Alberta is seeing a lot of cultural action these days.

There’s Santiago Calatrava’s controversial bridge, Lethbridge’s own (and VoCA favorite) David Hoffos with a large retrospective coming up this fall at the National Gallery of Canada, and Nigerian artist El Anatsui giving a talk tomorrow at the Glenbow Museum, courtesy of the Canadian Art Foundation, to name just a few things going on.

Burtynsky’s new book. Image: rsvppost.com

Not to mention the Art Gallery of Alberta, which is currently under construction and set to open in early 2010 with Edward Burtynsky: Oil.

From October 9 - December 12, the Illingworth Kerr Gallery at the Alberta College of Art and Design launches 2 exhibitions by an American and an Irish artist, that explore the issues associated with the idea of the North and related ideas of the West.

Glenn Ligon, Death of Tom, 2008. Image: fadwebsite.com

Glenn Ligon’s video installation Death of Tom was created in collaboration with filmmaker Deco Dawson and ACAD students last year. It is based on Edwin S. Porter’s 1903 silent film version of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which was made for Thomas Edison’s film studio, while John Gerrard’s video Grow Finish Unit (Elkhart, Kansas), is an intricately detailed virtual representation of a large pig production facility in which a viewer-controlled camera permits oversight by the work’s audience.

Click HERE to see a clip of Gerrard’s piece, on Youtube.

Meanwhile, in Toronto..

Artist Josh Thorpe’s new book for Art Metropole arrives with a splash thanks to a launch party and lecture by the esteemed American installation artist Dan Graham.

Dan Graham, Triangular Pavilion with Circular Cut-out Variation H, Holland Park. Image: ica.org.uk

The book is titled Dan Graham Pavilions: A Guide and is the first publication to provide comprehensive and direct information on the remote international sites where Graham’s public works may be discovered and enjoyed.

Graham’s pavilions are parodies of corporate architecture, moments of psychedelic experience in the urban landscape, shelters for the weather-beaten pedestrian, romantic rendezvous for lovers, photo-ops for tourists, and funhouses for kids.

Dan Graham, “Heart Pavilion”, 1991, two-way mirror glass and aluminum, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh.
Image: carefullyaimeddarts.com

Toronto Book Launch with Dan Graham at Art Metropole:

Sunday October 4, 2009
1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
788 King St. W, Toronto

Public Lecture by Dan Graham at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design, University of Toronto

Monday October 5, 2009
6:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m.
Room 103, 230 College Street
Toronto

Dan Graham Pavilions: A Guide is $20 and can be purchased HERE.