KEVIN SCHMIDT
FOG
November 5 – December 19, 2004

Detail from Fog, 2004

This exhibition premieres new work by Vancouver artist Kevin Schmidt. It will feature Fog, a meditative reflection on nature as both a sublime and an artificial spectacle. This new work extends his interest in utopic aspirations expressed in the powerful video work, Long Beach, Led Zep, (2002), now in the National Gallery of Canada Collection. Recent exhibitions include: Emotion Eins (Frankfurter Kunstverein), Important Canadian Art (Zierhersmith, New York), Soudtracks – Replay, (Edmonton Art Gallery, Blackwood Gallery, McKenzie Art Gallery), Hammertown (Liverpool and Edinburgh) and Satan Oscillate my Metallic Sonatas (Contemporary Art Gallery).

Opening Reception: November 5, 8pm
Artist Performance/Talk: Tuesday November 9, 8pm

Kevin Schmidt with his rock band will premiere music specially composed for this artist talk at Presentation House Theatre (also located at 333 Chesterfield Ave.)

ANDREW WRIGHT
SKIES
November 5 – December 19, 2004

Skies XII, Unique Camera Obscura Gelatin Silver Print, 2004, 229 x 105 cm

Andrew Wright has worked with archaic photographic devices for many years. The photographs in this exhibition are part of an ongoing series that takes the camera obscura as a point of departure. Using a hole in the roof of his studio fitted with a make-shift lens and shutter, he produces large unique images of the sky, printed in reverse. The artist refers to these images as “counter photographic”. They are arbitrary encounters with light and space that do away with the “decisive moment”. As an inquiry into natural phenomena these photographs document the ephemerality of nature, and the fluidity of water vapour, perception and light itself. Also included in the exhibition are sky studies produced by a pinhole camera.

Andrew Wright lives and works in Waterloo, Ontario and teaches photography at the University of Toronto and Sheridan College. He has produced sculpture, film, installation, outdoor works and prints. He has exhibited widely since graduating with an MFA from the University of Windsor in 1997, including shows at the Oakville Galleries, Roam Contemporary (New York), Braziers Workshop (U.K.), and the University of California, Berkeley. His feature-length film installation Blind Man's Bluff is currently on tour and opens at the Art Gallery of Calgary on November 29, 2004. This marks his first exhibition in Vancouver. He is represented by Peak Gallery in Toronto.

Opening Reception: November 5, 8pm
Camera obscura demonstration w/ artist: Sunday November 7, 2pm

Andrew Wright will create photographs from an on-site camera obscura at the gallery set up specially for this event. Learn about this archaic viewing apparatus that predates the camera. For centuries artists have used the camera obscura as a visual aid. Renaissance artists called its effects natural magic. The artist will demonstrate how the camera obscura works and will discuss his use of hand-made cameras. In his exhibition currently at the gallery are photographs of the sky taken with a camera obscura as well as a handmade pinhole camera.