
E: info@mocca.ca
www.mocca.ca/
Hours: Tues–Sun 11:00–6:00 p.m.

The expression “losing yourself in the wilderness” takes on new meaning in works by Peter Doig, Sarah Anne Johnson and Tim Gardner. Here ambiguous, hallucinatory vistas collide with sublime pastoral scenes, and the idea of the ruggedness of the hinterland clashes with its ultimate fragility. In each case, the realism of the works is interrupted by a sense of sheer uncanny. These multifarious landscapes mix autobiography with illusion and the banal with the extraordinary, offering striking images that suggest a shift in our perceived relationship with the natural world.

Organized by the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art and the National Gallery of Canada.

January 12 – February 19, 2012
Opening: Thursday, January 12, 6–8 p.m.

 Fran Hill and New York curator Edward Rubin

Stepping into the gallery a day before the opening, I saw Ed Rubin talking on the phone with his usual enthusiasm, inviting people to the show. Then Rubin, an international art writer, curator, traveller and renaissance art man, gave me a tour of the exhibition.

The eight New York artists represent a great diversity both in their age, artistic approach and style. Rubin was talking about  Ejay Weiss’s Seascape with Venus comb, and how strikingly beautiful it is.

Ejay Weiss, Seascape with Venus comb, murex, 2010

Paintings of Ejay Weiss (left) and Ernest Concepcion (right). Photo: Ed Rubin

Ernest Concepcion was the only artist who came to Toronto for the opening. His black, white and gray Power Dream is a twisted interpretation of the words, showing all the natural powers unleashed around the peacefully sleeping figure.

Artist Ernest Concepcion and curator Edward Rubin

Lori Nelson‘s teenage girl seems almost pretty surrounded by red flowers—until we have a closer look and see that she is actually throwing up.

Lori Nelson, Pretty, pretty on the inside, 2010

Heidi Johnson‘s paintings are radiating happiness with their strong colors juxtaposed by Jason Stopa more monocrome cityscapes.

Scott Walden’s photographs (left) and Heidi Johnson’s paintings (right). Photo: Ed Rubin

Then we talked about New York and Toronto, and that was the first time someone called this city laid back to me. The show could easily fill a much larger gallery, and Rubin is looking into that possibility.

Steve Rockwell, publisher of dArt International. Photo: Fran Hill

Canadian activist, artist Franke James, Chris Mitchell, Penny Rose, Edward Rubin and Fran Hill

Emese Krunak-Hajagos

February 1 – 28, 2012
Opening:  Thursday, February 2, 6–9 p.m.
THE RED HEAD GALLERY
401 Richmond St. W., Suite 115
Toronto, ON M5V 3A8
T:  416.504.5654
Email: art@redheadgallery.org
www.redheadgallery.org
Hours: Wed–Sat 12–5 p.m.

The Red Head Gallery will be hosting an opening for ‘ANNA,’ a video and photo installation by Andrea Cooper, touted by The Globe and Mail as “one of the shows to see” in 2012 (“Art that Avoids the Apocalypse“).

“From the moment of birth, people are sought then unfurled.  The second a child is pushed from the womb they become objects of prey.” A 12 – minute experimental video performed by the artist in an abandoned barn, ANNA explores predator-prey relations, and defines the moment when prey becomes predator.

Inspired by women who have gone missing or are lost, ANNA is a haunting performance about hope and addiction. The character creates an allegorical, seductive poem about death and disappearance.

Andrea Cooper is an international media artist with a Masters in Visual Studies from the University of Toronto and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Concordia.  www.andreacooper.com

January 24 – February 12, 2012
Opening: Thursday, January 26, 7 – 9 p.m.
HANG MAN GALLERY
756 Queen Street East (at Broadview Avenue)
Toronto, ON, M4M 1H4
T: 416.465.0302
E: hangmangallery@gmail.com
www.ArtistsNetwork.ca.
Hours: Tues to Sun 12–5 p.m.

This group art exhibition playfully acknowledges Queen Elizabeth’s II Diamond Jubilee in 2012 by aligning artists with monarchists and/or anarchists.

The work reacts to the monarchy’s hold on our society. Its prevalence in our currency, government and military institutions is scrutinized in the wake of the G20 and Occupy movements in Canada.

The artists explore Canada’s identity, from Will And Kate’s royal wedding and visit, to the G20 and Occupy Movement, to Prince Charles and Camilla’s arrival for 2012. Can Coronation Street really represent us anymore, or is Canada ready for the Sex Pistols?

The Hangman Art Gallery is located in the middle of a exciting neighbourhood of creative and visual arts professionals. It is the home of the Artists’ Network. It supports a thriving arts community by providing exhibition spaces to connect art lovers and collectors with member and non-member artists alike. It is a venue where artists from all stages of their career can meet and showcase their personal perceptions of the realities of contemporary life. artistsnetwork.ca/hangman

Dance at the UN, 1955. Copyright:© George S. Zimbel / Courtesy of Stephen Bulger Gallery

January 21 – February 18, 2012
Opening: Friday, January 21, 5–9 p.m.
STEPHEN BULGER GALLERY
1026 Queen Street West
Toronto, Ontario M6J 1H6
T: 416.504.0575
E: info@bulgergallery.com
www.bulgergallery.com 
Hours: Tues – Sat  11–6 p.m.

Fascinated by the optimism of the 1950s, Stephen Bulger has long considered 1955 to be the epitome of this era, so often mythologized and made nostalgic in North American mass media.

This exhibition contains works by various makers, all photographed in 1955, displaying many different approaches to photography. 1955 begins with Larry Morris’ photograph of the Times Square New Year’s Eve Party welcoming in 1955, which was the 50th anniversary of the first celebration at One Times Square.

Next comes Charles Swedlund, a twenty-year-old native of Chicago who graduated from the famed Institute of Design and, in 1955, delved into an intense year of image making. On exhibit are selections of his multiple exposures from the series called “Chicago,” as well as selections from his series “Firefighters.”

George S. Zimbel travelled America in 1955 and received an assignment to photograph New Orleans. His take on the city was a rawer look than was wanted by his client, who offered only a ‘kill fee’ after seeing the photographs. Images from this series have been acquired by major museums around the world, and they were published as BourbonStreet, New Orleans 1955 [les éditions du passage, 2006.]. This trip confirmed George’s love of Elaine Semovitz, to whom he proposed from El Paso. They rendezvoused in New Orleans and were married there on Feb 3, 1955.

The exhibition offers glimpses of life in 1955 and fine examples of photographic practice by Dr.Harold Edgerton; Elliot Erwitt; Dave Heath; André Kertész, O. Winston Link; Angus McBean; W. Eugene Smith; Frederick Sommer; Dennis Stock; and Gabor Szilasi.

The exhibition also includes the wedding portrait of Murray and Jane Bulger, who were married on February 19, 1955, and to whom this exhibition is lovingly dedicated.

Screening Saturdays at 3 p.m.:

• January 21: Oklahoma
• January 28: Bad Day at Black Rock
• February 4: The Seven Year Itch
• February 11: The Desperate Hours
• February 18: Rebel Without a Cause

January 25 – April 1, 2012
Opening: January 20, 2012, 7–9 p.m.
ART GALLERY OF ONTARIO
317 Dundas Street West
Toronto, ON M5T 1G4
T: 416.979.6648
www.ago.net
Hours: Tue & Thurs–Sun 10–5:30, Wed 10–8:30

After winning the Artes Mundi prize for “work that stimulates thinking about the human condition” in 2010, Israeli filmmaker and artist Yael Bartana presented her latest project at the 2011 Venice Biennale—the first non-Polish artist to represent Poland at the major international art exhibition. …And Europe Will Be Stunned, her film trilogy made between 2007 and 2011, will be on view for the first time in Canada in the AGO’s Lind Gallery from Jan. 25 to April 1, 2012.

“Interweaving past and present, reality and fiction, the conceptual and the emotional, and drawing on propaganda films of the 1930s and ’40s, as well as the visual language of advertising, Bartana’s films boldly traverse a landscape scarred by the histories of competing nationalisms and militarisms,” said Elizabeth Smith, AGO executive director of Curatorial Affairs and curator of the exhibition.

Featuring architecture and scenography by Oren Sagiv, …And Europe Will Be Stunned raises questions about ideas of homeland and a sense of belonging. In the films—Mary Koszmary (Nightmares), Mur i Wieża (Wall and Tower) and Zamach (Assassination)—Bartana tests reactions to the unexpected return of the “long-unseen neighbour,” telling a story of the Jewish Renaissance Movement in Poland. The trilogy also challenges the viewer’s readiness to accept the other and the complexities of cultural integration in a culturally and politically unstable world.

…And Europe Will Be Stunned is accompanied by one of the artist’s earlier video works, Trembling Time (2001), from the AGO’s collection. Bartana will be present for a public Meet the Artist program on January 26 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. in Jackman Hall at the AGO.

January 21 – April 1, 2012
Opening: January 20, 2012, 7–9 p.m.
ART GALLERY OF ONTARIO
317 Dundas Street West
Toronto, ON M5T 1G4
T:416.979.6648
www.ago.net
Hours: Tue & Thurs–Sun 10–5:30, Wed 10–8:30

Relocated from the street, local Toronto artists Sean Martindale and Pascal Paquette come together in the gallery for a collaborative installation in the Toronto Now series. Using convergent forms of street art, graffiti writing and activist interventions, combined with contemporary painting, sculpture and design, these artists eradicate traditional art classifications and work to expand the understanding of what artistic creativity can be. Taking inspiration from their daily environment, the gallery and the current socio-political and cultural climate of Toronto, this installation invites audiences to reconsider Toronto Now.

The NOW service bureau kicks off 2012 inside the Young Gallery. This Do It Yourself (DIY) agency offers visitors the opportunity to use the gallery as a forum for pressing Toronto issues. Pushing the idea of Toronto Now to its edge, the artists appropriate the AGO logo and the NOW name to provide a place of artistic creativity that encourages mindful action on local issues. This project reflects the artists’ interest in the tension between the rush and impatience of our current lifestyle and the benefit of slowing down, being mindful and aware of environmental, political and cultural subjects. This tension is supported by the DIY mentality that privileges the experience of the here and now in order to provoke change through self-consciousness, self-transformation and social interactions or exchanges.

GIFT SHOP GIFT SHOP

Gift Shop Gift Shop, a store within a store, features souvenirs of the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) gift shop itself, rather than the expected gallery mementos, as well as other related open-edition art multiples. Gift Shop Gift Shop works by artists Sean Martindale and Pascal Paquette will be available alongside both collaborative and independent multiples by other local Toronto-based artists, designers and illustrators. The products for sale develop out of self-reflective art making, and many of the works transform raw street and everyday materials and images into privileged, valuable objects. This project builds off the artists’ affinity for collaboration and the practice of using reclaimed materials. Taking inspiration from existing gift shop souvenirs or using gift shop overstock, these items will be examined and reworked to deconstruct how consumable objects are given value.

Martindale and Paquette run Gift Shop Gift Shop with shopAGO as a parallel project during the course of the NOW exhibition in the Toronto Now series. Located in the Young Gallery, the Toronto Now series promotes Toronto’s local arts community, in addition to providing visitors free access to contemporary art. Situated on in the eastern corner of the AGO, the Young Gallery is accessed through the museum’s FRANK Restaurant. Developed from an exploration and recognition of the Young Gallery’s position within the larger institution and through meetings with the museum’s gift shop and FRANK Restaurant, the artists extend their project beyond the gallery into other areas of the museum.

Martindale and Paquette join forces for the first time to create a collaborative installation for the Toronto Now series. Curated by Katherine Dennis, an MFA candidate in Criticism & Curatorial Practice at OCAD University, this exhibition is the focus of her thesis. Over the course of five months, the artists and curator have worked closely with the AGO, including the FRANK restaurant, the AGO gift shop and the Weston Family Learning Centre, to construct an integrated project that playfully works with and responds to established museum systems.

Participating Gift Shop Gift Shop Artists:

• Xenia Benivolski
• Cindy Blazevic
• Keith Cole
• Jessie Curell
• Janis Demkiw
• Sameer Farooq and Mirjam Linschooten
• Maggie Flynn and Kassem
• Globe
• Adam Krawesky
• CN Tower Liquidation
• Sean Martindale
• Hazel Meyer
• Olia Mishchenko
• Sarah Nasby
• Pascal Paquette
• Sandy Plotnikoff
• Seth Scriver
• Spud
• Tongue & Groove
• Jessica Vallentin
• VSVSVS
• Deborah Wan

The Toronto Now series is generously supported by The Contemporary Circle.

January 4 – 29, 2012
Opening: Thursday, January 5, 6-9 p.m.
Propeller Centre for Visual Arts
984 Queen St. W.
T: 416 504 7142
www.propellerctr.com
Hours: Wed – Sat 12 – 6pm, Sun 12-5pm

Propeller’s Salon show is an annual tradition that brings together the community to celebrate all forms of the visual arts.

January 4 marks the 6th Annual Salon Show and Sale at Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts. Part show, part sale, and all celebration: a great way to kick off the New Year. This social event rekindles the es- sence of the old French Salons of the 19th century. The whole gallery will be completely filled with art created by local artists from wall to wall and floor to ceiling.

This post holiday celebration brings together both quality and affordable art for everyone.

This multi disciplinary exhibit juxtaposes everything from photography to sculpture and showcases the artists’ innovative ideas and experiences. With over seventy artists exhibiting, there is a wide range of art for all to enjoy. This is a chance to see both established and emerging artists all in one venue where the art will be displayed as a modern take on an old tradition.
This will be a lively fair that brings together a diverse community of artists that all possess a different approach to their art. The collective show fosters a welcoming atmosphere for newcomers, veterans, and novice art goers alike, offering a forward-looking vision that engages the community through awareness and appreciation of the arts. A chance to enjoy good food, company, and most importantly art.

Christine Negus, video still from secret galaxy, 2009

January 19 – February 18, 2012
Opening: Thursday, January 19, 7 –  9 p.m.
Gallery TPW
56 Ossington Ave.
Toronto ON M6J 2Y7  
T: 416-645-1066
info@gallerytpw.ca 
Hours: Tues – Sat, 12 – 5 pm

Gallery TPW is pleased to present a solo exhibition by emerging artist Christine Negus.

Negus’ works range from ephemeral objects, including glittery party banners, neon signs and artificially flowered memorial wreaths, to video works steeped in sweet sadness. At the centre of you can’t spell slaughter without laughter is a constellation of short but intense, single channel videos and digital-animations investigating nostalgia and loss through humour and difficult irony. Here children tell terrible stories, pop songs become awkward and painful poetry, night stars are watching us, and small traumas play out within a larger view of the cosmos.
Based in London, Ontario, Christine Negus has an MFA from Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois. She has exhibited her work internationally, with notable exhibitions and screenings including the Montreal Underground Film Festival, Cambridge Galleries, The Art Gallery of York University, Xpace Cultural Centre and the Images Festival where, in 2008, she won the National Film Board of Canada’s Best Emerging Video/Filmmaker.

 Paul Morrison, from “Calathidium”  2007,  silkscreen  edition of 45.  38 3/8 x 28 3/4 inches

January 20 – February 25, 2012
Opening: Friday, January 20, 7-10 p.m. 
Paul Petro Contemporary Art
980 Queen St West
Toronto, ON   M6J 1H1
Tel: 416-979-7874
info@paulpetro.com
www.paulpetro.com
Hours: Wed – Sat: 11–5

With works by

Donald Baechler

Miles Collyer

Tom Dean, Jim Dine

Glenn Ligon

Jonathan Monk

Michael Morris

Paul Morrison

Matt Mullican

Ged Quinn,

Andy Warhol   

Rainer Ganahl

Candida Höfer

Ho Tam

January 12 – March 20, 2012
Opening: Thursday, January 12, 7-10 p.m.
LAUSBERG CONTEMPORARY
326 Dundas Street West
Toronto, Ontario M5T 1G5
T: 416-516-4440
E: toronto@galerie-lausberrg.com
www.galerie-lausberg.com
Hours: Tues-Sun 12–6 or by appointment

Featuring 16 Canadian & International Artists:

Raffael Barrios  | David Burdeny  | Freddy Chandra | Franco Defrancesca  | James Robert Durant | Marie Lannoo | Michael Laube | Zammy Migdal | Udo Noeger | Juergen Paas | Rui Pimenta | Rita Rohlfing | Dirk Salz | Klaus Staudt | Gabi Terhuven | Achim Zeman

Image: Klaus Staudt, Santorin (detail)