The space of the magazine

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Editorial
Authors: Jacques Doyon | Artists: Christian Boltanski, Hans-Peter Feldmann, Michael Snow, Ron Terada

[Fall 2009] by Jacques Doyon What do the images in a magazine say? What is revealed by the reiteration of certain types of images – as well as their format, positioning, and grouping? Photographs are central to the definition of magazines, often equal in importance to textual content. For the image, the magazine goes beyond […]

Hans-Peter Feldmann, profil without words

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Portfolios
Artists: Hans-Peter Feldmann

[Fall 2009] profil without words (2000), by Hans-Peter Feldmann, is a replica of a news magazine from which the text has been removed so that only the photographs remain, in their original sequence and positioning on the pages. Making the images talk for themselves, this project reveals the visual formatting of current affairs produced by […]

Christian Boltanski, Signal – Anne Bénichou, Signal A Nazi Propaganda Magazine Deconstructed by an Artist

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Portfolios
Authors: Anne Bénichou | Artists: Christian Boltanski

[Fall 2009] Signal (2004), by Christian Boltanski, is a series of colour plates taken from the magazine Signal, a propaganda organ of the Nazi regime issued bimonthly from April 1940 to March 1945 with a print run of 2.5 million copies. Excerpted from the original page sequences, these plates juxtapose portrayals of war and culture that […]

Michael Snow, Repeat Offender – Martha Langford, From Repeat Offender to La revue

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Portfolios
Authors: Martha Langford | Artists: Michael Snow

[Fall 2009] Repeat Offender (1986), by Michael Snow, is a reprint, inverted and in black and white, of a Penthouse portfolio. First published in the now-defunct Toronto photography magazine Photo Communique, this project was produced upon invitation of Elke Town for an issue with the themes of mass mediation and appropriation. In the context of […]

Ron Terada, Defile – Adam Carr, Trading Places, The Story of Defile

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Portfolios
Authors: Adam Carr | Artists: Ron Terada

[Fall 2009] Defile (2003), by Ron Terada, is a single-issue artist’s magazine that deals with advertising as an intrinsic component of the art world: the magazine is composed exclusively of ads. Produced by Art Metropole and YYZ Books, this project featured the main art magazines from Canada and other countries in exchange for the publication […]

Magazines and the Making of Photographic Modernism in Canada – Zoë Tousignant

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Essays
Authors: Zoë Tousignant

[Fall 2009] What images does the expression “photographic modernism in Canada” call to mind? If you are conversant with early-twentieth-century Canadian photography, the pictures of John Vanderpant, the Dutch-born Vancouver-based photographer who was the subject of an exhibition presented at the National Gallery of Canada in 1976, will likely be conjured. The photographic production of […]

Haunting Images: On Joachim Koester’s Photographic Works – Maxime Coulombe

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Essays
Authors: Maxime Coulombe | Artists: Joachim Koester

[Fall 2009] Joachim Koester photographs, and sometimes films, invisible events. Since the mid-1990s, he has sought out places that history seems to have touched, then deserted, and finally left to fade away. He sees himself as an archaeologist of the intangible, and thus he asks a question both beautiful and disturbing: Once an event is […]

Manon De Pauw, Intrigues – James D. Campbell

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: James D. Campbell | Artists: Manon De Pauw

[Fall 2009] Galerie de l’UQAM, Montreal February 27 to March 28, 2009 Manon De Pauw practices a corporeal poetics as inventive and involute in its physical articulation as it is varied and inviting in its philosophical approach. Her manner of thinking the body – the “universal thing” – sheds light on the meaning of corporeality […]

Harun Faroki et Rodney Graham, HF|RG – Cyril Thomas

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Cyril Thomas | Artists: Harun Farocki, Rodney Graham

[Fall 2009] This article was originally published only in French. You can read it by switching over to the French version of this page. Jeu de Paume, Paris Du 7 avril au 7 juin 2009

Tony Fouhse, USER: Portraits of Crack Addicts – Emily Falvey

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Emily Falvey | Artists: Tony Fouhse

[Fall 2009] iPs Gallery Montreal June 6 to 27, 2009 Crack cocaine is the classic drug of addiction nightmares: it gets you high for five or ten minutes, and then haunts you for the rest of your life. The most addictive form of any drug, crack turns most of its users into dependents, the majority […]

Thomas Kneubühler, Electric Mountains – Sylvain Campeau

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Sylvain Campeau | Artists: Thomas Kneubühler

[Fall 2009] This article was originally published only in French. You can read it by switching over to the French version of this page. Projex-Mtl Galerie, Montréal Du 30 avril au 20 juin 2009

Venice Biennale. Mark Lewis, Atta Kim, Fiona Tan – Jean-François Bélisle

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Jean-François Bélisle | Artists: Atta Kim, Fiona Tan, Mark Lewis

[Fall 2009] June 7 to November 22, 2009 The constellation of temporary exhibitions, national representations, and thematic exhibitions that take over Venice for the first week of June every other year is usually a grand affair that defies any type of human scale. Surprisingly, that was largely untrue this year. Perhaps as a side effect […]

La Biennale de Venise, Les petites nations – Michèle Cohen Hadria

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Michèle Cohen Hadria | Artists: Jamshed Kholikov, Paolo William Tamburella, Taysir Batniji

[Fall 2009] This article was originally published only in French. You can read it by switching over to the French version of this page. Les petites nations Du 7 juin au 22 novembre 2009

Scott McFarland, A Cultivated View – John Grande

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: John K. Grande | Artists: Scott McFarland

[Fall 2009] Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa April 11 to September 13, 2009 Given his avid interest in gardening, west coast photographer Scott McFarland addresses the landscape with his photographs. Is he acutely aware of the history of landscape in art? The thirty-six works on view in this […]

Road Runners – René Viau

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews

[Automne 2009] This article was originally published only in French. You can read it by switching over to the French version of this page. VOX, centre de l’image contemporaine, Cinémathèque québécoise, Montréal Du 6 mars au 30 mai 2009

Sylvie Readman, S’absenter – Philippe Guillaume

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Philippe Guillaume | Artists: Sylvie Readman

[Fall 2009] Occurrence, Espace d’Art, and d’Essai Contemporain, Montreal May 14 to June 13, 2009 Sylvie Readman traveled to Argentina to create the core elements for her latest project, S’absenter (2009), exhibited recently at Espace Occurrence in Montreal. The refined and masterful seven photographs and three videos that form this project invite the viewer into […]

Bertrand Carrière et Serge Clément, Chemin faisant – Sylvain Campeau

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Sylvain Campeau | Artists: Bertrand Carrière, Serge Clément

[Fall 2009] This article was originally published only in French. You can read it by switching over to the French version of this page. Galerie Simon Blais, Montréal Du 10 juin au 1er août 2009

Chantal Gervais, Cindy Stelmackowich, Sarah Sudhoff, Rx – Corina Ilea

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Corina Ilea | Artists: Chantal Gervais, Cindy Stelmackowich, Sarah Sudhoff

[Fall 2009] In Plain Sight Gallery, Montreal April 18 to May 23, 2009 The Rx exhibition, curated by Penny Cousineau-Levine and Zoe Casino at the In Plain Sight Gallery in Montreal, explores the inherent conflicts aroused by the intrusions of medical devices and representations into the construction of identity. The presupposed neutrality and innocence of […]

Recent Publications – Anne Marie St-Jean Aubre

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Book Reviews
Authors: Anne-Marie St-Jean Aubre

[Fall 2009] Martin Désilets Le grand voyage Longueuil, Plein sud, 2007, 87 p., ill. coul. Texte bilingue (français et anglais). Produit dans le cadre de l’exposition Le grand voyage, cet ouvrage, qui regroupe trois corpus d’œuvres réalisés par Martin Désilets depuis le début des années 2000, propose un premier bilan de la pratique de l’artiste. […]

Robert Polidori, A Dialogue with Place in Time – John K. Grande

Ciel variable 83 - MEDIUM : MAGAZINES | Interviews
Authors: John K. Grande | Artists: Robert Polidori

[Fall 2009] Robert Polidori’s photographies evoke a sense of tragedy, or of history – but, above all, of place. The analytical quality of his images is combined with the an- cient and contemporary, yet always topi- cal selection of places he works in, which have resulted in numerous popular books, including New Orleans after the […]