Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009
The closing weekend of Responsive Space was a full one- marked by a tarot reading by Neelam Kler and the closing tea party hosted by Stacey Sproule. Another warm thank you to all of the artists and guests involved in the show.
Image: Guest performer Neelam Kler with Stacey Sproule
Click below to see more pictures.
Friday, April 17th, 2009
Neelam Kler, born in Vernon, BC is an installation and new media artist currently based in Toronto. Her work investigates the social and universal paradox of wholeness/fragmentation along with her anticipation for an entirely new world order.
Previous Work: can be viewed at: http://webspace.ocad.ca/~nk05ls
Neelam will be doing a tarot card reading for Stacey in the gallery at 3pm on Saturday.
Image credit: Neelam Kler, still of Hallelujah, Anyways, 2006, video collection of 9 shorts
Thursday, April 16th, 2009
http://www.akimbo.biz/akimblog/?id=278
Image: Stanzie Tooth, Floating, 2008, acrylic and oil on canvas
Saturday, April 11th, 2009
Randy and Stacey will be practicing the act of remembering in the gallery from noon to 3pm on April 15th. They will be recounting events past and making a record of that recollection. Stacey and Randy frequently collaborate together including a performance at the 2008 Toronto International Art Fair and one at 7*a11d International Festival of Performance Art.
Randy Gagne was born in Cambridge, ON in 1983; He received his Bachelor of Art degree from the Ontario College of Arts in 2007, majoring in drawing of painting. Randy is currently active in sound/performance art, writing and music, and just recently had his writing on sound art published in the academic journal “sense & society”. Other recent exhibitions include the odB sound art festival in Finland, the 2008 7a11d International Performance Art Festival, and the 2008 Toronto International Art Festival. Randy continues to prolifically record, collaborate, and perform music in and around the Toronto area, and has a new album included in an international anthology of experimental music from the record label Bennifer Editions.
Image: from 7*a11d performance at Xpace Cultural Centre
Saturday, April 11th, 2009
Click for more images.
Thursday, April 9th, 2009
Click below to see more pictures from Sunday’s performance.
Friday, April 3rd, 2009
Isla Craig is a song crafter of smooth sailing melody and trance like meanderings. Inspiration comes to her in the form of afghan geometry, early vocal music and R &B listening/imitation, and an all encompassing habitation within a world wraught in textile wizardry and colour explosion.
Unity is both the internal and external focus as one seeks the truth about oneself, one’s relationship to others and reality (both the world at large and the unseen realm). The mystic’s motivation for such an arduous endeavor appears to be unique to the individual and culture, and sometimes a new religion, order or sect may be the legacy.
Isla collaborates regularly with the Muskox (www.myspace.com/muskoxmuskoxmuskoxmuskox) and the Element Choir (www.myspace.com/elementchoir).
Friday, April 3rd, 2009
Thank you to everyone who made it out to the Gala Performance for Responsive Space on Thursday, April 2nd. A big highlight of the night was the Toronto F. Morris Men, (visit www.tfmm.ca for more information) who entertained us with their traditional song and dance routines.
Please see the below post for the Stacey Sproule’s performance schedule, complete with a listing of guest artists and performers.
Sunday, March 22nd, 2009
image credit: Alex McLeod, Building Test Fire #4, digital print, 2009
ALL OVER AGAIN
an installation by Stacey Sproule
Stacey Sproule incorporates herself as an active component to her installations. As part of Responsive Space, Sproule will create a complete living environment within the gallery space. Through this installation she will inhabit the gallery as a creature emerging from hibernation. Sproule will create a series of handmade objects using obscure or obsolete technologies. Knitting garments for spring, nourishing herself with homemade preserves, resetting clocks, napping and indexing memories, all as a preparation for re-entering the world. This piece is meant as a period not only of preparation but also of contemplation for what the next season will bring. Through this interior space, Sproule addresses the symbiotic relationship of our human life cycles to the cycles of nature. The use of obsolete technologies speaks to a time when we as animals were still intrinsically bound to the changing of the seasons, as opposed to our modern condition in which we use technology to combat them.
Click below for more information and for a schedule of performances
Tuesday, February 10th, 2009
Image credit: Alex McLeod, Building Test Fire #4, digital print, 2009
Responsive Space
In the Critique of Judgment, philosopher Immanuel Kant described the vastness of nature as one of the few physical examples that illustrates ideas of the infinite. He believed that the forces of nature were powerful enough to display that which was beyond human reason.
We feel the effects of the sublime in the stories and legends that shape our culture. In fairytales or Romantic writing, the landscape is used like a character to describe the emotion or psychology of the scene. Added to this is the tradition of landscape as artist’s subject- attempts to capture the sublime through art.
