Luminato: Bright Lights, Big City
New York light-graffiti duo Sweatshoppe will paint the town with video during Luminato 2010
Hot on the heels of Contact, Toronto kicks off the summer season with Luminato, another blockbuster arts fest that opens this week. With more than 150 performances, exhibitions and events on its roster—and marquee names like John Malkovich and Rufus Wainwright, as well as some temporary inflatable playhouses—there’s something for everyone. Here’s some the visual-arts highlights.
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Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller prepare for Ship O’ Fools |
Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller’s Ship O’ Fools
Awarding-winning Canadian duo Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller spearhead this year’s visual arts lineup with their new installation Ship O’ Fools, on view at Trinity Bellwoods Park. Employing their usual legerdemain, Cardiff and Bures Miller transform a salvaged 30-foot Chinese junk into an interactive installation that takes its cue from the metaphor of a captainless, wandering vessel.
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One of FriendsWithYou's bouncy houses |
FriendsWithYou’s Wish Come True Festival
Miami-based art collective FriendsWithYou, whose toys have been a longtime favourite at local alt-cult shop Magic Pony, bring their installations to Toronto for the first time with the large-scale work Wish Come True Festival. Led by the Rainbow King, Luminato’s 2010 mascot (who knew!) a host of celestial characters transforms Queen’s Park into a candy-coloured playground, complete with bounce houses, inflatable friends and giant totems that spread the message of “Magic, Luck and Friendship” one bubble-gum emissary at a time.
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A still from Michael Snow’s Solar Breath (Northern Caryatids) 2002 |
Michael Snow and Mani Mazinani’s Solar Breath (Northern Caryatids) / Light Air
Curated by film director Atom Egoyan, Solar Breath (Northern Caryatids) / Light Air, a combined work by veteran Michael Snow and emerging Toronto artist Mani Mazinani, pays tribute to the late Luminato co-founder David Pecaut. Mazinani’s video work Light Air is an emotive response to Snow’s Solar Breath (Northern Caryatids) from 2002. For those of you who missed Snow’s impressive recent show at the Power Plant, this is a chance to see a master at work.
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Nabaz’mob in action, by Antoine Schmitt and Jean-Jacques Birgé |
Antoine Schmitt and Jean-Jacques Birgé’s Nabaz’mob
Winners of the 2009 Prix Ars Electronica Award of Distinction in Digital Musics, French artists Antoine Schmitt and Jean-Jacques Birgé bring an ensemble of singing robots to the Distillery District. A cheeky marriage of classical music and contemporary visual arts—with a tip of the hat to John Cage, Steve Reich, Conlon Nancarrow and György Ligeti—this “mob” of quirky creatures known as Nabaztags (nine-inch-tall, wi-fi-enabled toy rabbits) will perform musical and choreographic scores for three voices.
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Sweatshoppe spreads its digital graffiti |
Sweatshoppe’s urban installations
New York–based artistic duo Sweatshoppe paints the town red, literally, with a deceptively simple installation that combines guerilla street-art tactics with new multimedia technologies. Taking the urban landscape as its canvas, the pair constructs an interactive performance that brings Toronto walls and alleyways to life with fresh coats of video. Spontaneous performances will happen at various locations around the city.
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A sketch from Mark Fast |
Mark Fast’s The Ascension of Beauty
Canada-born, UK-based designer Mark Fast transforms his iconic knitwear into an architectural blend of art, fashion and aesthetics in The Ascension of Beauty. Best known for his innovations in the fashion world, Fast focuses his skills on an installation that reinterprets an enduring symbol of femininity, the rose. As rose bushes bloom around the city, Fast’s installation also pays homage to one of the notable aspects of Toronto life in June.
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