fluid JUNE 5th - JULY 2nd, 2014 PROJECT GALLERY TORONTO
WELCOME Welcome to FLUID, a celebration of photography and video art by bisexual, pansexual, omnisexual, queer, two spirit and fluid-identified artists.
The recognition of our relationships, our history and culture - in the face of erasure and invisibility - is life-affirming and our artists celebrate these unabashedly.
These are works that challenge gender, sexual and personal boundaries. For some, this is their first time sharing their work publicly while for others, it is the first time they are sharing their work in an exhibition that unapologetically affirms their sexual identity.
We offer to you art that starts a conversation: art that builds bridges, changes perceptions and opens hearts.
with love, the fluid collective
Michael, Jaene & Catherine
THANK YOU TO OUR FRIENDS AND SUPPORTERS Toronto Bisexuality Education Project, DNA Toys, I Furiosi, Alex Adams, Amy Payne, Andrea Copeland, Anonymous, Apanaki Temitayo M, Barb Crisp, C Keeling, C.H. Baker, Caitlin Fisher, Dana Shaw, Darla Linville, Deborah Casado, Dennis Slade Jr., Felix Deak, Gabriel Holt, Gretchen Turner, Heather Zwicker, Ian de Rege, Irene & Andy Martin, J Varney, Jane Fisher, Jenni, Jermain Joseph, John Pindar, Kitty Kerosene, Krista Pennington Janicki, Kristine Maitland, Lana Daley, Lani Ka’ahumanu, Laura M, Leila Timmins, Lynnette McFadzen, Margaret Robinson, Mary Jo Sterne, Matt Soar, The McWhit Family, Megan, Melanie Schweppe, Melinda F. Brown, Meredith Simons, Mo Engel, Neoyorquina, Pamela Bentley, Penelope Ironstone, Phebe, Robin RenÊe, Robyn Ochs, Samantha M Derr, Sarah E Stumpf, Sean Patenaude, Simon Butcher, Stephen Harvey, Steve Hoffard, Sue Gwaaykyaa, Sunny Inga JosephSniuolis , Tara Schorr, Thomas and Gunilla Leavitt, Walter Rothenburger.
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS ALLICETTE TORRES AMANDA ROBERTSON-HEBERT ANGELA YUKIKO SHINTANI CATHERINE JONES JAENE CASTRILLON JENNI JIM RILEY JOYCE KATI HOLLAND KRISTY BOYCE MELISSA WILKINSON MICHAEL MILLS SARAH THOMSON SHANNON LILLY
Allicette Torres Harlem, NY Allicette Torres is best known for her photographic series on the conceptual nude. As a figurative photographer and curator the core of her work is about memory—the compelling, yearning, starvation or the gluttony it may elicit. Incorporating aspects of sculpture, film, and performance art she deliberately orchestrates her photos to imbue the pain of the past and its ramifications in present. Often through highly charged themes such as repression, history, race, and sexuality her photographs ask, “How does history coupled with choices or inactions shape the fabric and legacy of who we are?” Originally from Dorado, Puerto Rico, her early work visually depicted the historical context of colonialism and legacy through poetic and at times brutal imagery challenging the viewer. Since, her work has grown to be as formally ambitious, expressive as well as psychically probing. By 2012 she had been featured in over 35 national exhibitions, and was specially selected by General Electric Co. to exhibit at the Image in the Mirror: Reflection on Identity in Fairfield Connecticut. At the 2013 Femmes, Ancien Musée de Peinture Place de Verdun – Grenoble, France, Allicette debuted “Liberation Through Oppression” a controversial work regarding the hajib and burka and its context within the political climate
in Europe. She has currently been selected to show at Pont De Claix, France. Allicette has also been a finalist in the 3rd Edition International Julia Margaret Cameron Award, Nude category. Motivated by her conscientious approach to create a platform that will broaden the established confines of what is the nude photographic figure as art, Allicette founded the magazine Clear Nude, a quarterly publication focusing on the artistic nude. With a growing recognition of her work, nationally and internationally, Allicette Torres continues to expand the boundaries of the nude figure in photography, by breaking out of the photographic frame evoking a fearless and vulnerable image. Residing in Harlem New York, Allicette is a member of the Woman’s Caucus for Art (WCA) and artHARLEM, both major organizations for art in the United States and an affiliate of the Italian art collective, l’association Eco E Narciso. http://blue7.com/
Amanda Robertson-Hebert Toronto, ON This series is part of a larger collected works (still in progress) titled “Oral”. This photo series challenges our views about oral sex, personal power and self-respect. Intended as a cathartic relief, these pieces examine the artist’s personal relationship with her sexuality while processing intense experiences within her last relationship. A beautiful love can become feral and empty when one denies their own emotional needs. It is possible to make too many compromises to accommodate our partner. The subjects in these pieces are fouled by sexual fluids without being completely encompassed in supportive love. The images depict how we can give and receive orgasm. The bright colourful secretions are a playful attack on the graphic and sometimes disenfranchising nature of sex and pornography. These works explore the female’s relationship with accepting and rejecting her sexual independence, in spite of a society that struggles to understand equality and individuality. http://www.adoresubtract.net
Angela Yukiko Shintani Toronto, ON
Searching for inspiration on a warm fall day, I came upon an abandoned unkempt apple orchard. Carrying my corset, my subject, myself, I explored different ways to make the tree my model. The result was in its most natural state, nature chose to be fluid; the tree unbound, the corset untied.
nature chose to be fluid the tree unbound
Catherine Jones Toronto, ON I am interested in the elusiveness of memory. I am a photographer because I want to tell stories, but I often question how successful can I be as a storyteller without knowing and understanding my own personal history? I am without a country, without a history, disconnected and disowned. Sometimes it feels like I am crawling around in the shadows, alone. This series explores a particular fragment of memory between my sister and me. When I try and follow the threads I find myself in an uncomfortable place; an intersection of comfort and danger, craving and jealousy, desire and hatred. http://www.marmiteontoast.com
Jaene Castrillon // Toronto, ON
Jenni // Toronto, ON These self-portraits found me in a very dark, lost place in my life. I had just woken up from a 16 hour crash of mood, body, everything. My relationship is on the rocks, plagued by my selfdoubt surrounding a great deal including my sexuality. School is falling apart. The business is falling apart. I woke up to find a rainbow streak across my face thanks to an adjacent mirror. I wanted to
capture the moment of feeling so worn and yet having this beautiful colour playing across me, the sunlight just starting to lower. I took the pictures quickly before the light bounced off the mirror’s edge and disappeared completely. It was like a sign of new things to come. Of being broken and yet not so much so. A sign that I might be more fluid than I thought after all.
Jim Riley // Burlington, ON Jim Riley is an artist and independent curator. His art practice is a blend of documentary evidence, personal ideology, social commentary and artistic investigations. Riley’s present aesthetic investigations explore time and perceptual memory. He believes that time is not a linear quality but an elastic process when creating memory. Riley loops video imagery of a moment in time and it becomes neverending. The use of time can create beauty and mystery that we overlook at normal speed. His artworks deal more with an emotive narrative than one that is linear and literal. Water and Air are two of the classical elements that the ancients believed to reflect the simplest essential parts and principles of which anything or reality consists. The fluid aspect of water creatures mixing with the components of air (clouds and a bird) initially seems unnatural. The fireworks are sparked when the two elements’ mix in a gentle manner may suggest the fluidity of sexuality. The bird may represent a sexuality mediator. http://www.jimriley.ca
Joyce // Argentina
Kati Holland Budapest, Hungary Why should a person be limited to a given socially defined category? The hetero-bi-homosexual categories become irrelevant if we view people as a mix of masculine and feminine. The photographs I have submitted depict people in either a feminine or masculine light. This is merely a social construct of the person. I am trying to express that gender is imposed upon them from the outside and is very much dependent on the observer’s viewpoint. I feel that if someone feels they want to be viewed as a person of the opposite gender then they should be allowed to be who they want to be. https://www.behance.net/Kati_Holland
Kristy Boyce Toronto, ON “What Dyke Looks Like” (WDLL) is a portrait anthology of lesbian, queer, LGBTQ-identified non-heteronormative females. Each participant is encouraged to present their idea of what “dyke looks like” to/for them. This project seeks to take a closer look at what real queer women actually look like versus the stereotypes/preconceptions that people may have of their looks and lives. Cue images of burly girls resplendent in plaid from head to toe or “The L Word” gang in their completely “realistic” interpretation of queer life. They are from all walks of life, class and creed, come in every shape and form, and though they may love box, they should not be defined in one.
I have been photographing this project since 2011 and have photographed well over 100 women in Brooklyn, Toronto, Vancouver, Seattle and many smaller communities throughout Canada and the U.S.. Russia: Saying “This is What Dyke Looks Like” is a bold statement. And it will never be a true one without an international scope beyond just the North American perspective. In February of 2014 the world’s eyes were on Russia.
In light of the recent homophobia, violence towards queers, and antigay laws, right before the Olympics seemed the perfect time to go to Moscow and collect the stories of the LGBTQ community there through video interviews and photography. http://www.whatdykelookslike.com
Melissa Wilkinson Bono, Arkansas
This series relates to my interest in dichotomies: obscuring and revealing, attraction and repulsion, good and evil, the past and the present. I appropriate imagery from a variety of sources in order to develop a pastiche that fractures the conventional male gaze and positions art historical models as both subject and spectacle. I choose to dismantle epic narratives from the past to create a schizophrenic perspective. The images break from their original sources into fragments, creating a complex visual experience that both irritates and seduces.
Michael Mills Toronto, ON These two photographs examine some of the complexities of understanding oneself in relationship as a gender fluid individual. “In and Out” is about power and receptivity, both. It examines the enticement, the allure, and the possible danger of sexual intimacy in a relationship where much is unknown and uncategorized. “Caress” draws to mind a gentle hour on a weekend afternoon when two lovers are alone, still, and alive to each other in the way a tree is alive to sunlight. It is about that thing that happens when words and conscious thoughts quiet down and being takes over. The two images together are about bodies and hearts. They draw attention to the manner in which individuals create intimacy and how they, in due time, separate themselves from their shared territory in order to define necessary boundaries. Being fluid is about riding the waves into shore and retreating… into shore and retreating… http://www.studiomills.com
Sarah Thomson Toronto, ON
My artwork takes a critical look at our internal personal struggles and how we choose to overcome them. We all experience them, the life crisis; be it our body, our mind, or our sexuality. Taking the time to smash down the roadblocks in our life is the key to self-love and success. Photographing this series on a Mamiya 645 and using traditional medium format black & white film allowed for a fluid and vulnerable workflow. I impulsively scratched and burnt the negatives. I then threw the film in a garbage bag and violently hit and stomped on them. Developing the photographs in the darkroom allowed for a completely hands-on artisan process. This process was, in itself a manner for me to confront and destroy my own anxieties. The rebellious destructiveness forced me to deal with the uncontrollable consequences of my actions. In the end showing the beauty to be found in the broken. http://sarahTphoto.ca
the beauty in the broken
During their earliest years, children tend not to view the male sex and female sex as being very different, if at all. Our strange attraction to the same or opposite sex can come naturally and early, but I think that for those of us who lie somewhere in the middle, the attraction is thrust upon us from the group of people we are raised around, and the society we watch and read about. Some of us may be born with a neutrality of sexuality, but because all we see is heterosexual behavior and partnerships, we then feel as though that’s the way it’s supposed to be, and the other part of us that is drawn to the same sex is just an oddity. For homosexuals, these same thoughts may come into their heads, but it is then followed by an understanding - whether consciously or not - that they actually have no attraction to the opposite sex whatsoever. During a separate shoot, my model suggested we set up this look and scenario. While shooting and editing, I found myself responding to the images in an entirely unexpected way. I saw a male and female in a relationship by definition but not in practice. They are looking in opposite directions, signifying
their emotional distance from each other, despite the effort to tie themselves together through the color of their clothing and what they view as poise. To me, the stiffness in their bodies conveys a sense of coldness; it shows they are actively trying to hold themselves up, perhaps because they are not satisfied enough in their relationship to do it naturally, or to have their partner help them with it. They try to fit themselves into a box, conforming to the norm. What comes from this is a distorted and unsettling relationship. They are solitary within a coupling. However, I believe they are not truly as rigid as they are attempting to be. Who are they? Is he a homosexual man trapped in a heterosexual relationship? Have they been together since they were teenagers, and after years of distance has she recently realized that she is gay or bisexual? Have they both had same-sex affairs outside of their boring relationship? Or are they simply two people who are not attracted to each other? http://shannon-lilly.com/
Shannon Lilly Berlin, Germany
WORKS IN THE EXHIBITION ALLICETTE TORRES
Untitled, 2014, 13 x 19 in Untitled, 2014, 13 x 19 in Untitled, 2014, 13 x 19 in Untitled, 2014, 13 x 19 in Untitled, 2014, 13 x 19 in
KATI HOLLAND
Bang, 2014 Video, 1:06 min
Be Who You Want To Be 1, 2014, 16.5 x 16.5 in Be Who You Want To Be 2, 2014, 16.5 x 16.5 in Be Who You Want To Be 3, 2014, 16.5 x 16.5 in Be Who You Want To Be 4, 2014, 16.5 x 16.5 in
AMANDA ROBERTSON-HEBERT
KRISTY BOYCE
Mother’s Milk, 2013, 12 x 18 in Lovesick, 2013, 12 x 18 in
ANGELA YUKIKO SHINTANI Tree Unbound, 2001, 20 x 16 in
CATHERINE JONES
Anamnesis 1, 2013, 16 x 20 in Anamnesis 2, 2013, 16 x 20 in
JAENE CASTRILLON Unbroken, 2013 Video, 5:00 min
JENNI
Untitled, 2014, 8 x 10 in
JIM RILEY
Water & Air, 2014 Video, 4:11 min
JOYCE
Untitled, 2013, 16 x 20 in Untitled, 2013, 16 x 20 in
Elliot, 2013, 11 x 14 in Fuck Putin, 2013, 11 x 14 in Olga in St. Petersburg, 2013, 11 x 14 in Two Spirit Elder, 2013, 11 x 14 in
MELISSA WILKINSON
Back Glitch, 2014, 16 x 24 in Full, 2014, 24 x 16 in
MICHAEL MILLS
IN AND OUT, 2014, 90 x 70 cm CARESS, 2014, 90 x 70 cm
SARAH THOMSON Axe Resolution 1, 2013, 12 x 12 in Axe Resolution 2, 2013, 12 x 12 in Axe Resolution 3, 2013, 12 x 12 in Axe Resolution 4, 2013, 12 x 12 in
SHANNON LILLY
Him and Her, 2013, 19 x 13 in Him and Her 2, 2013, 19 x 13 in
EVENTS Saturday June 14th, 2pm MEET THE ARTISTS Artists’ talks and Q&A with Amanda Robertson-Hebert, Kristy Boyce, Michael Mills & Sarah Thomson Sunday June 15th, 2pm SEEING OUT LOUD* A hands-on photography workshop for bi*, fluid, queer, trans & 2 spirit youth (up to age 29) with Sean Patenaude Wednesday June 18th, 4pm OUR COLOURS, OURSELVES* Collaborative collage with African textiles for bi*, fluid, queer, trans & 2 spirit youth (up to age 25) with Apanaki Temitayo M Thursday June 19th, 7pm WORD FLOW An evening of poetry and spoken word
For more info & workshop descriptions go to fluid2014.wordpress.com *REGISTRATION REQUIRED AS SPACE IS LIMITED PLEASE E-MAIL FLUIDTORONTO@GMAIL.COM TO REGISTER
JOIN THE CONVERSATION @ AUDIOBOO https://audioboo.fm/users/2474206/playlists Listen to podcasts, and contribute your own thoughts on identity, sexuality, and coming out. Tell us what you thought by leaving feedback on the show. Meet the artists. Download the AudioBoo app, or click “RECORD” in the top right hand corner. Be sure and tag your podcast #FLUID.