Lee, Sean | Critical Distance Centre for Curators

Sean Lee

Sean Lee is an artist and curator exploring the assertion of disability art as the last avant-garde. His methodology explores crip curatorial practices as a means to resist traditional aesthetic idealities. Orienting towards a “crip horizon”, Sean’s practice explores the transformative possibilities of accessibility as an embodied politic and disability community building as a way to desire the ways disability can disrupt.

Sean holds a B.A. in Arts Management and Studio from the University of Toronto, Scarborough and is currently the Director of Programming at Tangled Art + Disability. Previous to this role, he was Tangled’s inaugural Curator in Residence (2016) as well as Tangled’s Gallery Manager (2017). Sean has been integral to countless exhibitions and public engagements throughout his tenure at Tangled Art + Disability.

In addition to his position at Tangled Art + Disability, Sean is an independent lecturer, speaker, and moderator adding his insights and perspectives to conversations surrounding Disability Arts across Canada, the United States and internationally. Sean currently sits on the board of CARFAC Ontario, Creative Users Projects, and is a member of the Ontario Art Council’s Deaf and Disability Advisory Group and Toronto Art Council’s Visual Arts / Media Arts Committee.

REPORT: Access Working Group

June 22, 2021 - February 15, 2025

an inter-organizational research platform with Critical Distance Centre for Curators, Carleton University Art Gallery, and Tangled Art + Disability With funding from the Canada Council for the Arts, from 2021 to 2023, Critical Distance Centre for Curators (CDCC) initiated and steered an inter-organizational research platform, whose purpose was to advance an…Find out more

DIRECTORY SPOTLIGHT> Peer-to-Peer: The First Circle

October 18, 2024 - December 31, 2024

Critical Distance is thrilled to launch our latest initiative to support curatorial practices across Canada and beyond. Titled Peer-to-Peer, this Directory-based program shines a spotlight on emerging, midcareer, and established curators whose projects and practices have attracted the notice of colleagues in the field.

Please join us in congratulating the First Circle curators, namely:

Amin Alsaden
Fatma Hendawy Yehia
Genevieve Wallen
Kate Whiteway
Lillian O’Brien Davis
Liz Ikiriko
Noor Alé
Sean Lee
Swapnaa Tamhane
Zoë Chan

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Case Study: El Alto

February 22, 2021 - February 22, 2021

Monday, February 22 | 1pm

Case Study: El Alto
Conversation with Maria del Carmen Camarena, Eliza Chandler, Saada El-Akhrass, Vanessa Dion Fletcher, Sean Lee, and Beatriz Miranda, moderated by Aidan Moesby

FREE Event – Click HERE to register.

This event will take place on Zoom, and have ASL and captioning. Images will be described and presenters will describe themselves. If you have any other access requests or questions please contact emily@criticaldistance.ca.

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Workshop: Galeries Ontario/ Ontario Galleries’ Professional Development Series

January 28, 2021 - January 28, 2021

Join Galeries Ontario / Ontario Galleries for upcoming online workshops, where senior, mid-career, and emerging professionals will gain professional knowledge, skills and practices in the public art gallery and museum sector.

Emily Cook, Critical Distance’s Education & Accessibility Programs Director, will be joining the panel of presenters for the first workshop in the series, Collections and Accessibility.

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EVENT: The Culture of Crip Aesthetics

November 9, 2019 - November 9, 2019

Panel discussion with Sean Lee, Elizabeth Sweeney, Andy Slater, Wy Joung Kou and Aislinn Thomas
Moderated by Emily Cook

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Gallery

A female presenting person listens to headphones attached to the wall. To their right, a wall filled with colour acrylic portrait paintings are arrange in a grid pattern.

Opening reception for Outliers on Tour. A hot pink light bathes two people sitting on white chairs holding pink pillows. To their left, two people chat and to their right, someone observes an art piece from off frame.

Three Windows by Aislinn Thomas installed at Holding Patterns held at a storage locker facility. The locker has a black curtain, opened to reveal a projection on a canvas of a window.

An installation shot of Outliers on Tour. A painting on canvas measuring 7x11 feet is on the right, and two smaller digital prints on the left. The work on the right is called Mountain and resembles a rainbow multicoloured band punctuated by an organic grid of squares and rectangles. To the right, the two digital prints resemble abstract watercolours.

There are two people facing the back wall of Tangled Art Gallery, each dressed in black and wearing a headset. They are listening to two audio stations situated on the wall in front of them. Behind them, a soft sculpture object hangs, as if floating, between two large wooden pillars.

Two hands outside the frame reaching to touch a sculpture by Persimmon Blackbridge. The piece is titled “Soft Touch”, and is a handcrafted figure made of wood, bone and plastic to resemble a person constructed from found objects. It is mounted on a wood panel.