Squirrel Face: Highlights from CONTACT '09

I can't believe the month of May is coming to a close. CONTACT was quite strong this year and I found myself inspired by so many photographers and cleverly curated exhibitions.

A few standouts for me:

Jeff Harris at Allan Lambert Galleria in Brookfield Place.
What a talent Jeff is. His show was incredible and a total celebration of life. He has so many amazing images that it's hard to select just a few, so here's a bunch of them.

copyright Jeff Harris

From the Contact website:
In the grand atrium of Brookfield Place, this exhibition’s massive grid of images celebrates a ten-year milestone in Jeff Harris’s personal photo project. Since January 1, 1999, Harris has made at least one photograph of himself every day. Soon after, he started posting them on the internet. Harris’ project anticipates the current obsession taken up by millions of people to document and make public every aspect of their lives on Facebook, Flickr and similar sites. Harris’ photographs are selfportraits in the broadest definition of the term. Sometimes the images contain only the barest trace of the subject – the artist’s feet, shadow or his reflection on a table – and as often as not the portraits of Harris have been taken by other people (the artist frequently has celebrities he happens to encounter take his picture – Gene Simmons, Michael Moore, Leslie Feist). Seen together, the 3,653 images provide an evocative portrayal of how Harris’ life plays out, day after day. Whether the social media giants will continue to flourish remains to be seen; meanwhile, Jeff Harris’ website has a huge following and he plans to keep on shooting.

Hank Willis Thomas at Georgia Sherman Projects
Totally amazing!! Due to its strong response, the show has been extended until June 20. Go see it! That's all I can say.

copyright Hank Willis Thomas

From the Contact website:
Sourced from an evolving mass of iconic images of corporate American advertising, Thomas’ work explores the genesis of the still image in the creation of cultural identity. Advertising and branding has disconnected the public from cultural reality and has produced a new visual vocabulary that defines our relationship to objects. Perhaps the concept that “the medium is the message” has never been better exemplified than in how advertising and branding have shaped issues of race, class and culture. These issues are vividly brought to light in Thomas’ re-appropriation of the past 50 years of corporate advertising depicting Black Americans.

Feature Exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art.
The show runs until June 14.

copyright Barbara Astman

From the Contact website:
Today, the proliferation of photographic technologies is laden with infinite possibilities for image production, reflecting our rapidly changing world and burgeoning global culture. Meanwhile, historical precedents in the medium continue to extend substantial influence. Still Revolution: Suspended in Time looks back to the revolutionary foundations of photography to explore the current innovations that continue to transform the medium. The exhibition presents eight Canadian and international artists whose photographs mirror a complex history marked by pervasive change. From documentary to abstraction, choreographed fact to constructed fiction, the works in this exhibition implicate photography’s catalytic role in social and political change. Suspending transitory moments in time, the evolving manifestations of photographic imagery overwhelmingly influence the way that we see the world today.

Alison Rossiter at Stephen Bulger Gallery.

copyright Alison Rossiter

From the Contact website:
Alison Rossiter has worked with the materials and processes of light-sensitive, gelatin silver-based photography since 1970. Her exhibition Lament pays homage to the disappearing materials of analogue photography, as the global shift from photochemical processing gives rise to digitization. Rossiter’s luminous images rely on the intrinsic qualities of expired photographic papers from throughout the 20th century that are now part of our history. Processing these papers, she reveals years of incidental exposure, moisture, humidity and physical disruption, resulting in a latent imagery that has been coaxed to life. This project would have been unimaginable just two decades ago when graded gelatin silver papers of every variety were still widely available. Transforming the medium that was once used to realistically document a fleeting moment, Rossiter abstractly depicts the passage of time.

Beverly Owens at Beverly Owens Gallery.

copyright Beverly Owens

From the Contact website:
Posing, posturing, a playful sense of presence and gravitas appear inherent to group photography. Owens’ contemporary photo/encaustic twist brings doubt to our understanding of group identity. Binary tensions between gender, sexuality and race melt and we ask ourselves: Can we really know our whereabouts, when standing within a group? Curated by Michelle Cox.

James Nizam at Birch Libralato.
The show runs until June 13.

copyright James Nizam

From the Contact website:
In his series Anteroom, James Nizam has turned the interiors of abandoned, soon-to-be-demolished homes into room-sized camerae obscurae. He achieves this by fitting a makeshift lens to a hole he made in a wall, or attached to a hole in garbage bags covering a window. He then photographs the results with a 35mm camera, creating chaotic-looking images that presage not only the photographed structures’ imminent destruction but also the tenuous future of analogue photography itself. Nizam’s work in this series suggests reasons for the pinhole camera’s increasing popularity: it’s a format that looks to the past as a way to consider the state of the medium today.

And of course, how could I not mention Michael Werner at one of my favourite places on Queen West for lattes and capuchinos, the White Squirrel Coffee Shop. The show runs until June 8. It's super cute!

copyright Michael Werner

From the Contact website:
First spotted on Queen Street West on the grounds of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, a burgeoning population of white squirrels migrated east to Trinity-Bellwoods Park, where they have captured the hearts and imaginations of local residents, artists and businesspeople alike. Due to chronic health problems caused by their recessive albino gene, the population has dwindled from an estimated 25 – 30 to just two squirrels. Michael Werner’s photos document their existence and activities in the park. Curated by Michael Werner.