Tonight as well: Moral Dissonance Vernissage

There’s also an intriguing vernissage happening tonight at the VAV Gallery (7-9pm, 1395 René Lévesque Ouest). Matt Goerzen & Mark Stroemich are exhibiting Three Men Beating Someone Else to Near Death with Sticks and Bats and Such (pictured above in all its confrontational gloriousness). The second installation, Quantum Prayer Bells, is by Nimalan Yoganathan. It is a “quadraphonic sound installation that immerses the listener inside a Montreal South Indian Hindu temple re-contextualized within an Electroacoustic setting.”

The show’s all about negotiating selves through either destruction or reflection, and it’s staying in the VAV gallery until May 8.

Tonight. Excitement before May in the name of Malcolm Sutherland….

Anyone who is interested in animation should perk their little ears up over their midday cappucinos and lift their hooded, weary lids to mine, like the man in this image is doing (courtesy of the pen of Malcolm Sutherland). For what I am to tell you will be of utmost importance in your life, and good enough to cancel whatever plans you might have for tonight (hot dates excepted. but only HOT dates!)

Anyone NOT interested in animation, please re-read the first paragraph and ignore the part about having to be interested in animation. This post is of equal importance for everyone. 

Tonight, at 7:30pm at the NFB (on the corner of St Denis and de Maisonneuve) animator, clown, sheep, illustrator, old-soul and dear heart Malcolm Sutherland will be presenting about his creative process and his body of work, including a peek at his latest delight, The Forming Game. 

This is going to be truly awesome folks, seriously. Sutherland is already an established artist in the realm of animation, and he is a PUPPY, people, a puppy. I do believe he will be remembered as this generation’s Normal McLaren, I kid you not. Which in and of itself is reason to go see a selection of his films, (they are all creations of a true genius) but why I am encouraging you to ditch your lukewarm dates and come to this instead is because he is a truly affable, engaging fellow who does a genuinely inspiring presentation. You will not be bored. And that date you were going on? You can’t really guarantee the same of that, can you….?

COMBINE

COMBINE is the name of this year’s Concordia Undergraduate Show. Some of the artists showing have already received love on this site like Bridget Moser and Katie Jung but I’ll be sure to be there to scout out new interesting people to add to the blogosphere. Here are all the details.
April 27 - May 22, 2009
Opening Thursday April 30th from 6 - 8pm
FOFA Gallery
1515 St Catherine Ouest

Jennifer Abernan
Denise Santillan Moreno
Tara Chartrand
Matthew Gagnon
Gaëlle D. Lalonde
Nimalan Yoganathan
Christina Hirukawa
Patrick Guilbeault
Marilyne Blais
Pier-Yves Larouche
David G. Butler
Étienne Tremblay-Tardif
Zoë Yuristy
Stephanie Lau
Alanna Lynch
Lise Latreille
Kevin Bertram
Brett Bergmann
Laël Williams
Sylvia Chan
Bridget Moser
Adrian DiLena
Yolaine Lefebvre
Katie Jung

Conversation with artists
hosted by jake moore
Thursday April 30th

12:30 - 1:30 PM
Alanna Lynch, Lise Latreille, Brett Bergmann, Jennifer Abernan, Christina Hirukawa, Patrick Guilbeault, Zoë Yuristy

3:00 - 4:00 PM
Gaëlle D. Lalonde, Matthew Gagnon, Kevin Bertram, Yolaine Lefebvre, Pier-Yves Larouche

5:00 - 6:00 PM
Nimalan Yoganathan, Tara Chartrand, David G. Butler
Étienne Tremblay-Tardif, Katie Jung, Bridget Moser, Stephanie Lau

Speaking of May Day…

Someone definitely hit the month of May with the awesome-stick, because on May 2nd, there will be a crazy carnival/fundraiser over at the Eastern Bloc (7240 Clark). It is co-hosted by Paper and Pine and here’s a few of the things you’ll find there:

BOOTHS! GAMES! SNACKS! BINGO! LIFE COACHING! KARAOKE! BINGO! NEW LOVE! VARIETY SHOW! THEATRE!

Indeed, an evening not to be missed. 2 dollars to get in, doors open at 8pm.

MAYDAY MAYDAY!

Man, May just keeps getting better and better. Such a juicy month, it’s like I ordered a visual-arts thick cut-steak and it’s in the process of getting cooked up for me. Oh yeah. That actually sounds absolutely perverse, but it’s Friday, so I think that’s an acceptable tone all things considered.

So the REASON why May is getting better and better is that I forgot that it is the Montreal Biennale again, from May 1st until the end of the month. Oh yeah. One of the things I love about the Biennale is how they focus not only on local amazingness in the form of talented artists, but on the creative links between curators and their selected peoples, and the collaborations that arise from the whole darn process.

In fact, the festival website talks about the open culture model that the Biennale is shaping this year’s vision with, a stance that allows for a deeper exploration of the relationship between the artistic process and creativity, of communal sharing and cooperation.

I’ll be doing a little guide for folks interested in exploring the nooks and crannies of what this Biennale has to offer, but as a little tantalizing tidbit (before the main STEAK COURSE) I’d like to mention that the fest has programmed Rick Leong (whose painting you see here) in collaboration with a musician, as well as ROADSWORTH, my favourite graffiti artist of all time.

I am very much looking forward to perusing the program in a more indepth way this weekend to offer you, dear reader, an intimate guide to all the other bits and snacks the Biennale has in store for you.

Now I am going to go eat lunch, because frank(furter)ly, these food metaphors are starting to irritate me.

Bring On The LOLs

Some regional humor for you all. As a BC ex-pat in Montreal I feel the need to share this with all of you. I’m not the only one, raise your hand if you’re from BC living in Quebec.
This what happens when I open emails titled “This is funny”.

We Have A (Late) Winner (Or 2)

We used the random number generator to draw a winner of the Kate Bingaman-Burt giveaway. The number was 6 which means Jed is the winner. Jed bought pie fixings, always a good financial choice if you ask me.
Also I would like to offer a runner up prize to Sophie who was the only person to actually draw her purchases. Here’s her illustration.

You 2 can both expect an email from us.

I can’t believe I am doing this….

For earth day folks, here’s a little Andy Goldsworthy. BUT consider this a challenge - can people comment with their favourite environmentally aware or environmentally engaged artists that might not have a bunch of coffee table books out?

Not that I dislike Andy Goldsworthy. I should give the guy a break. I mean, he’s way more patient than I will ever, ever be.

May is officially the new black.

Oh man. I also just found out that Ed Pien, who I did a mini-post on (somewhat) recently, is going to be at the Pierre-Francois Ouellette Art Contemporain, (another Belgo/Beluga Building staple) from May 16-June 27th. Bah! I will write about it more thoroughly in the future, kids, but needless to say ALL THIS IS MAKING ME WISH I HAD A TIME TRAVEL MACHINE TO GO FORWARD IN TIME 2 WEEKS.

Wouldn’t that be ridiculous, if you had a time travel machine that could bring you either into the future or back in the past (or back, to the future?) and you could only use it once and you decided to go into the future only a few days or weeks later than your present time?

Yes that would be ridiculous. Except for right now with all these amazing exhibitions happening. Right now, that would make so much sense.

Speaking of May…..

Anyone, anyone? Bueller…..?