Sarah Robayo Sheridan | Les Levine: Transmedia 1964-1974

[Sarah Robayo Sheridan, editor]
Les Levine: Transmedia 1964-1974
Oakville, Canada: Oakville Galleries, 2018
188 pp., softcover
Edition size unknown

The catalogue for the touring exhibition of the same name launches tomorrow at Art Metropole, from 2 to 4 pm. Join curator Sarah Robayo Sheridan in conversation with Ihor Holubizky, and catch a rare opportunity to see Les Levine's video Express Doubt.

"For more than five decades, the work of Irish-American artist Les Levine has taken shape across a wide range of techniques, media and approaches. Born in Dublin, Levine immigrated to Toronto in 1957, where he enjoyed his first acclaim as an artist through solo exhibitions at the David Mirvish Gallery, Hart House, the Isaacs Gallery and the Art Gallery of Ontario. On his move to New York City in 1964, Levine's practice quickly proliferated; he would go on to become one of the most exhibited artists of his generation. This beautifully composed monograph surveys the first prolific decade of this highly influential artist's work and brings together a selection of Levine's key works from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s. Working across, beyond, and through media, Levine would become known for developing new approaches to artmaking, establishing new categories such as camera art, disposable art, media sculpture, software art, body control systems, and what he would term Mott art. Constantly expanding the parameters of what could be understood as art, Levine's artworks addressed the conditions and experiences of a rapidly changing media landscape in ways that proved uniquely prescient of contemporary concerns and sensibilities."

- publisher's blurb

Art Metropole / 1490 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Saturday 24 March 2018, 2:00 pm–4:00 pm

Les Levine | Levine’s Restaurant

Les Levine
Levine’s Restaurant
Filderstadt, Germany: Edition Domberger, 1969
50 x 65 cm.
Edition of 100

From March to September 1969, Les Levine operated "New York's only Canadian restaurant" at 19th Street and Park Avenue South. The venue featured "deplorable food and dismal light." Some examples of the former include Salmon Steak Halifax, Chopped Chicken Liver Levine, and London Broil.

The above souvenir from the project is featured in an exhibition titled Transmedia, which opens today at 2:30pm at Oakville Galleries. Curated by Sarah Robayo Sheridan, the show presents a selection of the artist's key works from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s.

For more information, visit the gallery website, here.

Sign, Sign, Everywhere A Sign

Last night, alongside Kelly Mark's book launch, curator Sarah Robayo Sheridan gave an excellent walk-through of her exhibition Sign, Sign, Everywhere A Sign. Drawing on works from the permanent collection, the show includes Atelier Populaire, Berenice Abbott, Carl Beam, James Carl, Ian Carr-Harris, Lynne Cohen, Robin Collyer, Greg Curnoe, Robert Fones, Robert Frank, General Idea, Hadley+Maxwell, Richard Hamilton, Jamelie Hassan, David Hlynsky, Luis Jacob, Will Kwan, Ken Lum, Kelly Mark, Ron Terada, Jeff Thomas, and John Thomson.

A few editioned works are featured, including the above General Idea piece (in front of a Ken Lum painting) and Kelly Mark's I Really Should... Several other works deal with the visual language of retail, including images of storefront window displays, advertising billboards, etc.

The show continues until March 7th. For more information, visit the gallery site, here.

Kelly Mark: Everything Is Interesting

[Kelly Mark]
Kelly Mark: Everything Is Interesting
Toronto, Canada: The Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, 2014
256 pp., 26 x 21 x 2 cm., hardcover
Edition size unknown

Edited and with an introduction by curator Barbara Fischer, this survey of mid-career work by Kelly Mark features new essays by Jonathan Watkins, Christina Ritchie and Dan Adler. It also features republished texts, reviews and interviews by: Robin Metcalfe, James Prior, Jenifer Papararo, David Liss, Brian Joseph Davis, Alan Dunn, Craig Buckley, Germaine Koh, Sara Krajewski, Ingrid Jenkner, Terri Whitehead, Jonathan Safran Foer, Kristan Horton, Micah Lexier, Gabrielle Moser, Christopher Régimbal, Robert Enright, Jen Graves and Eileen Sommerman.

A text I wrote for Mark's 2005 glow-in-the-dark poster for Glow House is also re-printed.

The title, co-published with Cambridge Galleries, Mount St. Vincent University Art Gallery, Kenderdine Art Gallery, and Art Gallery of Windsor, is divided into six categories of the artist's work: Installation/Intervention, Video, Sculpture, Photography, Drawing, Multiples/Audio/Misc. The latter includes posters, buttons, rubber stamps, CDs and records, cigarette lighters and wallpaper.

The title launches tomorrow night (Wednesday February 11th) at the the University of Toronto Art Centre. The reception begins at 8pm, with remarks at 8:15. Mark and several contributors will be in attendance.

Just prior to this, at 7pm, curator Sarah Robayo Sheridan will present a tour of her exhibition Sign, sign, everywhere a sign, featuring recent acquisitions that "captures the ways in which commercial graphics shape urban landscapes -- whether in the proliferation of billboards and screens, the identity of nations and institutions, or the visual logic of window display." Mark's video for Demonstration is included in the exhibition.

Everything Is Interesting will be on sale for $25.00 CDN.

For more information, join the Facebook group, here.

Bookclub at the London Art Book Fair

In addition to the Nothing Else Press Booth at the Whitechapel London Art Book Fair, we will also be taking part in a presentation about Bookclub. 

Bookclub consists of a group of Toronto artists, publishers, curators, gallerists and writers who collect artists' publications. The group meets a few times a year to present (mostly informally, but sometimes formally, such as presentations at the Power Plant in 2011 and 2013) artists' books, and occasionally, artists' multiples, records, ephemera, etc. For the past three years we have been commissioning artists to produce book bags: Michael Dumontier in 2012, Kay Rosen in 2013 and a forthcoming project by Claude Closky.

The members of Bookclub include Bill Clarke, myself, Wendy Gomoll, Michael Klein, Micah Lexier, Derek McCormack, Roula Partheniou, Sarah Robayo Sheridan, Derek Sullivan, and Paul Van Kooy. Bill, Roula and I will present on behalf of the group, many of whom are attending the simultaneous Art Book Fair in NYC.

For more information about the group, read the Toronto Standard piece by Jason McBride from a few years ago, here. Details about the event are forthcoming.