Certain contemporary descendants of the landscape tradition known as the sublime seem to have followed a trajectory through the land art practices of the 70’s to a critical examination of contemporary suburban development. A no-man’s land of repetition and standardization lies at the intersection of mass production and spatial homogenization, where the massive scale of globalization glimpsed between the narrow gaps of spec developer housing provides a requisite esthetic chill.
On the other hand, the six artists in Surrealestate actively engage in the production of an expanded civic realm. Skateboarders, BMX cyclists, and kids goofing on the subway are seen to augment, rather than subvert, public space – a subversion conventionally forced upon them by forbidding signage, if not up-to-date construction details. In the world of these artists, skyscrapers reproduce through anthropomorphic rather than market forces, and techniques of autoCAD and building technology are layered, stretched, and pulled apart in space-time to reveal ghosts in machines and gaps in assumptions.
Refreshingly, an enthusiasm of inhabitation is imbued throughout the works; new forms of architecture and urbanism, as well as new ways of thinking and acting them, have been proposed and explored among these installations. Without fear, and full of curiosity, Surrealestate provides a half dozen shared hopeful visions of a world to come.
Surrealestate brings together international visual and media-based artists to confront the effects of architecture and urban planning on the inhabitant’s mental, social and economic well-being. Work in the exhibition includes video and computer animated digital projections, drawing, ideas and on-site construction that critically engages both the existing gallery space and you.
Curated by Leif Harmsen and Scott Sorli.
Featured in YYZINE: VOLUME 4, ISSUE 3
Practice, Practise, Praxis: Serial Repitition, organizational Behaviour and Strategic Action in Architecture
Edited by: Scott Sorli, available for purchase:
Documentation
Artist Bios
Michael Bartosik
Michael Bartosik is a practicing architect in Toronto under the umbrella of Kln. Upon graduating from the University of Toronto, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, he has nearly completed his first architectural project at 401 Richmond. He is currently investigating the potential for new Toronto developments to harness white lightning as a source of reusable energy.
Shaun Gladwell
Shaun Gladwell was born in Sydney in 1972. He went on to complete an honours degree at Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney and postgraduate research with the College of Fine Arts, University of New South Wales. Shaun was awarded the Samstag International Visual Arts Scholarship and conducted associate research at Goldsmiths College, University of London in 2001 – 2002. He has undertaken an Australia Council studio residency at the Cite Internationale des Arts, Paris. Shaun has exhibited widely in the past ten years throughout Australia and in the United States, Canada, and Europe. Shaun is a founding member of the Sydney based artist collective Imperial Slacks and is represented by Sherman Galleries, Sydney.
Sara Graham
Sara Graham graduated from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 1997. She has exhibited across Canada with recent exhibitions in Halifax, Lethbridge, Kelowna, Montreal, Sackville, NB and St. John’s. In 2004, she will be participating in a solo exhibition in Calgary, a three person exhibition at the Confederation Centre Art Gallery & Museum in Charlottetown and a drawing exhibition in London, ON. Graham will also be launching her magazine, Citymovement in late 2004.
Coryn Kempster
Coryn Kempster was born in Brantford, ON in 1974. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree with High Distinction in Architecture and Visual Studies at the University of Toronto in 2003. He is currently a presidential scholar in the Master of Architecture program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Adriana Kuiper
Adriana Kuiper lives and works in London, Ontario. She currently teaches painting and drawing in the fine art program at Fanshawe College. Kuiper’s studio practice is motivated by intertwining approaches within the areas of painting, sculpture, and architecture. Her most recent project examines architecture’s ability to provide safety and refuge against overwhelming forces, natural and otherwise. The research has centred on hidden architectural structures, specifically tornado shelters, bomb shelters, and bunkers constructed during the Cold War.
Pil & Galia Collective
Pil & Galia Collective is just one of our video animation projects. We have worked as journalists and artists collaboratively for ten years now, and our work has been shown in many places around the world. Apart from creating video animation collages fusing modernist aesthetics with trashy cult references, we have also been engaged in activities like curating art shows, producing music videos, organising music events and starting an art fanzine. Our research into the democratic promises of high modernism and their dilution into contemporary popular cultures will take the form of a joint PhD, at Goldsmiths College in 2004.
Leif Harmsen
Leif Harmsen is an interdisciplinary artist with advanced credentials in digital media. He has a fascination with portraiture and urban landscape, markers of identity, male sexuality, betrayal, environmental issues, as well as the volatile place where class, sex and money intersect. He is also known to bicycle to destinations regardless of the distance and for failing to wear clothes. SCOTT SRLI lives in Toronto. His work engages architecture on a number of levels, among them writing, editing, publishing, programming, curation, education, design, construction and inhabitation. He has been a member of the board of YYZ Artists’ Outlet since 1998.
Scott Sorli
Scott Sorli lives in Toronto. His work engages architecture on a number of levels, among them writing, editing, publishing, programming, curation, education, design, construction and inhabitation. He has been a member of the board of YYZ Artists’ Outlet since 1998.