Release party:Thursday, November 21, 2013,
7–10pm
Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art
401 Richmond Street West, Suite 124
Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5V 3A8
www.prefix.ca
Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art is pleased to announce the release of the 28th issue of Prefix Photo magazine. On the subject of monuments, editor Scott McLeod writes: “A consideration of monuments and photography brings together a complex array of thoughts and associations. While photography may be used simply as a tool to document monuments, it also has the ability to monumentalize its subjects. As it endures over time, however, the photograph, like monuments themselves, comes to serve the purpose of historical preservation. In other words, one can both photograph monuments, and monumentalize photographs.”
Contributions to the magazine include the following:
Mark Durden examines the dominant themes in the work of Albanian artist Adrian Paci. Living in exile in Italy, Paci plumbs the depths of the experience of exile both symbolically and literally. Working predominantly in video but also with sculpture, painting and photography, he explores the dynamics of rupture and attachment. More recently, he has begun to think about global capitalism’s relations of production and distribution. Extending his long-standing preoccupation with the tension between reality and poetics, his latest project, TheColumn, embodies these relations.
Bruce W. Ferguson discusses the present-day issues of Egypt through an examination of works by four artists––Lara Baladi, Ahmed Basiony, Amal Kenawy and Bahia Shehab––created in the two years prior to the now-famous “18 days” of revolution that began in January of 2011. Reviewing recent developments in Egypt, and taking as his starting point the assumption that works of art can be symptomatic of larger cultural and political issues, Ferguson explores the ways in which art can be seen to be critical and, in a sense, diagnostic, even in a society in which “symbolic capital,” as he calls it, is most tightly controlled.
Leah Modigliani analyzes the work of Canadian artist Jeff Wall. She notes that, since the early 1980s, most critical writing about Wall’s work has ignored feminist readings of it, aligning it instead with cinematography, the historic avant-garde and a return to history painting. Tracking the gendered content in many of Wall’s works, Modigliani suggests that his artistic development was more directly influenced by the women’s movement of the 1970s than has been previously acknowledged.
Eldon Garnet, in his literary feature, conjures the image of a great work of art––a monumental photograph for which the negatives and files were destroyed, no reproductions were allowed and the only existent print was destroyed by fire.
Other contributors include Halil Altindere, Coco Fusco, Oliver Hartung, Jan Kempenaers and Michael Love, with book reviews by Aileen Burns&Johan Lundh, Sarah Munro, Amanda Rataj and Dara Solomon.
On the occasion of the release of Prefix Photo 28, Prefix ICA is pleased to host the closing reception for Trade Marks, an exhibition curated by Betty Julian andfeaturing the work of Keesic Douglas, Meryl McMaster, Nigit’sil Norbert and Bear Witness. The release party for the magazine and the closing reception for the exhibition will be held on Thursday, November 21, from 7 to 10pm at Prefix ICA, located at 401 Richmond Street West, Suite 124, Toronto. Admission is free.
Prefix Photo is published by Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art, Inc., a registered charitable organization that fosters the appreciation and understanding of contemporary photographic, media and digital arts. Prefix Photo is available by subscription and in fine bookstores and newsstands in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Spain, Greece, Switzerland, Ireland, Singapore and Hong Kong.
Prefix Photo gratefully acknowledges its supporting sponsor Steam Whistle Brewing and its official catering sponsor à la Carte Kitchen for their assistance with the release party held for Prefix Photo 28 in Toronto.
Prefix Photo gratefully acknowledges the assistance of its staff, volunteers and patrons, as well as the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts. The Ontario Arts Council is an agency of the Government of Ontario.
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