The exhibition will be closed from Feb 1-7, but will reopen to visits by appointment from Feb 8-13 between 10am-5pm.

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“I create work through the logic of the mould, with “its pleasurable and mysterious constraint” (Marcel Duchamp). Closely observed matter, location and sound recur throughout my work, alluding to multiple scales of geography and time. This Toronto studio installation is a reworking of my Halifax exhibition, Dirty Sweep. It consists of small sculptural works and field recordings in video and audio form. Wall-mounted suites of the eponymous structures, refer in part to horizonless, photographic backdrops. They consist of white plastic sheets curving away from the walls on sloping (just-off-level) wooden shelves. These canted cots are inspired by Soviet architect, Konstantin Melnikov’s unrealized “sleeping laboratory” (“Green City” 1929) whose communal, technologized sleep cure resonated and drew me to design such supports for a resulting restless collective. These shelves will hold an updated and rotating selection of recombinant objects, designed without singular orientation or wholeness. Other objects held in place are organic, subject to a number of many sculptural procedures and the porousness of worlds, never “exceeding biology” (Jen McMackon). The supports function as both rationalistic constructions and irrational yearnings.

A separate room will present related videos, including ‘Studio Series’ (2019) and recent audio work. These are voyeuristic studies of insect and animal subjects who delineate our shared infrastructure, exhibiting an empathic and at times, impassive gaze.”

-Lauren Schaffer

Artist Talk

Join Lauren and artists Richard Moszka (Mexico City) and Kelly Lycan (Vancouver) for an online conversation about the installation on Sun, Jan 30 at 1pm.