Throughout 2011 Scott Waters followed The Third Battalion of the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry as they trained for and were deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan, for the start of Canada’s post-combat training mission in that country. ROTOZERO is a project created through the auspices of The Canadian Forces Artist Program, but whose central characteristic is one of contemplation.
ROTOZERO is less a document of a mission and more a consideration of how we recall and construct stories. Incorporating painting, photography, text panels, and found objects, it is an assemblage of tangible objects which act as proxy for the narrative drive a narrative drive which, in this case, is based on the anticipation, boredom, frustration, terror, and sense of expectation that are markers of the training mission to Afghanistan.
Photo credit: Allan Kosmajac
Documentation
Essay
Circles and Zeroes by David Balzer
Works in Waters' new exhibition ROTOZERO are not homogenous: they comprise, he says, a kind of garage salefragments of experience.
Artist Bio
Scott Waters
Scott Waters received his BFA from The University of Victoria, his MFA from York University, and served as an Infantry soldier in the Canadian Forces. Recent solo exhibitions include Rodman Hall, The Art Gallery of South Western Manitoba, and The Alternator Gallery. Publications include the illustrated memoir, The Hero Book (Conundrum Press), the anthology, Embedded on the Homefront (Heritage House), with features in Border Crossings, Public, and Legion Magazine. A two-time participant in the Canadian Forces Artist Program, Waters has received funding from The Ontario Arts Council and The Canada Council for the Arts. He was recently awarded The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal. Waters is represented by LE Gallery, Toronto.
Scott Waters would like to offer a heartfelt thank you to The Third Battalion of The Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, especially Maj. Kevin Barry, Maj. Quentin Innis, CSM Rich Davey and Lt. Coady Summerfield. Without the battalion ROTOZERO would not exist. Without the help of these individuals, it would have been immeasurably inferior.
Scott Waters: ROTOZERO, 2013.