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.

PROGRAM: 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

Find out more

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.