Once a week, Vandalist features some of the most interesting street art and graffiti from around Toronto. Find something great? Email vandalist@torontoist.com.
Here’s one other post from a few weeks back that I really liked:
Public Zen by DCM, a sand garden installation located at Queen and Roncesvalles, Toronto. Photo by Jessica Drummond
Detail: dikdik / ghost dikdik by Emily Jan, 2010, dimentions variable, materials: hog gut, reed, zip ties, resin, wax, wool, branches, found glass, found metal, technique: casting, felting
For 60 weeks, the World of Threads Festival website has been posting interviews with local, national, and international fibre artist. The interviews are organized by Gareth Bate, one of the festival curators, and Dawne Rudman, festival director. Their efforts have now accumulated into a comprehensive archive of fibre artists from around the world. Works in textile and conceptually related materials has been posted weekly and is also available as a newsletter. SEE THE WHOLE STORY ›
The project will be installed on the east wall of the Red Room, 401 Richmond Galleries, Toronto.
The World of Threads Festival is an international showcase of contemporary fibre art. We are a not-for-profit initiative with charitable status organized by dedicated volunteers. We exhibit innovative fibre based art from around the world and highlight the strength of our local talent.
Happy Sleepy will soon have a new show! We are busy working on Braveland, an installation for the Fine & Dandy window gallery in June.
Braveland presents a pair of giant medals made of brightly painted cardboard and textiles and emblazoned with the phrases “Forza” and “Bon Courage”. Set in a fantastical, geometric landscape, the medals celebrate the viewer’s many daily acts of courage.
Fine & Dandy
2017 Dundas St West, Toronto, Canada
1 to 30 June 2012 | open 24 hours, 7 days
Opening Reception: Thursday, 31 May 2012
Gallery 1313
1313 Queen Street West | 7 pm
Glass Gem Corn photo from the Seeds Trust http://secure.seedstrust.com/
The story of glass gem corn:
Seedsman Greg Schoen got the seed from Carl Barnes, a part-Cherokee man, now in his 80′s, in Oklahoma. He was Greg’s “corn-teacher”. Greg was in the process of moving last year and wanted someone else to store and protect some of his seeds. He left samples of several corn varieties, including glass gem. I grew out a small handful this past summer just to see. The rest, as they say is history. I got so excited, I posted a picture on Facebook. We have never seen anything like this.
The viewer above shows a full selection of images of the Reef as installed at upArt 2011. Use the button on the bottom right of the viewer above to see the images in full screen. The images are from the Reef photo set on Flickr and can also be viewed there.
Animated gifs of painted paper “fauna” elements against a textile sculpture background from the Reef project that was installed at upART 2011. There are a couple of Happy Sleepies in there, too.
Polytopia; post manufacturing industry textiles including canvass, upholstery, vinyl, nylon, foiled nylon wall covering, ripstop and waterproof fabrics, thread, staples; pyramid components 6 x 6 inches at the base x 7 inches tall, above installation at upART 2011 overall size 9 x 12 feet wide; 2011.
Animated gif of the takedown of Polytopia from the upArt 2011 installation.
It took months to make, a week to assemble, 4 hours to hoist up, 2 hours to nail in place, and only 1 hour to take down. It was kind of sad!
This project has a lot of life of its own, in a way, and ripping out the staples felt like disecting some creature. I kept whispering to it that it shouldn’t worry, and that I hoped it didn’t hurt too much. A surprisingly strong and strange reaction to the task at hand, and no doubt the thick layer of fatigue that filtered my reality at that point in the exhibition had lots to do with it.
Marc Ngui takes down the Polytopia component of The Reef installation. There was a whole lot of ladder action with this project...
Polytopia is an ongoing textile art project and it formed the background component for the Reef installation that happened 27 – 30 October 2001 as part of the Gladstone Hotel’s upART art fair in Toronto, Canada.
The exhibit was wonderfully photographable, and as a result we have hundreds of images to edit of the installation and exhibition, and those are coming, too.
Here are some photos of arrangements of sewn textile pyramids laid out on my studio floor to test composition before being sewn up into a large three dimentional quilt called Polytopia.
This Geom was made to be part of a larger installation of textile art and paper sculptures called The Reef, on display 27 to 30 October 2011 at the Gladstone Hotel in Toronto for the annual upART Contemporary Art Fair.
