The Art Gallery of York University’s booth at this year’s Toronto Alternative Art Fair International (TAAFI) is presented in apartment #403, 1144 Queen St W, Toronto and is the culmination of a month-long residency at Drake AIR. For the past month, artists Matthew Brannon, Liam Gillick, and Philip Monk have participated in the residency to make works independently and site-specifically and have worked with curator Emelie Chhangur to produce larger collaborative projects that continue to grow. While the AGYU anticipates an ongoing relationship with Brannon and Gillick that will extend far into the future, the immediate result of the laboratory/think-tank-style residency is a limited edition telephone designed by Brannon and Gillick and a related artists’ book by all three artists to be published by the AGYU in the new year. The AGYU will display the residue of the artists’ stay as well as some of the projects developed over the course of the month.

Special thanks to instructor Barbara McGill Balfour, technician Dan Olsen, and students Nadine Bariteau and Eric Matthew of the Print Media Area of the Department of Visual Arts at York University for their assistance in the production of Brannon’s screen-prints. Thanks also to Colin Harry of the Ontario Science Centre for his technical assistance and all around brilliance in the realization of Brannon and Gillick’s telephone.

Call Backwards << Reversions to Primitive Technology
Artist talks: Matthew Brannon and Liam Gillick, Denise Oleksijcuk

“In our race for improved technologies, we sometimes forget the simpler things in life…or a simpler time when conversations weren’t abbreviated text messages and love could be found in a good book. The artists featured in this talk have taken this issue to heart and have created extraordinary works that communicate to us on a whole new/forgotten level.”

Brannon and Gillick will discuss the prototype and eventual limited edition telephone they have collaboratively designed for the AGYU. They will shed light on the process of producing the work and outline some of the formal choices the two artists have made when considering the particular function of this special telephone––both the localized context such as at the AGYU, and its commercial potential outside of the gallery/art context. Vancouver-based artist and scholar Denise Oleksijczuk will discuss her text-based projects and more specifically her work Perennial Love, which is currently on display (17 October–15 November) at Solo Exhibition (787 Queen Street West). Call Backwards is co-presented with TAAFI, Drake AIR, and Solo Exhibition. Sponsored by the Canadian Art Foundation.