Last week, we attended a cocktail party in honour of the new director of Canadian Stage (CanStage) - Matthew Jocelyn. He has just announced his programme for the 2010-2011 season in Toronto, and it sounds FANTASTIC.

Merce Cunningham dancers performing against a backdrop by Robert Rauschenberg.
Image: nytimes.com

I spoke briefly with Mr. Jocelyn, who is interested in encouraging multidisciplinary artistic collaborations a la Merce Cunningham/John Cage/Robert Rauschenberg.

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Here’s a quote from Nancy Bauer’s opinion piece in the New York Times yesterday, which asks Are Lady Gaga and the women who identify with her confusing sexual power with self-objectification?:

Lady Gaga. Image: ftweekly.com

“There is nobody like Lady Gaga in part because she keeps us guessing about who she, as a woman, really is. She has been praised for using her music and videos to raise this question and to confound the usual exploitative answers provided by “the media.” (Journalist Ann) Powers compares Gaga to the artist Cindy Sherman: both draw our attention to the extent to which being a woman is a matter of artifice, of artful self-presentation. Gaga’s gonzo wigs, her outrageous costumes, and her fondness for dousing herself in what looks like blood, are supposed to complicate what are otherwise conventionally sexualized performances.”

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The 2010 Power Ball, the annual fundraiser for Toronto’s Power Plant Gallery, took place June 3, and took as its theme ‘The Ball that Started it All‘, which, it turned out, worked well!

All photos VoCA/Scott Barker.

Billed as “a carnivalesque line-up of amazing art, extraordinary entertainment, and spectacular prizes“, it aimed to “remix the best of the best from Power Ball’s glorious (and often notorious) past.”

Click below to see lots more photos…

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Check out my piece on artist Kent Monkman’s home and studio in the current issue of Design Lines magazine. The studio, a former factory, was re-done by Jason Halter of boutique design firm Wonder Inc.

You know Monkman for his traditionally painted landscapes into which he inserts contemporary figures of First Nations people, often doing rather unconventional things…

Kent Monkman, Achilles and Patroclus, 2008. Image: kentmonkman.com

Or for his drag performances as Miss Chief Eagle Testickle…

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It’s well known – in the art world, at least – that many artists support their careers by teaching.

It has also become popular for artists, collectives and independent curators to mount exhibitions in abandoned spaces.

Johanna Householder, video stills from installation in the Principal’s Office. Image: courtesy Heather Nicol

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Get ready, Toronto! This year, the city’s much-loved “All Night Contemporary Art Thing”, Nuit Blanche, takes place on October 2, 2010 from 7 pm to 7 am.

Agnès Winter, Monument to Smile, 2007. Image: hustlerofculture.com

It should be good, with a great lineup of curators, each of whom will curate a section of downtown. We have high hopes for McMaster’s choice of The Open Ended Group, Anthony Kiendl’s choice of Dan Graham (!!) and Christof Migone’s choice of French artist Davide Balula, in particular.  And we’re sure Toronto boy Darren O’Donnell (of Haircuts for Children fame) will not disappoint.

And the curators are:

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Artistic Director and Toronto man-about-town Bruno Billio took control of this year’s Massive Party, the 6th annual fundraiser for the Art Gallery of Ontario, which took place last night at the Frank Gehry-designed space.

Jon Sasaki’s installation. All images: VoCA

The AGO has got a new Young Patrons group, AGO Next, many of whom were there last night. Judging by the sold-out crowd of 2000 energetic partiers, the AGO has got a lot of future donors hooked.

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Though watching Ryan Trecartin’s films aren’t entirely a waste of time, it sure feels that way at the time. The hyper-intense mix of screeching voices, messily-costumed performers and banal scenarios come across like a reality tv show of drag queens on crack.

Ryan Trecartin, Still from A Family Finds Entertainment, 2004. Image: kera.org

Watch one of Trecartin’s videos on Youtube, HERE.

The videos on view at Toronto’s Power Plant (until May 24, 2010 - click HERE) reminded me of the at-first-hideous-but-in-hindsight-kind-of-brilliant film Idiocracy, “about the demise of North American civilization. America, 500 years into the future, has become a place where advertising, commercialism, and cultural anti-intellectualism run rampant resulting in a uniformly stupid human society.” (Thanks, Wikipedia - and Jennifer)

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Some excerpts from a fantastic article on Alexander McQueen:

Image: stylefrizz.com

“…anyone who cares about the culture at large — should take note of the death of Alexander McQueen. For every 1,000 so-called designers who pin a piece of jersey around a mannequin and call it fashion, there’s only one McQueen, an explosively imaginative designer…”

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“To build this house is to build my soul.” – Herman Wallace

Herman Wallace. Image: blacktalkradio.com

Last night we went to hear Jackie Sumell talk at Prefix ICA. Introduced by Kenneth Montague of Wedge Curatorial Projects, Sumell spoke about her fascinating art project, The House that Herman Built. For a number of years, Sumell, a Brooklyn-born, New Orleans-based artist has been corresponding with Herman Wallace, an inmate – in solitary confinement – in the Louisiana State Penitentiary for over 36 years.

Solitary confinement at the prison consists of spending a minimum of 23 hours a day in a six-foot-by-nine-foot cell.

Herman Wallace is one of the Angola Three, along with Robert King and Albert Woodfox, members of the Black Panther Party who organized a prison chapter of the party in order to desegregate the prison, and organized strikes for improved conditions.

Artist and activist Jackie Sumell. Image: grassroots.org

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