Your Cultural Concierge! VoCA offers critical commentary on the Canadian art scene, with a focus on Toronto. Featuring exhibition previews, critics picks, interviews and in-depth articles on art in Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Ottawa and Halifax.
April 16th, 2009 — Performance art, Photography, Thoughts on art
So we received this email yesterday:
UNEMPLOYED ARTIST USES REMAINING CASH
AS MEDIUM FOR ECONOMIC STATEMENT
April 15, 2009: A casualty of the 2008 economic crisis, unemployed conceptual artist Brian Rushton Phillips, has chosen to use his remaining cash to create a response to the current downturn and his own financial uncertainty.
Rushton Phillips, Financial Security (Blanket), 2009. Image:rushtonphillips.com
Admittedly, our first thought was…’Duh..”
April 15th, 2009 — Architecture
The Milan furniture fair opens this month from April 22 to 27, and one project by Dutch conceptual design legends Droog intrigues us.
At first glance, the point of this House of Furniture Parts isn’t clear, but the underlying idea of function (slightly) over form is a good one.
Design can – should – solve problems.
According to the press release, HoFP allows “the functionability and character of the house to be changed as more or less furniture is used…(it) can be made to suit different functions, produced locally and customized.”
The HoFP. Image: Droog.com
Imagine the possibilities for the HoFP in third world countries, where the planks could be flat packed and shipped, unfolded to provide shelter, chairs and tables for schoolkids, particularly in hot, arid climates. They could even be made from cradle-to-cradle* material, for temporary use.
April 14th, 2009 — Architecture, Art News: International
The Swiss architect (and VoCA favorite) Peter Zumthor has won the Pritzker Prize for excellence in “talent, vision and commitment” by a living architect.
Zumthor’s stunning Therme Spa in Graubünden. Image: mimoa.eu
Read the full article HERE
April 14th, 2009 — Montreal, Performance art, Thoughts on art, Toronto and region, Upcoming Events & Exhibitions
We’ve written a lot about the excellent public performance group Improv Everywhere HERE, and about one of our favorite films, the Spanish mock-umentary Noviembre HERE, in which street theatre performers tread a dangerous line between reality and fiction (In once case, a performer feigns collapse and the unknowing public calls an ambulance in desperation).
This past weekend, we received THIS video, in which performers break into a fantastically kitsch song-and-dance rendition of Do-Re-Mi from the Sound of Music, charming an unsuspecting public in Antwerp station.
The Sound of Music in Antwerp station. Image: theinspirationroom.com
Now that artists are taking to the streets more than ever in ways not specifically revealed as art projects, we wonder what the effects of this trend will be.
April 9th, 2009 — Montreal, Sculpture/Installation
As much as possible given the time and space allotted is an exhibition at the Leornard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery at Concordia Unviersity in Montreal. It was curated by Rebecca Duclos and David K. Ross, who VoCA featured as an artist to watch from the Quebec Triennale last year.
As much as possible given the time and space allotted, Installation view. Image: David K. Ross, 2009
The premise of the show is, we think, quite interesting. The idea is to move has many works as possible from the gallery’s storage vault into the gallery and install them, in systematic order, before disassembling them and returning them to the storage.
The process – installing, de-installing – then becomes a kind of ongoing performance. The gallery is put on display (as a theatre) and the viewer also becomes privy to the behind-the-scenes, the inner working of an art gallery.
April 8th, 2009 — Art Market, Books, Thoughts on art, Toronto and region
Is the economic shakedown the best thing that could have happened to the art world?
It seems that amid the upheaval and uncertainty, survivors will emerge and we reckon they will be old masters, mid-century and contemporary masters, as well as lesser-known, high quality works. Works that were representative of certain turns in the history of art, despite having fallen from favour. Witness the recent resurrection of the wonderful, and important artists Alice Neel, Elaine Sturtevant and Paul Thek, among others.
(A fantastic, weighty book on Thek is just out from MIT Press – click HERE)
Paul Thek, Meat Sculpture With Butterflies, 1966. Image: thebody.com
Not only because collectors are now demanding value for money – they may have cared more about flash and attitude a few years ago – but also, as Charlie Finch points out HERE, that America is seeing what he calls “the perfect storm”. Big American collectors are “desperate to invest devalued currency into artworks by the dead and aged, coming face-to-face with a slew of soon-to-be indicted moneybaggers, forced by either the law or necessity to sell their art collections.”
April 7th, 2009 — Thoughts on art
There’s an interesting piece in the Guardian on the future of theatre criticism, HERE. The role of the (art) critic is on our mind quite often (naturally) and one of the comments on the article – reproduced below – raises some good questions:
Putting the purpose, form and teaching of theatre criticism under the microscope is absolutely vital, but before we consider these points, should we not be addressing the economic state of our publishing outlets? Without a viable financial framework to support the professional critics work, there is little room for discussion on remit and form. Im not suggesting a relapse into doom and gloom diatribes on the decline of print media, what I suggest is a detailed and constructive look at how newspapers and the wider media industry is restructuring in light of economic pressures and digital distribution demands; and understanding where the theatre critic stands in relation to this.
The Art Critic. Image: api.ning.com
April 6th, 2009 — Architecture
We’ve mentioned Cameron Sinclair, the guy behind Architecture for Humanity, before (HERE) when gave a brilliant talk at OCAD in January 2008.
Architecture for Humanity’s Pallet House, a low-cost shelter for victims who lost their homes in natural disasters or war. Image: metropolismag.com
Here’s a reposting of Cameron Sinclair’s brilliant TED Talk on how design can change the world.
It’s really worth watching. Click HERE.
April 3rd, 2009 — Rumour Has it..., Toronto and region
Rumour has it that video artist extraordinaire Bill Viola will be part of a three-person exhibition coming to the Royal Ontario Museum in June 2009!
Bill Viola, Five Angels for the Millennium [detail] Departing Angel, 2001. Video/sound installation. Image: Kira Perov/tokyoartbeat.com
The exhibition will, apparently, be mounted by the ICC at the ROM in response to the upcoming exhibition of sixteen of the Dead Sea Scrolls. We hear that the curator has chosen one Christian artist, one Jewish artist and one Muslim artist for the show.
April 2nd, 2009 — Art Market
..Long Live Chinese Art!
Recent news articles have told of the Chinese art market suffering, falling from the dizzying heights of just a few years ago. It’s an interesting thing to witness from a truly hyped art scene where much work was awkward, and not all that great, even as it reflected political issues and the rise of the new China.
We wonder what Charles Saatchi, who invested considerably in Chinese art, will make of the readjustment and whether (or when) he will dump his Chinese works at auction. (His show in London, The Revolution Continues: New Art from China, was panned by British critics).
Read today’s full article from Reuters HERE, and recent articles in the New York Times and the Globe and Mail.
Andrea Carson writes on contemporary art, architecture and design...Read full bio