AN ERA OF DISCONTENT: ART AS OCCUPATION
Central Gallery
October 12 to December 31, 2012
Curated by Charo Neville, Kamloops Art Gallery
The Kamloops Art Gallery’s final exhibition of 2012, An Era of Discontent: Art as Occupation, brings together artwork that speaks to the current momentum of Occupy movements and Arab Spring revolutions, which are radically transforming our global reality. A group exhibition containing work in wide ranging mediums such as silkscreened posters, large-scale sculptures, video and installation works, An Era of Discontent: Art as Occupation offers diverse artistic responses to local and world politics, shifting social moralities, and destabilizing balances of power.
The exhibition comprises work by regionally, nationally and internationally based artists, some of whom have made work specifically for the exhibition. It also contains work on loan from private and institutional collections. Artists include Sabine Bitter and Helmut Weber, Jonas Staal (New World Summit project), Christoph Buchel, In Protest, Cameron Kerr, Teresa Marshall, Alex Morrison, John Sharkey, Holly Ward and Elizabeth Zvonar.
An Era of Discontent addresses the current political climate by way of philosophical inquiry into what it means to occupy physical and ideological space. Situated within a broad framework, it articulates the complexities of subjects such as cultural capital, labour, war, nationhood and mass resistance movements within the context of power structures that are intrinsically bound to these politically embedded systems and constructs.
Drawing on the rich history of utilizing art as a vehicle for social transformation, some of the artists in the exhibition generate active and contentious interventions and others make subtler gestures towards the political by re-representing or critically responding to subjects drawn from the world around us. The exhibition and coinciding roundtable discussion on the topic of art and democracy held at the KAG on October 13 and 14 are a provocation to question the role of art and the artist in this time of heightened political consciousness.
Generously sponsored by Funk Signs
Installation view showing five war rugs
untitled, c. 2000-2005
Private Collection, Vancouver
Photo: Dawn Vernon, Kamloops Art Gallery
