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Lorna Mills and Sally McKay
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The Images Festival is on now. The program is here. Note: Peggy Anne Berton's excellent film is showing on the 22nd! Also note Deirdre Logue opening tonight at Paul Petro. Tomorrow I'm conducting a marathon gallery tour of the "off screen" projects, meaning stuff that's in galleries rather than in the theatre. Here's the blurb:
A Guided Tour to the Images Festival's Installation Projects
Saturday, April 15, 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM
Meet at 401 Richmond St. West, suite Suite 448
Join Toronto artist, curator writer and IF tour guide Sally McKay for a free guided walking tour of the installation and new media projects exhibited in this year's Images Off Screen.
Here is the schedule. Yes, we will see 14 galleries in 4 hours! Join us for the whole thing, or pick up the tour along the way...
1:00
Images Office (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 448
Welcome (grab a snack)
1:11
Vtape (15min)
401 Richmond, suite 452
Mieke Bal
short artist talk
1:28
Trinity Square Video (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 376
Michael Campbell
1:41
YYZ (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 140
Laiwan and Kristan Horton
1:52
Prefix (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 124
Annika Larsson
2:03
WARC Gallery (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 122
Alison Chun Ya
short artist talk
2:15
A Space (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 110
Mieke Bal and Sadegh Tirafkan
2:26
Gallery 44 (15min)
401 Richmond, suite 120
Tony Cokes, Chris Curreri and Carol Flax
2:42
Wynick/Tuck (10min)
401 Richmond, suite 128
Takehito Koganezawa
2:52
bathroom break (5min)
3:03
Gallery TPW (10min)
80 Spadina, suite 310
Calum Stirling
(walk west on Queen St.)
3:38
Mercer Union (10min)
37 Lisgar St.
Brian Joseph Davis
3:48
Coffee Break (15min)
4:08
InterAccess (10min)
9 Ossington
Hisako Yamakawa
4:19
Paul Petro (20min)
980 Queen St. W
Deirdre Loque
short artist talk
4:42
Edward Day (10min)
952 Queen St. W
John Oswald
4:53
MOCCA (10min)
952 Queen St. W
Tammy Forsythe, Jeremy Shaw and J.R. Carpenter
5:03
the end! but stay at MOCCA as long as you like...
(performance by Tammy Forsythe at 6:00)
Speaking of courtesy and transportation.... its not the fact that car drivers kill us that pisses me off quite so much as the blatant discourtesy of a civic system that consistently dismisses the safety and (gasp!) pleasure of cyclists and pedestrians.
Since we're on the topic, here's one for the "shoulda' said" department. When the Spadina streetcars were backed up in the middle of a weekday (yesterday) and crowds and crowds of people who'd been waiting for ages including an old guy who fell asleep leaning on his crutches were finally, dismally, filing on to the car that finally, slowly pulled up and the TTC worker admonished us, in a well practiced high pitched camp counsellor tone of utter patronising contempt for the pathetic mob to please "take off our backpacks as a courtesy to the other passengers" I should have suggested that as a courtesy to their paying customers they keep the damn streetcars running on time so we didn't have to all bunch up like this. But I didn't cause the doors were closing and I wanted on the car cause I was late for a paying gig. And then of course we crawled along down Spadina which always gets me into a bit of a stew cause of this....(below)...arrrrrrg...how about putting the stops before the light so we don't all have to wait twice at every intersection?...weep....
Boing Boing has a post complaining about the Dia forbidding people to take photographs of The Lightning Field. I'm basically onside with letting people take pictures of art, but Cory Doctorow neglects to mention anything about the fact that The Lightning Field is not just a roadside attraction, but a bona fide work of art made in 1977 by Walter De Maria (who also made The Earth Room and the Broken Kilometer, also owned by Dia). In fact he neglects to mention Walter De Maria at all! If it was my art I'd say go ahead and take pictures, but please give a little credit where credit is due.
UPDATE: Greg made this point much better than I did.
A lot of you will already be reading Baghdad Burning, the "girl blog from Iraq." We just found out about it through Book Ninja. It's really good, sad and stressful, but as I said to Von Bark, it feels like a big relief to hear a voice from inside the situation. An example from March 18:
I’m sitting here trying to think what makes this year, 2006, so much worse than 2005 or 2004. It’s not the outward differences- things such as electricity, water, dilapidated buildings, broken streets and ugly concrete security walls. Those things are disturbing, but they are fixable. Iraqis have proved again and again that countries can be rebuilt. No- it’s not the obvious that fills us with foreboding.
The real fear is the mentality of so many people lately- the rift that seems to have worked it’s way through the very heart of the country, dividing people. It’s disheartening to talk to acquaintances- sophisticated, civilized people- and hear how Sunnis are like this, and Shia are like that… To watch people pick up their things to move to “Sunni neighborhoods” or “Shia neighborhoods”. How did this happen?
I read constantly analyses mostly written by foreigners or Iraqis who’ve been abroad for decades talking about how there was always a divide between Sunnis and Shia in Iraq (which, ironically, only becomes apparent when you're not actually living amongst Iraqis they claim)… but how under a dictator, nobody saw it or nobody wanted to see it. That is simply not true- if there was a divide, it was between the fanatics on both ends. The extreme Shia and extreme Sunnis. Most people simply didn’t go around making friends or socializing with neighbors based on their sect. People didn't care- you could ask that question, but everyone would look at you like you were silly and rude.
There is a protest going on right now against Canada's "adoption of U.S-style enforcement policies" with regards to illegal immigrants. Portuguese people, among others, are being deported out of Toronto. It's been making the news because of the large number of illegal Portuguese immigrants working in the construction industry. Apparently there were recently raids conducted at Dufferin Mall, where people were stopped and asked for their papers. This is my neighbourhood and these are my neighbours. It feels pretty awful. A colleague of mine said the other day that it is immigrants who will be the first to feel the oppressive tactics of right wing government. For the rest of us the suffering will come later. Here is the mandate from the No One is IIlegal website, the group who organised today's protest:
No One is Illegal (Toronto) is a group of immigrants, refugees and allies who fight for the rights of all migrants to live with dignity and respect. We believe that granting citizenship to a privileged few is part of a racist immigration and border policy designed to exploit and marginalize migrants. We work to oppose these policies, as well as the international economic policies that create the conditions of poverty and war that force migration. At the same time, we also work to support and building alliances with our Indigenous brothers and sisters in their fight against displacement and the ongoing theft of their land.
Our demands:
- National Regularization Program for non-status people
- An end to detentions and deportations
- An immediate end to security certificates and secret trials
- An end to racial or religious profiling
- Recognition of the right to free movement
- Recognition of Indigenous sovereignty
Tom Moody just posted the some sound in progress that he and John Parker are working on for a Mods and Rockers show I'm curating that opens May 12th at York Quay Centre (part of digifest). I'll be putting up a full and proper blurb next week. The artists are working in teams: Myfanwy Ashmore & Lorna Mills, Chandra Bulucon & Andrew J. Paterson, Rob Cruickshank & Veronica Verkley, Tom Moody & John Parker. Tom and John have been posting their work in progress and its fantastic. You can follow their collaboration from the links at www.eyekhan.com.