LatentCity: Six Emerging Vancouver Artists
Publication Launch: Friday, November 10, 2006, 7:30 pm
LatentCity: featuring works by Curtis Grahauer, Andrew Kent, Scott Massey, Alex Pensato, Kara Uzelman and Danna Vajda.
Writing by Willie Brisco and Lance Blomgren.
Exhibition curated by Werner Whitman.
Helen Pitt Gallery
#102-148 Alexander Street
Vancouver, British Columbia
T: 604.681.6740
www.helenpittgallery.org
LatentCity,
Published by the Helen Pitt Gallery in conjunction with the LatentCity exhibition, held October 20 to November 11, 2006.
ISBN 0-9782165-2-0
Released November 2006
32 pages, soft cover, color plates, 5.5 x 8.5
For ordering contact pittg@telus.net
The Helen Pitt Gallery is pleased to announce the publication of LatentCity, the catalogue of the exhibition held from October 21 to November 11, 2006 in Vancouver, British Columbia.
LatentCity brings together the recent work of six diverse Vancouver artists who share an interest in the relationship between the materiality of the urban environment and the psychological traces it leaves on its inhabitants. Conceived as an inversion of Freuds notion of the mind as a city, these artists present an archeological view of our built environments that suggests the oppositethe city as mind.
The works in LatentCityspanning installation, drawing, photography and videolocate the distinct yet hazy communicative pulses and impulses resonating from the grey matter of the built environment. Using a variety of artistic and investigative strategies, the artists in this exhibition engage the city in much the same way a psychoanalyst studies a subject or an anthropologist attempts to resurrect a sense of context from the relics of past civilizations. And yet this type of analysis is far from perfect science. As LatentCity suggests, the possibility of fully understanding the subject is constantly confounded by miscommunication, misreading and problematic issues of psychological transference and projection. In LatentCity the idea of the city remains a half-imagined fiction; the artists investigations into the various facets of city life are ultimately investigations of self.
The works in this exhibition move through a conceptual, associative landscape marked by haunting industrial zones, backyard excavations, neighbourhood karaoke, Arthur Erikson, Zabriskie Point and buildings that come to you in your dreams. Collectively, these artists have shown across Canada and Europe, and locally at the Or gallery, Contemporary Art Gallery, Charles H. Scott and Artspeak, among others.
ARTISTS Curtis Grahauer is a graduate of the Emily Carr Institute. Working with film, sound, mixed media and primarily working in video, his practice is studying the dissipation and parasitic nature of pop culture through the documentation of isolated performative moments.
Andrew Kents work generally involves compounding literal readings of culturally (in)significant moments. He lives and works in Vancouver and is a graduate of the Emily Carr Institute.
Scott Massey is a Vancouver artist whose work explores the uneasy relationship between nature and culture. Although primarily a photo-based artist, Massey also creates sculptural installations and temporary outdoor interventions related to this theme. He has recently exhibited at Artspeak (Vancouver) and the Surrey Art Gallery.
Alex Pensatos works forge associative systems of language that question the modern built environment. Rematerializing the abstracted notions of our surroundings, his works offer the viewer a personal experience with the structures and material sensibilities of the city. He recently exhibited Coming Soon .at Access Project Space and will have a solo exhibit in 2007 at the Galerie Werner Whitman in Montreal.
Kara Uzelman has worked extensively both collaboratively and independently. Since 2002 she has shown work in numerous group and solo exhibitions and has been highlighted in both national and local publications. Recently she received a Visual Artists Development Award and has been studying with Archaeologist, Ross Jamieson.
Danna Vajda was born in North Vancouver, BC. She graduated from the Emily Carr Institute in 2005 and currently resides in Montreal, Quebec. Recent exhibitions include Model Spaces at Galerie Werner Whitman and Holodecks and Other Spaces: Wreath of Kron at the Blackboard Gallery.
AUTHORS Willie Brisco is the current director of the Galerie Werner Whitman, Montreal. Working as an artist, curator and writer, he has produced numerous exhibitions objects and events. Forthcoming exhibitions include Noh Forest, Premise Beach and Jerry Zaslove: Photographs.
Lance Blomgren is the curator/director of the Helen Pitt Gallery. His books include Practice (1995), Walkups (2000) and Corner Pieces (2004).
