The conference This is Paradise: Art and Artists in Toronto will explore the relationship between the urban context and local artistic cultures in Canada's largest city. Convening at the University of Toronto from May 28th to 31st, the conference includes over 75 presenters, including artists, critics, curators and scholars from across a diversity of disciplines, to focus on the ecology and conditions of emergence of the visual arts in Toronto.

Presentations will explore a range of themes: the "absence" of history, and the relationship between Toronto and other urban centres; the collective impulse in local artistic scenes, and the current pressures of "creative city" paradigms; case-studies of particular places and locales significant in the cultural ecology, as well as considerations of discourses including diaspora studies, urbanism, queer studies and feminism, and of the conditions of specific media such as DIY publishing, independent film and artists' video. The conference will culminate with roundtable conversations about the state of art institutions in Toronto - past, present and future.

This is Paradise: Art and Artists in Toronto is presented by the Justina M. Barnicke Gallery and the University of Toronto Art Centre.

Early Bird Registrants receive a This is Paradise: Art and Artists in Toronto tote bag and coupon for a free Justina M. Barnicke Gallery or University of Toronto Art Centre publication. While supplies last.

Regular Registration: May 16 - May 28, 2015

Registration Rates:

• Full Weekend: $100 Regular | $70 Student
• Single Day: $40 Regular | $25 Student

Tickets available from the UofTTix Box Office, online, by phone, or in-person. Prices include HST. More information here.

Many Daniels Faculty, Alumni, and students will be particpating in the conference. For a list, see the schedule below.

FULL SCHEDULE

Thursday, May 28th

Location: University College, Room 140

7:30 pm: Reception at the University of Toronto Art Centre

Friday, May 29th

10:00 am – 10:30 am: Welcoming Remarks: Barbara Fischer (Senior Lecturer) and Luis Jacob

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Robert Fones: Castle Frank and the Loss of Place
• Wanda Nanibush (MVS-Curatorial 2012): (title tba)
• Ian Carr-Harris: The Power Plant and The Play of History, 1987
• Sarah Milroy: Sort of the Same
• Moderator: Sara Angel

------- lunch at the University of Toronto Art Centre -------

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Adam Lauder: Toronto’s Modernist Pre-histories: Bertram Brooker and Elizabeth Wyn Wood
• Charles Stankievech (Assistant Professor): Dialogues on the Prospects of Recording: Notes of Correspondence between Herbert Marshall McLuhan & Glenn Herbert Gould (1964-68)
• Mohammad H. Salemy: Time & Televisual Intersubjectivity, McLuhan's Idea of Globalized Presence as the Prehistory of Telecomputation
• Jaqueline McLeod Rogers: (title tba)
• Gary Genosko: Marshall McLuhan Meets Invertebrate Paleontology or, Harley Parker at the ROM
• Moderator: Charles Stankievech (Assistant Professor)

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Janice Gurney (MVS 2007): In and Out of History: Appropriation in Canadian and American Art
• Judith Doyle: In and Out of History: Appropriation in Canadian and American Art
• Cristina S. Martinez: In and Out of History: Appropriation in Canadian and American Art
• Sarah Robayo Sheridan: Les Levine Copies Everyone
• Moderator: Julian Haladyn

------- break -------

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Will Kwan: Dead Zones: Clocks that do not tell the time
• Alison Bain: Suburban creativity: culture from the outside in
• Andy Patton: Winnipeg to Toronto, Recollections
• Christina Ritchie: Halifax in Toronto
• Moderator: tba

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Adam Welch: Back and Forth: Wieland between Toronto and New York, 1962-71
• E.C. Woodley: Greg Curnoe (Toronto-London)
• Felicity Tayler: Toronto via Vancouver: Image Bank and Filing Systems for Networked Bodies
• Moderator: Gregory Humeniuk

------- break -------

Location: University College, Room 140

SATURDAY, MAY 30

Location: UC 140, University College

• Peter Kingstone: What Does an Artist Look Like?
• Denise Ryner: Sandra Brewster’s Open House and Life of a Craphead’s Bugs as Expressions of Non-Place
• Maiko Tanaka (MVS-Curatorial 2013) and Chris Lee: Model Minority
• Jamelie Hassan: Orientalism & Ephemera
• Moderator: Su-Ying Lee (MVS-Curatorial 2011)

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Jon Davies: I’ll Be Your Mirror
• Sabrina Maher (MVS-Curatorial 2014): Canned Fruit: David Buchan
• Andy Fabo (Sessional Instructor): Pioneering Queer Strategies in Toronto’s Alternative Scene
• Moderator: Kegan McFadden

------- break -------

Location: UC 140, University College

• Dot Tuer
• Lisa Steele (Associate Chair, Visual Studies Program, Professor)
• Carole Condé and Karl Beveridge
• Shary Boyle
• Srimoyee Mitra
• Moderator: Georgiana Uhlyarik

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Ellyn Walker
• Abbas Akhavan
• Duane Linklater
• Vicky Moufawad-Paul
• Moderator: Camilla Singh

------- lunch at the University of Toronto Art Centre -------

Location: UC 140, University College

• Jessica Wyman: Collectives and Their Hybrids in Toronto
• Michael DiRisio and Teresa Carlesimo: February Group, October Group, and the Independent Artists' Union
• Maggie Flynn: A Case Study for the Anarchist Free University
• Moderator: Christine Shaw

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Peter Goddard: Caliban on College
• Chrysanne Stathacos: Transmissions: Toronto - 1976-1982
• Rae Johnson: The Ecology of the Street
• Moderator: tba

------- break -------

Location: UC 140, University College

• Janine Marchessault: Festivals
• Gwen McGregor: The Legacy of Toronto’s Nuit Blanche
• Emelie Chhangur: Contemporary Art’s New Ritual Behaviour: Festive Ready-Mades and New Modes of Civic Address
• Moderator: Christine Shaw

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Rosemary Donegan: Queen St. West 2015: Now We Know
• Kristian Clarke and Friederike Landau: Artist Advocacy – Two Perspectives on Recognizing Artists as Professionals
• Michael Maranda: Waging Culture, Making a Living
• Moderator: Amish Morrell

------- break -------

Location: UC 140, University College

SUNDAY, MAY 31

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Ryan Ferko: Delinquent History for the Leslie Street Spit
• Yan Wu (MVS-Curatorial student) and Ann Dean: James Carl’s The Balcony
• Andrew Hunter: In the Belly of the Whale
• Moderator: Shawn Micallef

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Francine Dibacco: This Must Be The Place: The Urban Design Group and The Image of the City
• Amy Lavender Harris: Re-‘naturalizing’ the Don: Text, Architext, and Nature-Culture Connections
• Adrian Blackwell (former Daniels Faculty Professor): A Genealogy of forms of public housing, during Toronto’s neoliberal urbanization
• Moderator: Jane Wolff (Associate Professor)

------- break -------

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Wyndham Wise: The Events Leading to the Formation of the Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre, the First Artist-Run Distribution Centre in Canada
• Andrew James Paterson: Tele Video Situations
• Peggy Gale: Rose-Coloured Glasses for Toronto Video
• Zoë Heyn-Jones: Programming Process: Pleasure Dome <---> Film Farm
• Moderator: Kass Banning

Location: South Dining Room, Hart House

• Jim Shedden: Making a Scene: D.I.Y. Art Publishing in Toronto, 1975-1985
• Eldon Garnet: A Case Study of an Artist Magazine: Impulse
• Kegan McFadden: Flower Magazine (a case study)
• Stephen Cain: Writing Paradise: the Literary Representation of Cameron House and Queen West
• Moderator: Rosemary Heather

------- lunch at the University of Toronto Art Centre -------

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Commercial Galleries
• Prizes and Awards
• Public Art
• Magazines and Art Criticism
• Audiences and Exhibitions

Moderated by Vera Frenkel

Participants TBA

------- break -------

Location: Debates Room, Hart House

• Commercial Galleries
• Funding and Prizes
• Public Art
• Festivals
• Publishing, Art Criticism, and Magazines
• Art and Art History Programs
• Audiences, Exhibitions, and Public Galleries

Closing Remarks by Kitty Scott

For more information, visit http://www.jmbgallery.ca/eventTorontoConference.html