SIGHTINGS is a program of satellite exhibitions initiated by the Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery in 2012 to examine how we comprehend the exhibition space and the modes of display of artworks. This project refers to four pioneering essays written by the Irish critic and artist Brian O’Doherty between 1976 and 1981 – published together in 1986 as Inside the White Cube: The Ideology of the Gallery Space. In these essays O’Doherty theorized certain issues linked to a modernist conception of the exhibition space that he called the “white cube,” neutral and adaptable; this conception has remained current because it still defines a large number of galleries today. SIGHTINGS was developed to emphasize the persistence and false neutrality of the white cube and provide an experimental platform for artists and guest curators to generate new strategies of display and to test the limits of its adaptability.
A first series of projects were realized by students from the Faculty of Fine Arts. The current series of projects features artists and curators from the larger art community.
SIGHTINGS is located on the ground floor of the Hall Building at 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. West
July 6 – October 28, 2014
An installation by Pavitra Wickramasinghe
The term wonder is used when rationality is suspended. I felt this absolute state of wonder in my childhood when our television broke and my father opened the back to fix it. I remember wondering, “where do the images come from?” Until then, I believed the situations and places of TV shows existed as miniatures within the set. Prior to seeing the electronic guts of the television I had my own rational explanation. A small world inside the set seemed more credible than a pile of electronics generating the image on screen. Seeing the hidden mechanism did not serve to illuminate; rather, the whole process was even more unfathomable. I attempt to capture this sense of wonder within my work and in the studio.
My practice is inherently multi-disciplinary incorporating drawing, animation, installation, sculpture and video. I am mainly concerned with new ways of conceptualizing the moving image and exploring conventions of seeing. I am guided by the need to know how things work – to break down motion, video and screen to their basic elements and to build them up again. Projections become particles of light and moving shadows; screens deconstruct and crystallize; and motion is suspended into still elements.
I’m interested in the moment where illusion and reality compete. Still/Moving is a mirage induced by the moving body of the viewer. The motion of the viewer activates the drawing and silently transforms it into a moving image. This trompe l’oeil effect deals with the perception of the viewer and exploits the relationship between the eye (which sees) and the brain (which interprets). The stimuli are objective but the experience of movement is subjective, mirroring our brains, our psyches – ourselves. The tactility of experience goes beyond the physical and enters the realm of the imperceptible, the unseen and the imagination.
Perception allows us to select what is important or useful in our environment and ignore the rest. Otherwise, we would be in a state of constant sensory overload and unable to function in the world. The placement of the SIGHTINGS box in the busy hallway of the Hall Building brings into question the notion of a traditional gallery-viewer. The viewers of Still/Moving are most likely accidental rather than those that would make a deliberate journey to a gallery to see an exhibition. It is also probable that many will walk past the vitrine on a daily bases but never notice what is displayed inside. I plan to address these viewers and their very limited duration of attention.
Pavitra Wickramasinghe
Pavitra Wickramasinghe is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores new ways of conceptualizing the moving image and conventions of seeing. A graduate of Concordia University and the Alberta College of Art and Design, she is the recipient of numerous residencies, awards and grants including Changdong Art Studio, National Museum of Contemporary Art (Seoul, South Korea), La Chambre Blanche (Québec, Canada), Pépinières Européennes pour jeunes artistes (Huesca, Spain), Canada Council for the Arts, UNESCO-Aschberg Bursaries for Artists Programme and The Claudine and Stephen Bronfman Fellowship in Contemporary Art. Her work has been exhibited across Canada, in the United States, Europe, and Asia.