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Stan Douglas at Canadian Stage | Aleesa Cohene, Shary Boyle & Emily Vey...
For a guy who aligned himself with Samuel Beckett early in his career, Stan Douglas avoids the modernist celebration of delay in his first foray into theatre – Helen Lawrence at Canadian Stage– and...
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Ron Shuebrook at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery in Oshawa
The usual order of things has it that painting occupies the apex of the visual arts, and every other medium fights it out for a spot on one of the lower levels. I’m not quite sure where drawing fits...
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Jason de Haan at the Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery
Everywhere Ghostly is Nowhere Bodily, a collection of works by Jason de Haan currently on view at the Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery, relies on the portentous weight of material or “stored energy”...
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Shine a Light: The Canadian Biennial at the National Gallery in Ottawa
The Canadian Biennial is a showcase for the National Gallery’s recent acquisitions of contemporary Canadian art. Every two years it offers the opportunity for visitors to get a close look at what some...
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Scott Lyall at Susan Hobbs Gallery | Blue Republic at Georgia Scherman Projects
After the insanely close municipal election that just happened and all the noise that’s surrounding #gomeshigate, it seems a bit too late in the day and not all that interesting to point out that...
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Dianne Bos at the Carnegie Gallery in Hamilton
The inaugural exhibition at Carnegie Gallery’s TBA Artspace is a fitting homecoming for Dianne Bos, who knew this building in her childhood as Dundas’ library. Now, a glass atrium embraces the back...
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Neon: Audio Visual at Kasian Gallery
I’m interested in art that doesn’t matter if it’s art. I’m interested in art activities that occur outside of art-designated spaces, that exist as equal contributors to the greater world, that...
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Chimera at Craft Ontario | Moon Room at Narwhal Contemporary
Thematic exhibitions are a tricky proposition. Looking retrospectively at a single artist is so much simpler, with just one pair of hands to consider when figuring out what unites all the work and then...
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Brandon Vickerd at aceartinc.
I should be clear from the outset that sculptor Brandon Vickerd’s 2012 Chopper series (now on view at aceartinc.) and I were never going to be a love match. Biggish body-shop sculptures based on custom...
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Grier Edmundson at Centre Clark
I meandered across my neighbourhood (the increasingly gentrified Mile End) the other day to check out Grier Edmundson’s exhibition at Centre Clark (an old resident of the “Pied Carré” complex under...
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Laura Kikauka at MKG127 | Kotama Bouabane at Erin Stump Projects
He lived on Utopia Parkway in Queens and she lives on the Funny Farm in Meaford, but Joseph Cornell and Laura Kikauka are kindred spirits when it comes to redeeming the mass-produced detritus of the...
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Joscelyn Gardner at Alberta Printmakers
Joscelyn Gardner’s Creole Portraits III: bringing down the flowers… is an intimidating exhibition. Earlier, I was having a conversation with a friend at another gallery. She asked what I thought about...
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John Climenhage at the Art Gallery of Peterborough
I’ve always like fringes. Edges. The penumbra of things. It’s where, in the natural world, life thrives, and, in the aesthetic world, all the really interesting stuff tends to happen. John Climenhage...
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The Windsor-Essex Triennial at the Art Gallery of Windsor
Possible Futures: What is to be done?, the 2014 Windsor-Essex Triennial of Contemporary Art, frames its propositional title by themes of post-industrial and urban transformation (the changing landscape...
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Camp Fires at SMU Art Gallery
Camp Fires: The Queer Baroque of Léopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette is a beautifully presented retrospective of three significant contributors to queer ceramic art. The amount of work...
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Is Toronto Burning? at the Art Gallery of York University | Hazel Eckert...
To say history is written by the victors is a familiar adage; however, when discussing art history, it is perhaps more accurate to say it is written by the writers. Mike Kelley started writing about...
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BNLMTL 2014 at various venues
One of the largest, most anticipated events on the Montreal contemporary art calendar for 2014 has been the Montreal Biennale (aka BNLMTL 2014). Since its opening a few weeks ago at the Musée d’art...
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Samuel Roy-Bois at the Carleton University Art Gallery in Ottawa
I was at a gallery last week with a friend when she said, “Going to see art exhibitions is like playing the slot machines at the casino. Most of the time you lose.” We even saw a few works of art on...
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(im)mobile at the Dalhousie Art Gallery
Walking down the stairs to visit the Dalhousie Art Gallery’s latest exhibition – (im)mobile– the view-er enters a strange and unpredictable dream. Just inside the door, Germaine Koh’s Fair-Weather...
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Matt Donovan at Olga Korper | Jamelie Hassan & Ron Benner at A Space
As someone who is faced with the Sisyphean task of putting art into words each week, I often gravitate to work where the content dominates. This allows me to tell a story in advance of my critique,...
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