By SHANNON KELLY
"Arirang" 2006 (Philippe Chancel)
Toronto’s annual CONTACT Photography Festival opens next Tuesday, May 1. The month-long festival brings the work of more than 100 photographers to more than 200 galleries, museums and public spaces around the city. The theme this year is “Public”. To see what’s on when, check out this handy festival map. (more…)
Artist Hua Jin exhibits her photography at Richmond Art Gallery
Explore the consequences of China’s one-child-per-family policy through photography and video by former Shanghai resident Hua Jin in her exhibit My Big Family. Jin, a first-generation “only” child, uses her own experiences to examine the repercussions of this rule on not only families, but the community and country, too. View her work at the Richmond Art Gallery (Apr. 20 to Jun. 10).—Jennifer Patterson
"The Believer" by Gavin Murphy is one of the photographs on display for "Transitions."
Local photographer Gavin Murphy is using his art to support a good cause. Until April 6, proceeds from his latest fundraising exhibition will go to the organization Breast Cancer Action Ottawa. Entitled “Transitions presented by Meridian,” the show features portraits of women of all shapes, sizes, ages, races, and backgrounds. These inspiring photos are an apt celebration of women, while also raising money to support survivors of a disease that targets people from all walks of life. On view at Gallery Farina, 216 Elgin St., and Meridian Credit Union, 99 Bank St., 613-741-4029.
"Floating Village, Cambodia" by David Burdeny
Fresh off a trip to Southeast Asia, local photographer David Burdeny presents chromogenic prints in Traverse at Jennifer Kostuik Gallery (Mar. 8 to Apr. 8). He creates these stunning photos by layering dye over a silver-halide image (“Floating Village, Cambodia,” pictured), his works often a commentary on the human condition.—Kristina Urquhart
This photo shows actors from Orpheus Musical Theatre Society rehearsing for "Rent."
Friday, March 2
Orpheus Musical Theatre brings its rendition of the Tony Award-winning Rent to the stage. Based on Puccini’s La Bohème, this rock opera follows a group of young, struggling artists trying to make it in New York City. Gritty and modern, the friends face challenges that range from relationships to money to the health threat of HIV and AIDS. See why the musical lasted 12 years on Broadway when this local theatre group takes on the show. (And don’t be surprised if you start humming songs like “La Vie Bohème B” and “Seasons of Love” and dreaming of running away to the Big Apple.) Opening tonight and running until March 11.
In 1971, Pink Floyd played two shows in Quebec, one in Montreal and one in Quebec city, for the first time ever. Celebrate the 40th anniversary of these legendary concerts with the 2011 travelling show Eclipse – The Pink Floyd Story, on at Casino du Lac-Leamy. This commemorative performance demonstrates the band’s evolution, with a live band performing the best of Pink Floyd from the early days to the later years. Moving lights, spectacular lasers, and video projections make this a complete sensory experience.
Enter the musical universe of Kyssi Wète this Friday at the National Arts Centre. Wète mixes the sounds and rhythms of blues, reggae, rumba, soul, raga, and pop to transport his audiences somewhere between France, Jamaica, and the Congo. Using human diversity and relationships as his inspiration, he relays messages of interracial harmony with his unique voice.
Saturday, March 3
Celebrate International Women’s Week on the opening day of the Celebrate HER Charity Music and Art Festival. The festival celebrates outstanding women in the Ottawa community with a week full of art, music, dance, theatre, and spoken word poetry. Check out this year’s centrepiece: the “Amazing Women-Femmes d’exception” photo installation at Alpha Soul Café, which includes women such as University of Ottawa professor Constance Backhouse and children’s author Naomi Guzman Poole. (more…)
Robert Frank's Chattanooga, Tennessee
JANUARY 24 TO MARCH 10 The timeless art of assemblage earns attention this season as the University of Toronto Art Centre showcases more than 200 images from the collection of Harry and Ann Malcolmson. One of Canada’s most impressive private stocks of vintage photography, this archive represents a trove of documentary and artistic works that exemplify the medium’s historical development and its major creative movements. Featuring diverse images by the likes of Robert Frank, André Kertész, Man Ray and photographic pioneer Henry Fox Talbot, the display reminds us how collections are at once composed of individual pieces, but gain consequence through their “being together.”
#88 by Ishiuchi Miyako "Wristwatch," 2010/2010 C-type print, 335 x 230, Okimoto S.
August 6, 1945. It’s a date not forgotten by many, but a Japanese photographer aims to document it for posterity with her 48 moving images of everyday objects left behind by the victims of the atomic bombing at Hiroshima, Japan, during World War II. Photos of these ownerless belongings, including a wristwatch (pictured), give a personal take on the event in hiroshima by Ishiuchi Miyako at the UBC Museum of Anthropology (to Feb. 12).—Kristina Urquhart
To January 22
"The Distance Between You and Me 15" by Gonzalo Lebrija courtesy the artist and Gallerie Laurent Godin, Paris
What do Vancouver, Los Angeles and Guadalajara have in common? Just ask Isabelle Pauwels, Kerry Tribe and Gonzalo Lebrija, a trio of photo and video artists who share similar ideas about physical and psychological location and dislocation despite living in different cities. See their work in The Distance Between You and Me at Vancouver Art Gallery.—Kristina Urquhart
"Kenyan Water Hole No. 1" by Alfred J. Klein, 1933, courtesy Satellite Gallery
Step back in time during Nature, Knowledge and the Knower at Satellite Gallery (to Jan 14). You’ll see three panoramic photograph enlargements taken in Kenya between 1920 and 1930 (“Kenyan Water Hole No. 1” by Alfred J. Klein, pictured), which were later used to aid in the creation of the habitat dioramas at the American Museum of Natural History. Complementing the exhibition is an online archive of over 400 photos by explorer James L. Clark and other artists. —Kristina Urquhart
More information:
SATELLITE GALLERY 560 Seymour St., 2nd floor; 604-687-8425
"Lunch @ Times Square" by Claudia Salguero.
Photo editing has become a popular way to beautify, correct, or enhance photos, but Claudia Salguero’s “Urbano Beats” uses the technique for a completely different purpose: she digitally paints over a photo and manipulates it to add artistic touches that did not exist before. In this exhibit, combining the realism of a photograph with the fantasy of a painting puts an intriguing postmodern twist on her subjects. Her distinct pieces will be on display at Trinity Art Gallery from Dec. 1 to Jan. 10 (the vernissage takes place Dec. 4 from 1 to 3pm).
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