- MIKA ROTTENBERG, TIME TRAVELLERTM BY SKAWENNATI AND NELSON HENRICKS -
MONTRÉAL, Sept. 1, 2022 /CNW Telbec/ - The Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal (MAC) is offering a rich and diverse fall cultural season. While the exhibition Mika Rottenberg is presented until October 10 inclusively, the film Remote by Mika Rottenberg and Mahyad Tousi will have its world premiere at the Cinémathèque québécoise on September 24, 25, 29 and October 1. The MAC will also host this fall the works TimeTraveller™ by Skawennati (October 13 to November 13, 2022) as well as by Montreal artist Nelson Henricks (November 17, 2022, to April 10, 2023). In addition to these broadcasts and exhibitions, the MAC and its foundation team will present the Idyll-themed Bal du MAC on Saturday, September 17.
Mika Rottenberg, the artist's first solo exhibition in Quebec, is presented at the MAC until October 10. The immersive installation, conceived by curator Lesley Johnstone in close collaboration with the artist, brings together several of the artist's best-known works, including three video installations, NoNoseKnows (2015), Cosmic Generator (2017) and Spaghetti Blockchain (2019), which form the central core around which unusual sculptural objects echo them. Inspired by the writings of Marx, which she reinterprets, Mika Rottenberg creates a "social surrealism" carried by images that seem to escape any narrative logic and which start from the principle that reality is more absurd than its representation.
After a two-year absence, the Bal du MAC - the MAC Foundation's flagship fundraising event - will be held on Saturday, September 17 at the Salada Market, Royalmount. The event, which will be held under the theme Idyll, is sold out and will bring together close to 900 people from the business community for a festive evening of celebration and support for the MAC. https://macm.org/en/activities/bal-du-mac-2022/
Co-created by Mika Rottenberg and Mahyad Tousi during the COVID-19 pandemic, Remote takes place in a post-pandemic future, five women living in different parts of the world—all of them fans of a popular South Korean dog-groomer-performer (Joony Kim)—discover a mysterious portal hidden in each of their homes with universe-altering consequences. Co-created by Mika Rottenberg and Mahyad Tousi, 'Remote' explores what it means to be connected in an age of technology and convenience.
The film follows Unoaku (Okwui Okpokwasili), an expat architect who works from her solarpunk apartment in Kuala Lumpur. We meet Unoaku in the flow of her rituals, performed with calm diligence from the moment she wakes to the end of her day when she watches dog grooming videos to relax.
Her calm is disrupted when she buys a pass to an online show featuring a South Korean dog groomer named Eunji (Joony Kim) and her dog, Soju. While watching, Unoaku observes an anomaly invisible to all other viewers. The experience leaves her questioning her mental state, disrupting the clockwork flow of her daily routines. Her state of mind takes a turn for the better when Anu (Nikita Tewani), another fan of Eunji & Soju's show, contacts Unoaku with news that she, too, can see the anomaly.
Anu introduces Unoaku to a network of women who share their experience: Ramesh (Pooya Mohseni), Matija (Antonia Predovan), and Kami (Yvette Mercedes). The women's quest for answers leads them to discover that they are connected to each other and the groomer through a mysterious portal hidden in each of their homes. Searching for answers, they must find a way to convince Eunji to join them.
The Cinémathèque québécoise and the MAC are hosting the world premiere of this film and are offering four screening dates: September 24, 25, 29 and October 1. It is essential to purchase a ticket to access the screenings: https://www.cinematheque.qc.ca/fr/cinema/remote/
Presented free of charge in the MAC at PVM's screening room, the nine-episode series TimeTraveller™, created by Skawennati between 2007 and 2013, offers a postcolonial rereading of the history of Indigenous peoples of Turtle Island. What makes this critical vision special is that it simultaneously projects Indigenous presence into the future through science fiction.
Starting October 13, the MAC screening room at Place Ville Marie will offer an excellent venue for viewing or revisiting this perpetually relevant work by a prolific artist who is an important ambassador for the Tiohtià:ke art community.
TimeTraveller™ is a 76-minute projection that tells the story of Hunter, a young Mohawk man living in the twenty-second century, who uses TimeTraveller™, an edutainment system developed by the Skawennati, to learn about his heritage. Resembling sleek glasses, the technology allows user-players to ostensibly travel through time, and Hunter selects moments in history important to Indigenous people. The episodes span a period of more than six hundred years, from pre-Columbian America to the future in 2021. During his visit to the simulation of the Oka Crisis at Kanesatake in 1990, Hunter meets Karahkwenhawi, who seems to be just another little girl. But in the next episode, as a young woman in our present, she mysteriously obtains a pair of TimeTravellers™, and proceeds to follow Hunter's trail until they meet again at the occupation of Alcatraz in 1969, and they decide to use the glasses to continue meeting. Karahkwenhawi is able to visit Hunter's time, where she discovers an exhibition of Indigenous contemporary art, among which we can recognize works from the MAC collection.
Free screening, reservation required: https://macm.org/en/exhibitions/timetraveller-by-skawennati/
Active for more than thirty years, Montréal artist Nelson Henricks has taken a double approach to his work. On the one hand, he has created immersive artworks in which the rhythmic pace of the editing of sound and images creates a unique musical dynamic. On the other hand, he has developed a fascinating approach to the exploration of different subjects taken from the history of art and culture, including, most recently, the work of the American abstract painter Joan Mitchell (1925–92).
In this exhibition, Henricks presents two previously unseen works, produced specially for the occasion and premièring at the MAC.
The first installation, Don't You Like the Green of A?, is a surrealist interpretation of the correspondences between letters of the alphabet and colours specific to Mitchell's synaesthesia – a condition in which certain stimuli provoke an additional perception and that Henricks happens to share with her. The second work, Heads Will Roll, is a four-channel video installation that shows a series of actions executed by musicians and dancers, exploring the revolutionary potential of pop songs and experimental music.
The MAC continues to make progress in its stated desire to make contemporary art accessible to as many people as possible. For example, the MAC at Place Ville Marie offers a single admission fee of $10 and free admission for children and young adults under 18 as well as schools and community groups.
The MAC participates in the "Borrow a Museum" program, which allows visitors to Montreal libraries to borrow a pass to visit the MAC in the same way as any other library book. The Museum has also developed a partnership with Canoo, which provides free access to participating cultural institutions, including the MAC, to newcomers to this country.
The Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal is a provincially owned corporation funded by the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec. It receives additional funding from the Government of Canada and the Canada Council for the Arts.
For more than fifty years, the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal has brought together local and international artists and their works with a variety of audiences, celebrating art as an essential component of life in Montréal and Québec. The Museum's headquarters, located in the heart of the Quartier des spectacles, are set to undergo a major architectural overhaul, changing the face of the famed Place des arts. In the meantime, the MAC has temporarily relocated its activities to Place Ville Marie, an iconic location in Montreal's Business district. As of December 1st, 2021, and throughout the renovations, the Museum will continue drawing in audiences with temporary exhibitions featuring outstanding artists and showcasing a variety of approaches. In addition to two main exhibitions per year, the MAC at Place Ville Marie will continue offering public programs as well as an array of educational services and community outreach activities. www.macm.org
SOURCE Musée d'art contemporain
MAC, Anne Dongois Public Relations Manager T. 514 826-2050 / [email protected]
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