The Witch_1942, 2019-2022
installation views from goodtime, The Plumb, Toronto and Tools ‘n’ Shit (Round 1, 2, 3), Goodwater Gallery, Toronto
~14,600 pieces of grapevine charcoal made over the course of two-years in Goodwater’s fireplace, drawing material for a lifetime. The work includes several tools necessary for production, installation, and storage plus a special edition Goodwater Mailer for the exhibition, goodtime.
production assistance: Melissa Bleecker, Sandra Rechico, Callum Schuster, Amanda White
photo documentation: Alison Postma, Colin Miner, John Goodwin
installation views from goodtime, The Plumb, Toronto and Tools ‘n’ Shit (Round 1, 2, 3), Goodwater Gallery, Toronto
~14,600 pieces of grapevine charcoal made over the course of two-years in Goodwater’s fireplace, drawing material for a lifetime. The work includes several tools necessary for production, installation, and storage plus a special edition Goodwater Mailer for the exhibition, goodtime.
production assistance: Melissa Bleecker, Sandra Rechico, Callum Schuster, Amanda White
photo documentation: Alison Postma, Colin Miner, John Goodwin
The Future is Dark...I think
August 2022, La Datcha, Berlin
[exhibition poster & text]
Following years of coorespondence and much delay, during the summer of 2022, Maggie Groat & I each held independant residencies at La Datcha working closely with Jessica Groome and the space itself, a Schrebergarten located in Volkspark Rehberge (Berlin Wedding).
La Datcha was transformed through a whirlwind of activity: sweeping, raking, weeding, watering, observing, playing, searching for spiders, renovating, gathering, assembling, watching, arriving, and making.
The culmination of our collaborative activities resulted in the exhibition The Future is Dark... I Think hosted by Project Space Festival Berlin.
I continued the “_~form_” series with site~form_willkommen, a goopy gate covered in salt dough mixed with, blackberry, plant material, banana, cane sugar, beer, Aperol, pinot noir, and Baba Jaga spirits; dream~form_Baba Jaga, a very long-lasting jute and beeswax candle; and several site~form_moon-milks, small conglomerate assortments of rocks painted with milk paint and moth bait, an all day slurp-fest for wasps and slugs.
Image credit: Colin Miner
August 2022, La Datcha, Berlin
[exhibition poster & text]
Following years of coorespondence and much delay, during the summer of 2022, Maggie Groat & I each held independant residencies at La Datcha working closely with Jessica Groome and the space itself, a Schrebergarten located in Volkspark Rehberge (Berlin Wedding).
La Datcha was transformed through a whirlwind of activity: sweeping, raking, weeding, watering, observing, playing, searching for spiders, renovating, gathering, assembling, watching, arriving, and making.
The culmination of our collaborative activities resulted in the exhibition The Future is Dark... I Think hosted by Project Space Festival Berlin.
I continued the “_~form_” series with site~form_willkommen, a goopy gate covered in salt dough mixed with, blackberry, plant material, banana, cane sugar, beer, Aperol, pinot noir, and Baba Jaga spirits; dream~form_Baba Jaga, a very long-lasting jute and beeswax candle; and several site~form_moon-milks, small conglomerate assortments of rocks painted with milk paint and moth bait, an all day slurp-fest for wasps and slugs.
Image credit: Colin Miner
Amber Falls
May 2022, Kikospace, Toronto
There was a picnic on its surface, this pearl, a magic skin, this mystical shell, a gleaming amber moon. Day poured into night, light into darkness, labour into pleasure. Wine glasses left rings. Salad dressing splashed. Someone spilled the salt. They had worked too hard. Walked too far, too fast. Feeling spacey, bodies shifted position and for an hour—an age—everything changed. Carefully, they took off habits, put down jobs, moved beyond limits of analysis, crossed distances of difference. And together, fell—curious, in dazzling arrays of particles, bursts, clusters. Chimes rang on the wind. Everyone asked, was that a moth or a butterfly?
...
This installation follows-up on the collaborative project, Bright Eyes with Stefana Fratila and Kiko Sounds, in which we created a 100 metre long sound bath + copper installation in the breezeway
outside the Art Gallery of York University for the summer months of 2019.Instead of an opening, DJs Crip Time, Cam Lee, Snail Space, and I hosted GUMMY UNIVERSE: TANGfastic Dance Party with yummy-gummy snacks c/o @spool_oven.
Manden Murphy contributed two articles on “The Resident” which will subsequently be reprinted in the upcoming, inaugeral issue of the “The Mercury”.
image credit: Alison Potsma
production support: Claudia Rick
Terms of Endearment
w/ Katie Lyle, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis
Winter 2021, Support, London On.
This exhibition, hosted by our good friends at Support (Tegan Moore, Liza Eurich, and Ruth Skinner), marks the final iteration of a three-part series that began with Greener than Grass in the fall of 2020 at Susan Hobbs Gallery in Toronto and continued with Dancing with Tantalus at the School of Art Gallery, University of Manitoba in Winnipeg in Spring 2021.
To culminate our collaboration, I designed a riso-publication for Support’s Materials series that pulls together associated texts written by Lillian, Simon Fuh, Nic Wilson, and Jillian Groening alongside a variety of, well, other materials.
Download PDF
![]()
w/ Katie Lyle, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis
Winter 2021, Support, London On.
This exhibition, hosted by our good friends at Support (Tegan Moore, Liza Eurich, and Ruth Skinner), marks the final iteration of a three-part series that began with Greener than Grass in the fall of 2020 at Susan Hobbs Gallery in Toronto and continued with Dancing with Tantalus at the School of Art Gallery, University of Manitoba in Winnipeg in Spring 2021.
To culminate our collaboration, I designed a riso-publication for Support’s Materials series that pulls together associated texts written by Lillian, Simon Fuh, Nic Wilson, and Jillian Groening alongside a variety of, well, other materials.
Download PDF
Dancing with Tantalus
w/ Katie Lyle and Gabrielle L'Hirondelle Hill, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis
Winter-Spring 2020, School of Art Gallery, University of Manitoba
Consider the Greek myth of Tantalus, who stole ambrosia, nectar, and the gods’ secrets of immortality for his people. As punishment for his crime, Tantalus was made to stand in a clear pool where water receded before he could drink, underneath trees laden with fruit that forever escaped his grasp. Touching leaves traces, often more lasting than originally imagined, but the absence of touch builds both anticipation and desire.
Dancing with Tantalus engages qualities of contact—between people, surfaces, and objects—to examine haptic intimacy and explore the causal relationship between artworks and the many structures that make contact with them—physically, intellectually, emotionally, institutionally, and historically.
My works in the exhibition expand upon the ongoing “_~form_” series to a selection of throw pillows and blankets (dream~forms_idle) and copper sheets (space~forms_currency).
Further Reading:
Clean Hands, Lillian’s exhibition text.
Crossing A Threshold: Tantalus’ Second Crime, nic wilson
w/ Katie Lyle and Gabrielle L'Hirondelle Hill, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis
Winter-Spring 2020, School of Art Gallery, University of Manitoba
Consider the Greek myth of Tantalus, who stole ambrosia, nectar, and the gods’ secrets of immortality for his people. As punishment for his crime, Tantalus was made to stand in a clear pool where water receded before he could drink, underneath trees laden with fruit that forever escaped his grasp. Touching leaves traces, often more lasting than originally imagined, but the absence of touch builds both anticipation and desire.
Dancing with Tantalus engages qualities of contact—between people, surfaces, and objects—to examine haptic intimacy and explore the causal relationship between artworks and the many structures that make contact with them—physically, intellectually, emotionally, institutionally, and historically.
My works in the exhibition expand upon the ongoing “_~form_” series to a selection of throw pillows and blankets (dream~forms_idle) and copper sheets (space~forms_currency).
Further Reading:
Clean Hands, Lillian’s exhibition text.
Crossing A Threshold: Tantalus’ Second Crime, nic wilson
*This exhibition develops from Greener than Grass at Susan Hobbs Gallery in 2020.
