On the Road is the brainchild of five of Winnipeg’s Artist-Run Centres: Platform: centre for photographic + digital arts, aceartinc., Video Pool Media Arts Centre, La Maison Des Artistes Visuels Francophones, and Urban Shaman: Contemporary Aboriginal Art.

This project is dedicated to the dissemination of contemporary art by cultural producers to diverse communities in Winnipeg and Manitoba in July of 2010. We wish to promote equal access to art and the organizations from which it is disseminated. Thus we are committed to bringing contemporary art to people who have limited access to it due to geographical barriers.

A 1976 Air Stream Trailer will be the shining, silver heart of On The Road, a rip-roaring contemporary art project led by architect Lancelot Coar. Branching from the trailer will be a huge, spidery, fiberglass and fabric frame that will, with community participation, morph into beautiful and strange structures to house a temporary art space. Within the structure we will showcase videos by Manitoban artists, lead art making workshops, and performances by The Abzurbs, a group of mayhem music makers. Each community is warmly invited to help raise the structure and make it their own for the duration of On The Road’s stay.

July 1: LAUNCH PARTY @ La Maisons des artistes visuels (219 Provencher Blvd)
July 2: Urban Barn @ Kenaston Blvd + McGillivray
July 16 + 17: St. Claude, Manitoba
July 20, 21 + 22: Peguis, Manitoba
July 24 + 25: Victoria Beach, Manitoba
July 30: Central Park, Winnipeg
July 31: CLOSING PARTY @ aceartinc. + The Raw Fur Parking Lot (290 McDermot Ave.)

For further information please contact Natasha Peterson, Project Coordinator, at ontheroad.coordinator@gmail.com or 204.942.8183

Follow the project online: http://ontheroadenroute.blogspot.com/

On The Road is generously funded by Winnipeg Arts Council’s Audience Development Grant as well as the Visual Arts Assistance Program through Manitoba Culture, Heritage, and Tourism.

Thursday 27 May 2010, 7PM
Aqua Books, 274 Garry Street

As our inaugural lecturer, Meeka Walsh will be discussing the career of celebrated photographer Robert Frank. Her talk, titled “Fragments of the Autobiographical: Me and Robert Frank” will allow the audience a glimpse into a personal archive reflecting Walsh and Frank’s friendship over the last twenty years. Heavily illustrated and highlighted by anecdotes, this informal lecture will offer a unique opportunity for Winnipeg audiences to reflect on the artistic legacy of Robert Frank.

Meeka Walsh is the editor of Border Crossings. She has contributed essays to a number of catalogues published in Canada and the United States. Her short fiction has been published in a number of anthologies, among them The Oxford Anthology of Canadian Women Writers. She has also published a collection of short stories, The Garden of Earthly Intimacies. From 1995 to 2000 she was a member of the Canadian Artists and Producers Professional Relations Tribunal and she served on the Board of the National Gallery from 2001 to 2005. She is a Member of the Executive of Winnipeg’s Plug In ICA. In 2003 Walsh was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Western Magazine Awards Foundation and in 2007 received an award from the Royal Canadian Academy of the Arts for her contribution to the visual arts in Canada.

The Focal Points Lecture series is generously funded by The W. H. and S.E. Loewen Foundation, and sponsored by The Institute for Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Winnipeg, and Aqua Books.

Exhibition
20 May - 26 June 2010

Opening Reception + Performances
Thursday 20 May, 7;30PM sharp!

Panel Discussion
Thursday 24 June, 7:30PM

PLATFORM centre for photographic + digital arts is pleased to present the exhibition, Ritualiz’d, featuring Winnipeg-based artists: Leah Decter, Michael Dudeck, and Freya Bjorg Olafson.

Curated by J.J. Kegan McFadden, this coming together of voices is meant to comment on aspects of the past, present, and future of ritual, its place in contemporary society, and what role, if any, the photographic and digital arts play in its presentation and understanding.

LEAH DECTER is an interdisciplinary artist currently living in Winnipeg, Canada. With a background in installation and sculpture her practice has evolved to include video, photography, public intervention and performance. Incorporating cultural and personal iconography, elements of the everyday, and the considered use of a wide vocabulary of materials as integral conceptual components, Decter’s work is rooted in intersections of human experience and social/political issues. She has exhibited widely in Canada, most recently at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, and her recent work has exhibiting in the US and toured internationally. She is currently working on several ongoing projects that explore the complexities of human relationships with place through a lens of the contemporary and historical and is undertaking an MFA in New Media at Transart Institute in Linz, Austria. <www.leahdecter.com>

MICHAEL DUDECK is an interdisciplinary multimedia artist and shaman whose works deal with the complicated relationship between humans and nature with undercurrents of gender, identity, and sexuality. His work has been included in School for Young Shamans, curated by AA Bronson for John Connelly Presents (New York City); and in February 2009, Dudeck’s Parthenogenesis [a solo exhibition with accompanying artist book] was simultaneously presented by Pari Nadimi Gallery and Art Metropole in Toronto. <www.michaeldudeck.com>

FREYA BJÖRG OLAFSON is an interdisciplinary artist who works with video, audio, and performance. Her work has been presented and exhibited nationally as well as internationally. Over the last year Olafson created a new performance, AVATAR, which was debuted at the nuna (now) festival in 2009. She combines her finesse in movement with the directness of her performance art, video and theoretical studies from the University of Manitoba School of Art and her subsequent completion of a Master of Fine Arts Degree in New Media from the Transart Institute / Donau Universitat in Krems, Austria.<www.freyaolafson.com>

Saturday 15 May 2010_12 - 5pm

$50 for members

Darkroom in a day is a refresher for those who have been ‘out of the dark’ for too long, this hands-on workshop covers the process of making black + white contacts and  enlargements from your negatives.

Individualized instruction | maximum 4 participants

Instructor: Brenda Stuart

Participants must bring negatives, RC b+w photographic paper and an old towel.

Non-members must purchase a user membership to participate ($30/annum).

*Fees include chemicals. Cash or cheque only.

Advanced registration required, contact the Centre at outreach@platformgallery.org, or 204.942.8183

To celebrate the international extravaganza of DIY, photography aceartinc. and PLATFORM: centre for photographic + digital art are joining forces and pooling resources to impart the skill of experimental pinhole photography to a few of our respective members.

Last year’s workshop was a roaring success- totally oversubscribed and gorgeously over-achieving. Book your place on this year’s workshop and learn the gentle craft of pinhole photography and get your pictures uploaded onto the WPPD website!

This workshop will take place over two Sundays with local artist, Sarah Crawley.
Sunday 11  April 2010 [Pinhole Making]  and Sunday 18 April 2010 [To Take and Develop Photos]

Participants will learn how to make a camera, take pictures with it, develop their images and finally upload them onto ace’s website as well as the official W.P.P.D. website, and exhibit the results on PLATFORM’s members wall P121.

Participants need to bring scissors, masking tape, a smock and 3 to 6 containers such as shoeboxes, Pringle cylinders, biscuit tins, film canisters etc. (round containers are preferable) but all other supplies (photo paper, film processing, paint, etc and all tuition is included in the subsidised $60 fee- a deal if ever a Winnipegger saw one! If you are interested but broke, get in touch with either ace or Platform.

There are very limited places and these will be awarded on a first-come, first-served basis, so hurry!

Please contact Natasha Peterson at outreach@platformgallery.org, or 204.942.8183 to register

Wednesday 17 March 2010 @ 7PM

Salon Nights are open to all members, no registration required. Come-one-Come-all! They are free evenings of informal critique and feedback where members are welcome to participate in the salon night.  Any PLATFORM member is welcome to attend to receive an crit, or feedback on their work. Whether you wish to present or not, you should come out to add to the dialogue and see what other artists have going on in their studios. Each session is hosted by a different local or visiting artist who will facilitate discussion and weigh in with their own experience.

Jenny Western is a curator, writer, and educator based in Winnipeg, Manitoba. She holds an undergraduate degree in History from the University of Winnipeg and a Masters in Art History and Curatorial Practice from York University in Toronto. While completing her graduate studies, she was appointed Curator of Contemporary Aboriginal Art at the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba in Brandon where she served from 2005 - 2007. Jenny has curated exhibitions for Urban Shaman, Ace Art Inc., and the Label Gallery in Winnipeg, and has worked as a Curatorial Assistant at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Most recently she has held positions as a Sessional Instructor in Art History and Art Collections Coordinator for the University of Manitoba, as well as Adjunct Curator for the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba. Of mixed European, Stockbridge-Munsee, Brothertown, and Oneida ancestry, Jenny is honoured to be the 2009/10 Aboriginal Curator-in-Residence at Plug In ICA and Urban Shaman: Contemporary Aboriginal Art.

Please R.S.V.P @ outreach@platformgallery.org

This next installment of the 2010 series of off-site Salons is offered to PLATFORM members exclusively, free of charge. This is an opportunity to meet with an artist in the studio, to discuss modes of work, and how one series can potentially inform the next.

Studio Visit: Wednesday 13 January 2010 @ 7PM

Space is limited; register asap

To register, please contact Natasha at outreach@platformgallery.org, or call 204.942.8183

Please Note: Dominique Rey’s studio is located on the fifth floor of a building that has no elevator. If you have trouble with stairs, you may want to make arrangements to come to PLATFORM’s next Salon Night, which will be hosted in-house.

Saturday 9 January 2010 10am - 4pm

$65 for user members*

A refresher for those who have been ‘out of the dark’ for too long, this hands-
on workshop covers the process of developing black + white film as well as
making black + white contacts and  enlargements from your negatives.

Individualized instruction | maximum 4 participants

Instructor: Brenda Stuart

Participants must bring exposed film, RC b+w photographic paper and an old towel.

Non-members must purchase a user membership to participate ($30/annum).

*Fees include chemicals. Cash or cheque only, advanced registration required, contact the Centre.

When: November 27, 6-9PM  + November 28th,  10-5

Cost: $50 for members.  $65 for non-members (includes membership)

This work shop will be a crash course in the use of photo emulsion. Photo Emulsion enables you to turn the surface just about any object into a piece of light sensitive photo paper. Participants will learn about the preparation, application, exposure and development of photo emulsion. Resources will be shared to facilitate participants to explore techniques further after the workshop is complete. Materials that will be explored: Paper, glass, brick, fabric, and 16mm film.

Registration is required please contact Natasha @ outreach@platformgallery.org, or 942.8183

Wednesday 18 November  |  7PM

Salon Nights are open to all members, no registration required. Come-one-Come-all! They are free evenings of informal critique and feedback where members can bring in their art projects for discussion. Whether you wish to present or not, you should come out to add to the dialogue and see what other artists have going on in their studios. Each session is hosted by a different local or visiting artist who will facilitate discussion and weigh in with their own experience.

Mary Reid is currently the Curator of Contemporary Art and Photography at The Winnipeg Art Gallery. Her primary curatorial interests lie in modern and contemporary art as well as public sculpture, with a particular interest in the investigation of the creative process, itself. On several occasions she has taught and lectured on art and contemporary issues regarding curating and exhibition practice at the University of Winnipeg, the University of Manitoba, and Georgian College. In September 2008 she became a mentor with Mentoring Artists for Women’s Art year long Foundation Mentorship Programme. She has curated a number of exhibitions and contributed to various publications, exhibition catalogues and magazines focused on contemporary art. Prior to her move to Winnipeg she was the curator at the MacLAren Art Centre.

If you are interested in attending please RSVP at outreach@platformgallery.org, or call 204.942.8183