Art in Montreal

There has been a spate of erotic art shows over the past year, varying highly in approach and quality. So it feels a bit timely that espace art actuel has put out an issue called “Porn*O,” not that it deals with any of this work, although it could be read in reference to some of it. Mathieu Beauséjour ’s show at Bradley|Ertaskiran for instance explicitly used porn the way that it’s sometimes discussed in the collection and Mia Sandhu ’s show at Patel|Brown could also be fitted in here while Kara Eckler ’s show overtly cast itself as a kind of pornography. The issue of esapce contains nine short essays/polemics. They range in approach from autobiography (Steven Audia) to brief art history genealogies (Julie Lavigne, Peter Dubé, Charlene K. Lau) and some attempts at theoretical art criticism (AM Trépanier, Claire Lahuerta, Emma-Kate Guimond, Mayookh Barua). It isn’t pornography itself that is treated as art (which is unfortunate), but a meta or post-pornography that more comfortably sl

Volupté , the new group show at Blouin|Division , features the work of 8 artists: Amanda Ba, Geneviève Cadieux, Shona McAndrew, GaHee Park, Elena Redmond, Hiba Schahbaz, Corri-Lynn Tetz, and Chloe Wise. It joins a set of erotic art shows that have been seen in the city over the past year (such as Mia Sandhu , Hannaleah Ledwell , Kara Eckler and Caroline Schub ), although it is notable for being the least ambitious or thoughtful of them, as well as the most uneven in quality. According to its press materials, in [b]ringing together a group of female-identifying artists from various backgrounds, Volupté aims to draw an alternative portrait of pleasure, one that dispels masked fears about the emancipation of female pleasure outside of patriarchal control. [p] The artists brought together in this project are exploring desire in its various expressions, whether it is psychological, physical, sensory, or erotic. Pleasure is represented as complex and multifarious and often posited at a wi

It is the nineteenth iteration of Art Mûr's annual survey of art being produced in graduate programs across the country. 13 institutes are taking part this time, and the work of 33 students pursuing their MFAs is showcased across two floors of the gallery. As usual, there are paintings and sculptures as well as textiles with painting dominating.  One of the more interesting things about this annual event has been the extent to which it tends to deprive artists of the various crutches they rely upon to maintain the "communicative" aspect of their work, namely supplementary text. They are in a certain sense denuded and left more vulnerable, set in potentially strange relations in this space alien from the studios of the artists or their intended fate as the aspect of an exhibition. Unlike most survey exhibitions, there is no justification offered for any of the selections and no clear unifying factor, which can make it all feel rather random. This contextualizatio

In a 1968 summary on the Montréal art scene by Yves Robillard, he suggested that the avant-garde may no longer exist: “In our century of communications, the isolated artist is a myth to be overcome, the refuge of a certain old-fashioned conception of humanism, one that makes the artist the salvation against technology.” [Yves Robillard, “Les beaux-arts” in Le Canada français d’aujourd’hui , ed. Léopold Lamontagne (University of Toronto Press; University of Laval Press, 1970), 97.] For half a century, he would make variations of this argument, finally given its most thorough formulation in the book, Vous êtes tous des créateurs, ou, Le mythe de l’art (1998). For Robillard, the theme park model of creativity that he believed would displace art was valuable as a kind of lab, a means to stimulate participation. Individualism is what we have in abundance and which proliferates. [135] Contrasting the peasant/tribal song as a happy game against the morose world of post-industrialism, he ca