Critical Distance Centre for Curators

How to Make Your Own Word Scavenger Hunt with Vanessa Dion Fletcher
2019-10-21 18:00 - 20:00 (America/Toronto) | Paperhouse Studio, 180 Shaw Street, Toronto, Ontarui, M6J 2W5, Canada
In this workshop, participants will be introduced to key aspects of Vanessa Dion Fletcher’s practice and research that went into making “Finding Language: A Word Scavenger Hunt”, a performance that examines the intersections between Indigenous language, neurodiversity, and learning disability. Participants will work towards making their own word scavenger hunt that responds to individual subjectivities, politics, and languages.
EVENT LOCATION and ACCESSIBILITY
This event will take place at Paperhouse Studio which is located on the south side of the first floor at Artscape Youngplacea wheelchair accessible building with a ramp at the 180 Shaw Street doors, and an accessible washroom on every level. Gendered multi-stall washrooms are also on every level, and single stall family washrooms are available on levels 2 and 3. All levels are accessible via elevator and stairs. The TTC’s 63 Ossington bus stops at Queen and Shaw and is wheelchair accessible.
CDCC seeks to facilitate a scent-free environment in order to reduce barriers to access for people with chemical sensitivities, and we ask all participants to kindly refrain from using or wearing scented products or materials in advance of and during this and other events. Please read more information of the importance of going scent free here: https://www.criticaldistance.ca/about/about-us/accessibility/
CDCC will provide ASL interpretation and attendant care during this workshop. Childcare can also be made available if needed— please inquire.
For these and any other access inquiries, please contact us at emily@criticaldistance.ca as far in advance as possible so that we can make arrangements to meet your needs. Late-breaking requests will also be accepted and we will always do our best to meet them but these will be subject to availability at the time of the request. Questions are welcome. Supporting your access is our priority.
image/description: A hand with bright red nail polish on the thumbnail holding a piece of paper with some prompts visible, including: a word to whisper, a word to… . A fragment of multicoloured quillwork (porcupine quills woven into flat strands used for artmaking) lays across the bottom right corner.

Indigeneity, Neurodiversity and the Arts
2019-10-20 14:00 - 17:00 | Small World Music, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, Toronto, Ontario, M6J 2W5, Canada
INDIGENEITY, NEURODIVERSITY, AND THE ARTS
A conversation with Vanessa Dion Fletcher and Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning
DOLLEEN TISAWII’ASHII MANNING is a member of Kettle and Stoney Point First Nation, currently residing in Toronto. She is an interdisciplinary artist and scholar, with a PhD in Theory and Criticism (Western University) and an MFA in Contemporary Art (Simon Fraser University). Manning is an Assistant Professor in Indigenous Education and Pedagogy at York University, on leave while completing her SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship at Michigan State University (Philosophy, 2018-2020). Manning’s research takes up Anishinaabe imaging practices, epistemological sovereignty, and the debilitating impact of settler colonial logics.
VANESSA DION FLETCHER is a Lenape and Potawatomi neurodiverse artist. She graduated from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2016 with an MFA in performance, and she has exhibited across Canada and the US at Art Mur (Montreal), Eastern Edge Gallery (Newfoundland), The Queer Arts Festival (Vancouver), Satellite Art Show (Miami). Her work is in the Indigenous Art Centre, Joan Flasch Artist Book collection, Vtape, and Seneca College. In 2019 Vanessa is supported by the City of Toronto Indigenous partnerships fund to be artist in residence at OCAD University.
https://www.dionfletcher.com/
Accessibility at this event:
Small World Music is located on the south side of the first floor at Artscape Youngplace, a wheelchair accessible building with a ramp at the 180 Shaw Street doors, and an accessible washroom on every level. Gendered multi-stall washrooms are also on every level, and single stall family washrooms are available on levels 2 and 3. All levels are accessible via elevator and stairs. The TTC’s 63 Ossington bus stops at Queen and Shaw and is wheelchair accessible.
CDCC seeks to facilitate a scent-free environment in order to reduce barriers to access for people with chemical sensitivities, and we ask all participants to kindly refrain from using or wearing scented products or materials in advance of and during this and other events.
CDCC will provide ASL interpretation and attendant care during this event. Attendants and ASL interpreters will be introduced at the start of the event and seating with a clear view of the ASL interpreters will be set aside for anyone who needs it. Childcare can also be made available if needed.
If you would like to reserve accessible seating or inquire about childcare, please contact us as far in advance as possible so that we can make arrangements to meet your needs. Late-breaking requests will also be accepted and we will always do our best to meet them but these will be subject to availability at the time of the request.
Please contact us at emily@criticaldistance.ca with these and any other requests or questions. Supporting your access is our priority. The event will also be recorded and captioned. More details to follow.

Ocean Archive: CDCC in Exchange with TBA21-Academy (Vienna)
2019-09-28 11:00 - 17:00 | Artscape Youngplace, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, M6J 2W5
Critical Distance Centre for Curators is pleased to participate in an international exchange with TBA21-Academy in response to the release of the IPCC Special Report on the Oceans and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (SROCC). Scheduled to be published on September 28th, the report and proceedings with be presented at the Climate Justice for a Living Ocean at Ocean Space in Venice as part of Phenomenal Ocean, a convening to be led by Chus Martinez, Director of Institut Kunst in Basel.
Coinciding with the events in Europe, Critical Distance will host a public open screening of videos from TBA21 and Ocean Archive, and will simultaneously transmit a daylong series of liveposts from The Drowned World, featuring artworks by over 25 artists in the Ontario Place Cinesphere, curated by Charles Stankievech for the inaugural Toronto Biennial of Art.
Drop in to the free public screening at Artscape Youngplace anytime from 11am–5pm on Saturday, September 28th. The screening will take place on the first floor across from the mezzanine cafe space. (Critical Distance is currently installing our Fall exhibition so the gallery will be closed; however an attendant will be in Suite 302 to provide programs and more information.) Liveposts from The Drowned World will be published throughout the day on Critical Distance’s Instagram feed (@critical.distance) and cross-posted to Facebook (facebook.com/criticaldistance) as well. For more info on The Drowned World at Toronto Biennial of Art, visit this link.

FEATURED ARTISTS from THE DROWNED WORLD at TORONTO BIENNIAL OF ART:
Aki Inomata, Alvin Lucier, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Aryo Danusiri, Brandon Poole, Charles Stankievech,
Clarice Lispector, Cyprien Gaillard, Dark Morph, Drexciya, J.G. Ballard, James Tenney, Jean Painleve, Julian Charrere, Jumana Manna, Katarzyna Badach and Alfredo Ramos Fernandez, Lisa Rave, Marguerite Humeau, Nils-Alak Valkeapaa, Pauline Oliveros, Revital Cohen and Tuur van Balen, Ville Kokkonen/Comme des Garcons, Whatever, World Soundscape Project.

VIDEO PROGRAM from TBA21-ACADEMY/OCEAN ARCHIVE to be screened by CRITICAL DISTANCE:
Will Benedict. All Bleeding Stops Eventually, 2019
Produced by DIS. Commissioned by TBA21–Academy.
DIS is a New York-based art collective (est. 2010). In 2018 the collective transitioned platforms from an online magazine, dismagazine.com, to a video streaming edutainment platform, dis.art, narrowing in on the future of education as entertainment.
Khadija von Zinnenburg Carroll, Te Haa Kui o Tangaroa, 2019
HD video, colour, sound, 3 min. Commissioned by TBA21–Academy for Ocean-Archive.org.
Khadija Von Zinnenburg Carroll is an artist and art historian specialising in global histories and contemporary art with a focus on problems of restitution, indigenous heritage, and colonial museums from the sixteenth century to the present.
Carsten Aniksdal. Speak of the Sea, 2019
Producer: Berit Kristoffersen. Stock footage courtesy of Verrimedia/Canon. Commissioned by TBA21–Academy for Ocean-Archive.org.
Norwegian fisherman’s daughter and seaweed entrepreneur Angelita Eriksen speaks to the interdependencies between the sea, the coastal culture of her beloved Lofoten Islands, and local harvesting practices amidst global warming and changing ocean ecologies. Carsten Anikdal is a Norwegian artist, filmmaker and photographer. Berit Kristoffersen is a political geographer and associate professor at UiT – the Arctic University of Norway.
Amanda Coulson: A Message from Inside the Rain, Bahamas, 2019
Amanda Coulson is an art critic, curator and artistic director of the VOLTA Show in Basel and Director of the NAGB (National Art Gallery of The Bahamas) on the island of New Providence, Bahamas.
Meet the Ocean Showreel
Meet the Ocean is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to educating the public on the importance of the saltwaters of our planet. Employing science, storytelling, and encounters from earth’s most remote locations, we combat environmental apathy and further understanding of how the ocean functions, in order to better protect it.

ABOUT THE PROJECT AND PARTNER:
Ocean Archive is a digital platform in the making; an archive and repository for collaborative research. It brings together the multitude of voices and stories around the Ocean and connects those striving to nurture and protect it. Initiated by TBA21–Academy, Ocean Archive is designed to be a pedagogical, research and storytelling tool for a broad audience, translating current knowledge about the ocean into a common ground aimed to enable us to make better decisions for urgently needed policies. Ocean Archive supports collaboration for a living ocean. The platform helps artists and scientific organisations find each other. It promotes decentralised cooperation between contributors and users and connects major international initiatives to other sources of knowledge, marginalised geographies and aesthetic approaches.
Jumpstarting the first developmental stage of Ocean Archive, the initiative will be introduced to the world in coordination with the IPCC special report on Oceans and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate. Phenomenal Ocean, a day of ideas for a new ocean language, curated by Chus Martínez, Expedition Leader of the second cycle of TBA21–Academy’s fellowship programme The Current. The public gathering, taking place at Ocean Space — a collaborative embassy for the Oceans in Venice, will be structured as a series of interviews with experts, scientists, artists, musicians, and activists discussing the tools we need to perform better for a living ocean.
As part of the response to the upcoming report, Ocean Archive invited arts and culture organisations worldwide to participate in a network of autonomous events to be held on the same day. By supporting local initiatives for ocean conservation and protection, these partner events will create spaces to gather a community around shared concerns and collective actions, advocating for amplified regional responses to climate justice for a living ocean.
Ocean Archive is being developed in collaboration with Across the Cloud.

TBA21–Academy leads artists, scientists, and thought-leaders on expeditions of collaborative discovery. Founded by Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza and led by Director Markus Reymann, the Academy is dedicated to fostering a deeper understanding of the ocean through the lens of art and to engendering creative solutions to its most pressing issues. Established in 2011, the nonprofit’s programme is informed by a belief in the power of exchange between disciplines and in the ability of the arts as a vessel for communication, change, and action.

PRESSING THE ISSUE Part 2: Critical Arts Publishing in Canada Continued
2019-08-09 19:00 - 21:00 | Small World Music, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, Toronto, Ontario, M6J 2W5, Canada
We are excited to continue the conversation on the state of independent critical arts publishing across Canada with a panel involving Anthea Black and Jessica Lynn Whitbread from The HIV Howler, Adrienne Crossman from Off Centre, Lauren Lavery from Peripheral Review, and Niki Little from imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival, moderated by Maxine Proctor.
There will be refreshments and all are welcome. Location is Artscape Youngplace, on the first floor at Unit 101, Small World Music Centre. Building is wheelchair accessible. This is a FREE event but please RSVP to rsvp@criticaldistance.ca as this helps us plan for enough space and refreshments.
This event follows Happy Hour with The HIV Howler, a presentation by Anthea Black and Jessica Whitbread in conversation with Danielle St. Amour (SBC galerie d’art contemporain – Gallery of Contemporary Art).

BIOGRAPHIES
Anthea Black is a Canadian artist, writer, and cultural worker based in San Francisco and Toronto. Her studio work addresses feminist and queer history, collaboration, materiality, and labour and has been exhibited in Canada, the US, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Norway. Black is co-editor of HANDBOOK: Supporting Queer and Trans Students in Art and Design Education with Shamina Chherawala and The New Politics of the Handmade: Craft, Art and Design with Nicole Burisch, and publisher of The HIV Howler: Transmitting Art and Activism with Jessica Whitbread. She is an Assistant Professor in Printmedia and Graduate Fine Arts at California College of the Arts.
Jessica Whitbread is a graduate of the York University Masters of Environmental Studies program, she has a degree in Building Communities to Ignite Social Change. She is a queer activist and artist that has been working in the HIV movement since shortly after her diagnosis in 2002. Her work includes LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN, Tea Time, No Pants No Problem and she is a co-curator of POSTERVirus. Jessica published Tea Time: Mapping Informal Networks of Women Living with HIV in 2015. She was the Wesley Mancini Artist in Residence at the McColl Center for Art and Innovation, and a recipient of the Premier’s Award from the Government of Ontario, and the Visual AIDS Vanguard Award. In 2016, she gave birth to twins and advocated to openly breastfeed them in a Canadian context.
Adrienne Crossman (she/they) is an interdisciplinary artist, educator and curator working in Hamilton, Ontario. They hold an MFA in Visual Art from the University of Windsor (2018), and a BFA in Integrated Media with a Minor in Digital and Media Studies from OCAD University (2012). Their practice investigates the liminality between the digital and the physical while highlighting queer sensibilities in the everyday. Crossman is interested in how the terms trans* and non-binary apply to media as well as gender, and she creates queer interventions through the manipulation of digital media and popular culture with a focus on the queer potentiality of the non-human. Adrienne is a co-founder and co-runs the online arts publication off centre with collaborator Luke Maddaford.
Lauren Lavery is a Toronto-based visual artist, writer and editor of the exhibition review magazine Peripheral Review. Her writing has been published by LUMA Quarterly, Public Parking, Peripheral Review, and has written texts for Y+ Contemporary and Xpace Cultural Centre in Toronto. She has exhibited in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto and Cambridge, ON. She holds a BFA with honours from Simon Fraser University’s School for the Contemporary Arts in Vancouver.
Niki Little is a mother, softball coach, artist/observer/community-curator and arts administrator. Little is a founding member of The Ephemerals art collective with Jaimie Isaac and Jenny Western who are long-listed for the 2019 Sobey Arts Award. She is of Anishininew / English descent from Kistiganwacheeng (Garden Hill, FN). Her interests lay in Indigenous community-based artistic and curatorial strategies that investigate cultural consumerism, Indigenous women, and Indigenous economies. Little recently started as Artistic Director at imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival. Before imagineNATIVE, she was the Director for the National Indigenous Media Arts Coalition.
Maxine Proctor demonstrates an ongoing commitment to creating meaningful connections between audiences and contemporary art through her curatorial projects, educational programs, and community outreach initiatives. A former resident of Saskatoon, Maxine completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Saskatchewan prior to pursuing a Master of Arts, Art History and Curatorial Studies at York University in Toronto. As director and co-founder of the Toronto Art Book Fair, and the managing editor of Black Flash Magazine, Maxine deeply values printed matter and understands the unique challenges and opportunities for print publishing.

LOCATION AND ACCESSIBILITY INFORMATION
Small World Music and Critical Distance Centre for Curators
Suite 101 and 302 (respectively) at Artscape Youngplace
180 Shaw Street (between Dundas and Queen Street in Toronto’s Queen West neighbourhood)
Toronto, Ontario M6J 2W5 Canada
Google Map
Artscape Youngplace and Critical Distance are fully accessible by Ontario standards, with a wheelchair ramp at the 180 Shaw Street doors, an elevator servicing every floor, and a fully accessible washroom on every level. The nearby 63 Ossington bus on the TTC is wheelchair accessible.

This event is held in conjunction with Publishing Against the Grain, co-presented with iCI (Independent Curators International) (Independent Curators International). Critical Distance would like to thank the Ontario Arts Council – Conseil des arts de l’Ontario for support in making this exhibition and related events possible.

image: screenshot of detail of I am so afraid of words, 2019 by Tal Sofia, as featured in Peripheral Review, June 13, 2019 by Chelsea Rozansky.

HAPPY HOUR WITH THE HIV HOWLER
2019-08-09 17:30 - 19:00 | Small World Music, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, Toronto, Ontario, M6J 2W5, Canada
HAPPY HOUR WITH THE HIV HOWLER
Join us for a presentation by Anthea Black and Jessica Whitbread, founders of The HIV Howler: Transmitting Art and Activism in conversation with Danielle St. Amour (SBC galerie d’art contemporain – Gallery of Contemporary Art).
Refreshments will be served and all are welcome. Location is Artscape Youngplace, exact space TBD. Building is wheelchair accessible.This is a FREE event but please RSVP to rsvp@criticaldistance.ca to help us to plan space and refreshments.
The HIV Howler: Transmitting Art and Activism is a limited edition art newspaper focusing on global grassroots HIV art and cultural production. Artists, writers and activists play a fundamental role in shaping broader societal understandings of HIV and working from within communities that are most impacted by the virus. Together we reflect the immediacy and urgency of global HIV/AIDS dialogues as well as their historical continuities. The HIV Howler is a forum for dialogue, a demand for aesthetic self-determination, a response to tokenism, and a guide to navigating the vibrational ambiguities between policy, pathology, and community.
Come for the happy hour and stay for PRESSING THE ISSUE, PART 2: Continuing the conversation on the state of independent critical arts publishing projects in Canada with Anthea Black and Jessica Whitbread from The HIV Howler, Adrienne Crossman from Off Centre, Lauren Lavery from Peripheral Review, and Niki Little from imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival.

Anthea Black is a Canadian artist, writer, and cultural worker based in San Francisco and Toronto. Her studio work addresses feminist and queer history, collaboration, materiality, and labour and has been exhibited in Canada, the US, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Norway. Black is co-editor of HANDBOOK: Supporting Queer and Trans Students in Art and Design Education with Shamina Chherawala and The New Politics of the Handmade: Craft, Art and Design with Nicole Burisch, and publisher of The HIV Howler: Transmitting Art and Activism with Jessica Whitbread. She is an Assistant Professor in Printmedia and Graduate Fine Arts at California College of the Arts.
Jessica Whitbread is a graduate of the York University Masters of Environmental Studies program, she has a degree in Building Communities to Ignite Social Change. She is a queer activist and artist that has been working in the HIV movement since shortly after her diagnosis in 2002. Her work includes LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN, Tea Time, No Pants No Problem and she is a co-curator of POSTERVirus. Jessica published Tea Time: Mapping Informal Networks of Women Living with HIV in 2015. She was the Wesley Mancini Artist in Residence at the McColl Center for Art and Innovation, and a recipient of the Premier’s Award from the Government of Ontario, and the Visual AIDS Vanguard Award. In 2016, she gave birth to twins and advocated to openly breastfeed them in a Canadian context.
This event is held in conjunction with Publishing Against Grain, co-presented with iCI (Independent Curators International). Critical Distance would like to thank the Ontario Arts Council – Conseil des arts de l’Ontario for support in making this exhibition and related events possible.

PRESSING THE ISSUE Part 1: On Critical Arts Publishing in Canada
2019-07-08 19:00 - 22:00 | Small World Music, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, Toronto, Ontario, M6J 2W5, Canada
Join us July 8th, 2019 starting at 7pm at Small World Music Centre, Suite 101 of Artscape Youngplace; reception to follow in gallery at Critical Distance, Suite 302.

We are thrilled to host a conversation with founders and co-founders of indie critical arts publishing projects in Canada including; Cecilia Berkovic (EMILIA-AMALIA), and Ben Donoghue (MICE Magazine), Merray Gerges (CRIT paper), Steffanie Ling (Charcuterie, Bartleby Review, STILLS), and Vanessa Runions (Carbon Paper). This panel will be moderated by Maxine Proctor.

There will be refreshments and all are welcome. This is a FREE event but please RSVP to rsvp@criticaldistance.ca. There will be non-alcoholic drinks available.

LOCATION AND ACCESSIBILITY INFORMATION
Small World Music and Critical Distance Centre for Curators
Suite 101 and 302 (respectively) at Artscape Youngplace
180 Shaw Street (between Dundas and Queen Street in Toronto’s Queen West neighbourhood)
Toronto, Ontario M6J 2W5 Canada
Google Map
Artscape Youngplace and Critical Distance are fully accessible by Ontario standards, with a wheelchair ramp at the 180 Shaw Street doors, an elevator servicing every floor, and a fully accessible washroom on every level. The nearby 63 Ossington bus on the TTC is wheelchair accessible.
This event is held in conjunction with Publishing Against the Grain, co-presented with iCI (Independent Curators International) (Independent Curators International). Critical Distance would like to thank the Ontario Arts Council – Conseil des arts de l’Ontario for support in making this exhibition and related events possible.

image: screenshot from Bartleby Review (eds, Steffanie Ling and Bopha Chhay)

WHO ARE WE WRITING FOR? A Workshop with Amy Fung for BIPOC Writers
2019-07-07 17:00 - 2019-07-10 19:00 | Critical Distance, Suite 122 at 401 Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3A8, Canada
WHO ARE WE WRITING FOR?
A Creative + Critical Art Writing Workshop with Amy Fung in gallery at Critical Distance.
Session 1: Sunday, July 7th, 2019 from 5-8 pm.
Session 2: Wednesday, July 10th, 2019 from 5:30–8:30 pm.
Geared for racialized arts writers and those thinking and writing about their place in the world. We will write through and alongside the things that move us (forward) and hold us (back).
This workshop will be facilitated by Amy Fung. She is a writer who has been writing and publishing on art and other things since 2002. Before I Was a Critic I was a Human Being (Bookhug and Artspeak) is her first book.
No laptops allowed. Please bring paper and pen only. Note: We will be writing and then sharing. No one expects it to be good.
Workshop is PWYC and limited to 12 participants so please RSVP to rsvp@criticaldistance.ca to complete your registration. PDFs for discussion will be sent out to registered participants one week prior to the workshop. Free childcare is available so do request this if it would allow you to participate.

Curating for the Future with AGYU Visiting Curator Tian Zhang
2019-06-19 19:00 - 21:00 | Small World Music, 180 Shaw St, Toronto, ON, Toronto, Ontario, M6J 2W5, Canada
A FREE PUBLIC PRESENTATION BY AGYU VISITING CURATOR TIAN ZHANG
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19, 2019 starting at 7PM at Small World Music Theatre, Suite 101 of Artscape Youngplace, 180 Shaw Street, Toronto, ON, M6J 2W5
AGYU and Critical Distance Centre For Curators (CDCC) are pleased to co-present a curatorial talk by AGYU Visiting Curator Tian Zhang (Sydney, Australia). A presentation of Tian’s work will be followed by a facilitated conversation hosted by Emelie Chhangur (AGYU), Myung-Sun Kim (Toronto Biennial of Art), and Shani K Parsons (Critical Distance).

TIAN ZHANG is a curator and cultural producer interested in socially-engaged, alternative and activist curatorial methodologies. Her work has been shown nationally in Australia, including at Customs House Sydney, Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts and Metro Arts. Her curatorial project I Am, You Are, We Are, They Are (2017) was nominated for a Museums and Galleries of NSW Imagine Award and she has produced multiple award-winning socially-engaged and site-specific works for Urban Theatre Projects (Bankstown:Live, 2015 and Home Country, 2017). Tian is the Chair of Firstdraft, Australia’s longest running artist-led organisation and a founding co-director of Pari, a new artist-run initiative for Parramatta. She is an alumni of the Australia Council for the Arts Future Leaders Program 2018.
EMELIE CHHANGUR is an award-winning curator, writer, and artist based in Toronto, where she works as Interim Director/Curator of Art Gallery of York University (AGYU). Chhangur is known for her process-based, participatory curatorial practice, the commissioning of complex works across all media, and the creation of long-term collaborative projects performatively staged within and outside the gallery context. Dedicated to questioning the social and civic role of the contemporary art gallery, Chhangur is known for a practice she calls “in-reach,” which is transforming institutional practice in the arts across Canada.
Situated in Toronto’s suburbs and located at one of Canada’s most diverse universities, AGYU has reinvented itself in order to become responsive to this nuanced cultural context and to make its location a catalyst for artistic risk-taking and institutional innovation. AGYU believes that a contemporary art gallery should serve an aesthetic and social function, that it must be fluid and flexible and transform itself through reciprocal engagement with artists, communities, and the world as it changes. AGYU has an award-winning exhibition, publishing, and commissioning program and is known for its long-term, socially engaged projects that bring together the various streams of its artistic activity. AGYU’s residencies operate in relation to the gallery’s research practice and as a core generator of its artist-centered, iterative-style of programming. AGYU’s Visiting Curator Series began in 2017.
MYUNG-SUN KIM is an interdisciplinary artist and cultural programmer. She has led curatorial programming at galleries and festivals including Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, Inside Out Film Festival (shorts), and The Theatre Centre, and programs multidisciplinary practices across various media. Her approach to public engagement focuses on intersectionality, empathetic methodologies, social processes, and engaging in civic conversations through meaningful partnerships and collaborations. She recently completed a Fellowship with the Toronto Arts Council’s Leader’s Lab with Banff Centre. Her work as an artist has been presented across North America and in Finland, including Art Gallery of Ontario, MOCA Toronto, FADO Performance Art Centre, and Plug In ICA. Currently, she is the Associate Curator of Public Programming & Learning at the Toronto Biennial of Art.
SHANI K PARSONS is an independent curator and founding director of Critical Distance Centre for Curators (CDCC) in Toronto. With degrees in architecture and design she has pursued a transdisciplinary, research-based practice within independent and institutional contexts and produced an eclectic body of work ranging from intimate artist’s books to immersive exhibitions. Curatorial projects include solo and group exhibitions featuring local and international artists working in all media, site-responsive interventions and installations in the public sphere, and thematic moving image programs bringing together eclectic and experimental films, videos, animations, music, and more. www.anotherbeautifulday.ca
CRITICAL DISTANCE is a not-for-profit project space, publisher, and professional network devoted to the support and advancement of curatorial practice and inquiry in Toronto, Canada, and beyond. With a focus on critically engaged, collaborative, and cross-disciplinary practices, underrepresented artists and art forms, and community outreach and education in art and exhibition-making, Critical Distance is an open platform for diverse curatorial perspectives, and a forum for the exchange of ideas on curating and exhibition-making as ways to engage and inform audiences from all walks of life. www.criticaldistance.ca
…
ACCESSIBILITY INFORMATION
Artscape Youngplace and Critical Distance are fully accessible by Ontario standards, with a wheelchair ramp at the 180 Shaw Street doors, an elevator servicing every floor, and a fully accessible washroom on every level. The nearby 63 Ossington bus on the TTC is wheelchair accessible.
…
Tian Zhang would like to acknowledge the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body for support for this project.
The Art Gallery of York University is a university-affiliated public non-profit contemporary art gallery supported by York University, the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, an Ontario government agency, the City of Toronto through the Toronto Arts Council, and through our membership.
…
image: Lux Eterna, Notch by notch the bamboo grows: Tian Zhang, 2017

Reading Groups at Gallery 44 and Critical Distance
2019-05-18 12:00 - 15:00 | ON
Reading Groups at Gallery 44 and Critical Distance
Saturday, May 18th, 12-3pm, at Gallery 44 and Saturday, May 25th, 1–3pm at Critical Distance
Join curators Gabrielle Moser and Liz Ikiriko in a conversation about the gestures artists and researchers use to activate the photographic archive. Reading out loud from performance studies scholar Diana Taylor’s book, The Archive and the Repertoire (2003), and photography theorist Tina M. Campt’s book, Image Matters (2012), the group will meet across both gallery spaces to consider the “archival choreographies” deployed by artists to develop alternate histories from private and public collections.
Free but please RSVP to coordinator@criticaldistance.ca for more information.

Live Performance: System of a Gesture by Camille Rojas
2019-05-11 13:00 - 15:00 | ON
Live Performance
System of a Gesture by Camille Rojas
Saturday, May 11th, 1–3pm
Free public premiere of System of a Gesture, choreographed by Camille Rojas, as part of the group exhibition An Archive, But Not An Atlas. Performance will take place outside Artscape Youngplace; in case of rain, an alternate location will be announced closer to the date.

Artist Talk: Nicole Kelly Westman
2019-04-14 13:30 - 16:00 | Critical Distance, Suite 122 at 401 Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3A8, Canada
Join us in the CDCC gallery for a talk with Calgary-based artist Nicole Kelly Westman. After this event, visitors are welcome to travel downstairs (or elevator) to Small World Music (Suite 101), for a 3 pm talk with Images Festival’s Canadian Spotlight artist KC Wei, followed by a conversation with journalist and critic Merray Gerges.
