Starting Thursday, it was possible for visitors to hop from opening to opening in galleries across the city. The official opening of CONTACT 2014 was Friday with the launch of exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto. Twenty-five hundred people were in attendance. Greeted in the building’s courtyard by Jim Naughten’s 17-meter long mural from the series Hereros, the public could choose where to start their visit.
On one side, the group exhibition Material Self – Performing the Other Within featured the work of eight photographers of different nationalities on rites, folklore and customs, each using material and staging to communicate the theme of their own identity. The Canadians Meryl McMaster and Dominique Rey explore the work resulting from performances while French artist Charles Fréger and the Swiss-Guinean artist Namsa Leuba take an interest in ancestral traditions. Viewers can admire the photographic sculptures of South African artist Mary Sibande, the portraits of Hendrik Kerstens, the experimental work of David Favrod and Japanese artist Tomoko Sawada, regularly photographed in the Japanese tradition of omiai studios, which help families introduce their daughters to their future husbands.
In the darkness of the adjacent hall, In Character: Self-Portrait of the Artist as Another brings together self-portraits of renowned photographers like Cindy Sherman, Sophie Calle and Yasumasa Morimura. Viewers can see the bright triptych of Vancouver artist Rodney Graham, and discover the remarkable self-portraits of Chilean-Canadian Rafael Goldchain, taken from his series I Am My Family, where the artist transforms himself into different members of his family.
Following this opening, visitors could keep the festivities going to the middle of the night at the Festival launch afterparty.
Openings are being held throughout the week. If you’re in Toronto, consult the festival calendar.
FESTIVAL
CONTACT 2014
May 01, 2014 – Jun 01, 2014
Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art
952 Queen Street West
Toronto, Ontario
Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 5 PM
