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| Jim Campbell, Exploded View (Commuters), 2011 1152 LEDs, custom electronics, wire, steel, 72 x 46 x 38". Photo credit: Derek Weidl |
Be sure to visit the Pari Nadimi Gallery, just south of Queen at 254 Niagara St. before December 22nd. I've been twice and intend to see the show once more tomorrow. Both times David Rokeby's interactive sound piece has been temporarily turned off — the Achilles Heel of New Media Art is that generally only the artist can fix it should something go awry. Luckily, the highlight of Toronto's most innovating art/tech show of the year is an installation of hundreds of spherical LEDs by the San Francisco artist, Jim Campbell. At first glance it seems like the lights are reacting to your presence in their vicinity, but distance disproves this theory. Instead the lights which are turned off resolve into life-size three-dimensional silhouettes who "walk" though the field of LEDs!
Nothing beats experiencing this New Media piece in the flesh and photos fail to reproduce its effect, so try to see it while it's still up! Alternately, a second installation of Exploded View (Commuters) has popped up at the The Museum (Kitchener), where Campbell will be leading a public tour of the show on December 11 at 11:30am. In fact, there is a lot happening at Kitchener Galleries right now! Check it out:
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| David Spriggs, Vision, 2010, airbrushed white acrylic paint, display case, springs, lights, transparent film, 264 x 315 x 91 cm. Photo credit: T. J. Hamilton. * NOTE: child not included! |
David Spriggs, an artist whose work caught my eye at the Toronto
International Art Fair this fall, has a large-scale installation
featured in the KW|AG (Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery) group show The Limits: Tracing Time & Space, running through January 8th.
An excellent 90 second interview with the artist on Vision can be found here. Spriggs is joined by six other artists, among them Spring Hurlbut (who I found out just today is A. female & B. very goth), Kristian Horton, and the exceptional Brooklyn-based Alyson Shotz.
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| Alyson Shotz, Double Torque (+ detail), 2010, yarn and pins on wall, 120 x 185" Installation view at Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas. Photo credit: Derek Eller Gallery |
Last but not least, if you're going to drive out to Kitchener, take 45 minutes to stop in Oakville and see two impressive and distinct shows at Og2:
Chris Kline - Bright Limit & Hyper Spaces.
