Hedda Roman: Rogue Planet

Oakville Galleries announces its summer exhibition Rogue Planet by German artist duo Hedda Roman, opening on Saturday, June 22. Following the opening is our Summer Party and the first program of Sunset Kino, Canada’s only outdoor, avant-garde film festival. 

Hedda Roman: Rogue Planet
At Gairloch Gardens and Centennial Square, Oakville Galleries
June 22–September 28, 2024

Exhibition opening events: Saturday, June 22, 2024
2–5pm: Exhibition Opening, Centennial Square
3–6pm: Exhibition Reception and Remarks at Gairloch Gardens
6–10pm: Summer Party & Sunset Kino in Gairloch Gardens

Hedda Roman will be in attendance.

All are welcome. All events are free. Join the Art Bus!

The exhibition Rogue Planet by Hedda Roman, explores the complexities of fictional biography, origin, and identity through AI technologies. Central to this exhibition is Oldboy, an avatar and Latent Space Traveller, whose poetic dialogues bridge digital realms with reality. Oldboy’s existence challenges more traditional concepts of origin and identity, reflecting the transformative impact of digital technologies and AI on our understanding of selfhood. 

The exhibition invites visitors to reconsider identity in the context of digital narratives and essentialism, and prompts a reflection on how machine learning and digital technologies shape, distort, and reconstruct our perceptions of identity and reality. Ultimately Rogue Planet encourages deeper contemplation on the influence of digitalization on identity as well as the authenticity of our personal and collective stories.

Hedda Roman is a Düsseldorf-based artist mesh composed of Hedda Schattanik and Roman Szczesny. Interweaving cinematographic elements with surreal animation, literature, drama, sculpture, photography, and drawing, they create, among others, immersive video installations as well as computer-generated images. Solo exhibitions include Sies + Höke, Düsseldorf (2023, 2021), Salzburger Kunstverein, (2023), Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2021), Sammlung Philara, Düsseldorf (2019), Julia Stoschek Collection, Studio 54, Düsseldorf (2019), Insel Hombroich, Neuss (2018), COMA Gallery, Sydney (2018).

Hedda Roman are also Oakville Galleries’ first artists-in-residence for 2024. This unique artist residency and apartment is located at Gairloch Gardens, one of the region’s most beautiful parks. 

Special thanks to Goethe-Institut Toronto for supporting this exhibition & residency.

Sunset Kino
Oakville Galleries in Gairloch Gardens
June 22, 2024–July 11, 2024

Sunset Kino is Canada’s only outdoor, avant-garde film festival. Founded by Séamus Kealy in Austria in 2017, this festival continues now at Oakville Galleries. Introduced by the programmers and commencing at sunset, audiences experience a curated program of films and videos by Canadian and international artists. 

This year’s theme, “Everything is a Lie,” complements the summer exhibition by Hedda Roman. The program explores narratives that inform our current world, encouraging deeper consideration of the influence of digitalization on identity and the authenticity of our personal and collective stories. The program thus ventures into themes of truth and fiction; reality and virtuality; distortion and essentialism; disinformation, propaganda and representation; as well as how art, film, ideas and politics all intersect in a rapidly changing world.

Program
Saturday, June 22, 8:30pm
Films by Catherina Cramer, Daphne Fietz, Fynn Ribbeck, and Silke Schönfeld
Programmed by Hedda Roman

Thursday, June 27, 8:30pm
Films by Aideen Barry
Programmed by Séamus Kealy

Thursday, July 4, 8:30pm
Films by Rehab Nazzal, Ali Kazimi, Jayce Salloum, and Sanaz Sohrabi
Programmed by Faisal Anwar & Tazeen Qayyum

Thursday, July 11, 8:30pm
Films by Adrian Paci
Programmed by Séamus Kealy

Oakville Galleries operates with support from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, an agency of the Government of Ontario, and the Corporation of the Town of Oakville, along with individual, corporate, and foundation partne