A Collaborative Project with Sean Martindale and Pascal Paquette
Relocated from the street, local Toronto artists Sean Martindale and Pascal Paquette come together in the gallery for a collaborative installation in the Toronto Now Series. Using convergent forms of street art, graffiti writing and activist interventions combined with contemporary painting, sculpture and design these artists eradicate traditional art classifications and work to expand the understanding of what artistic creativity can be.
Taking inspiration from their daily environment, the gallery and the current socio-political and cultural climate of Toronto, this installation invites audiences to reconsider Toronto Now.
Curated by Katherine Dennis, an MFA candidate in Criticism & Curatorial Practice at OCAD University, this exhibition is the focus of her thesis. Over the course of five months the artists and curator have worked closely with the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) including the FRANK restaurant, the AGO gift shop and the Weston Family Learning Centre to construct an integrated project that works with and responds to established museum systems.
............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
.....................................................
Playfully responding to the Young gallery's position within the larger museum framework, Martindale and Paquette present the NOW Service Bureau. This Do It Yourself (DIY) agency offers visitors the opportunity to use the gallery as a forum for pressing Toronto issues. Pushing the idea of Toronto Now to its edge the artists appropriate the AGO logo and the Now name to provide a place of artistic creativity that encourages mindful action on local issues. This project reflects the artists’ interest in the tension between the rush and impatience of our current lifestyle and the benefit of slowing down, being mindful and aware of environmental, political and cultural subjects. This tension is supported by the DIY mentality that privileges the experience of the here and now in order to provoke change through self-consciousness, self-transformation and social interactions or exchanges.
Martindale and Paquette’s installation includes a workspace for the artists and a lounge and work area for visitors (with free wi-fi access provided by the AGO). Next to their service counter, a comment wall provides space for visitors to display and reflect on their own ideas. Posting personal responses to current local or global issues on the wall the visitor contributes their own creative energies to the installation. Two time-lapse videos of graffiti writing taking place outside the gallery and a large-scale NOW sculpture finish the installation. Infinite NOW is a dynamic artwork that is completed, not by the artists, but by the visitors. Approaching the wall the visitor stands between two mirrored NOW sculptures that reflect their image ad infinitum.
As a DIY agency the artists flip the expectation of a functional service bureau and instead look to visitors to participate directly through attentive awareness, conversation or action. While the artworks function independently, the installation contains elements of social practice that aim to foster relationships and promote discussion. The artists will spend time in the gallery over the course of the exhibition to talk to people about the ideas being shared. When the artists are not around, visitors are encouraged to make use of the space and metal comment wall to post their thoughts, engage in the work and converse with others.
When transported into the museum Martindale and Paquette open up the Young gallery as a place where socially relevant and contentious ideas are addressed head on through art and where visitors are invited in to experience a previously overlooked space devoted to creativity.
Gallery Hours
Monday: CLOSED
Tuesday - Friday
11:30 am – 10:30 pm
Saturday
10 am – 10:30 pm
Sunday
10 am – 3 pm
January 21st 2012 to
April 1st 2012
Opening January 20th 7pm to 9pm
Young Gallery, Art Gallery of Ontario
Enter through the FRANK Restaurant at 317 Dundas Street West Toronto, ON Canada M5T 1G4
Photograph Cindy Blazevic
.....................................................
.....................................................
NOW Service Bureau Office Hours: Meet Sean and Pascal in person every Wednesday evening from 6 to 8pm in the Young Gallery (starting Feb. 15th 2012)
