Istvan Kantor: The Revolt of Depressed Lymphocytes at DeLeon White Gallery, Toronto.

The exhibition runs from August 9 to September 1 and is curated by artist Jubal Brown.

“An exhibition/installation of recent paintings and sculptural works dealing with the spirit of Wilhelm Reich, burning books, flags, flaming cats, sex, terror, robots, the broken clocks of the Emperor, the oppressive nature of hyper-authoritarian total control systems, the dictatorship of the Rentagon, the beauty of vandalism, the perishing of lifespace, blood and gold and bread, Queen West is dead! Amen!”

Standing on an old filing cabinet, Istvan Kantor posed, bare-legged, wearing an overcoat and sneakers. With his shaved head and sunglasses, it appeared as if a flasher had wandered up from Queen.

He held a large shepherd’s cane and lifted it up, striking a statuesque pose. Then he opened his coat to reveal his naked body, save for a strategically placed flashing light. He posed again. This display was no surprise to anyone familiar with Kantor’s work - his legendary performances regularly involve nudity, blood, fire, toxic smoke, robots and computer parts among other things.

Then he held up a wooden sign reading “Dirty Bloor West Uber Alles!” which he set alight and held aloft while it burned. He followed this with a paper flag – red on one side, black on the other. He set it alight and waved it, sending flaming bits of paper everywhere. He took a pink plastic toy keyboard and defiantly sang a song in his native Hungarian, before arranging a flaming wooden plank between two chairs and doing a cartwheel through the flames.

For the grand finale - and the most interesting part of the performance - he enlisted the help of the audience. To one side, he declared “You will be the revolutionaries!” to the other “You will be the executioners!” He then donned a red blindfold and, along with his fellow revolutionaries, staged an elaborate death at the executioners’ rapidly firing guns - “ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta!”.

Kantor is a passionte man whose work - like Neoism, the movement that he is closely aligned with - defies categorization.

Neoism is defined as “a specific subcultural network of artistic performance and media experimentalists and more generally to a practical underground philosophy. It operates with collectively shared pseudonyms and identities, pranks, paradoxes, plagiarism and fakes, and has created multiple contradicting definitions of itself.”

Is Kantor a revolutionary? It is unclear whether or not he accepts his efforts as futile. His rages against “Toronto” or “Bloor West” appear comical, yet his look and his passion are undeniably the real thing.

What lies beneath the skin of Kantor’s revolution?

Is he seeking to draw attention to the tyranny of contemporary society – our city streets, government, social infrastructure, the web’s interface design – to which we are bound?

Or is his anger directed more straightforwardly towards the city and the art institution? If so, he should go further. The basic problem in Kantor’s work is that he relies so heavily on the gallery’s infrastructure, whether using the gallery to stage his exhibitions and performances, or throwing blood on its walls. Many artists today struggle with the relevance of the museum. Being so extreme, Kantor’s performance would be more effective in an empty warehouse where the threat of arrest or injury would be real.

“My philosophy is based on the equation that life equals art equals life,” he has said. “Everything is art; everybody is an artist. The greatest art is the people in the streets, the beggars, the prostitutes, the people in the offices, executives and secretaries.”

Kantor is no stranger to extreme behavior, and yet… He has been arrested at least a dozen times, banned from the National Gallery of Canada and is known for his use of human blood. And yet, in 2004, he accepted the Canada Council’s $15,000 Governor General’s award.

Not very anti-establishment.

Read more about Istvan Kantor HERE