Critical Distance FEATURING

Artist: John Climenhage Curator: CDCC Director, Shani K Parsons On view September 20 — November 15, 2025 Opening Saturday, 9/20 in conjunction with Ontario Culture Days at 401 Richmond, RSVP for the Hands-on Curatorial Workshop Critical Distance Centre for Curators (CDCC) is pleased to present The Contingent Image, an artistic and curatorial collaboration and exhibition-as-research developed by Peterborough-based artist John Climenhage in conversation with CDCC Director Shani Khoo Parsons. Featuring an expansive new body of work that Climenhage has been developing since 2015, The Contingent Image is the artist’s first solo exhibition in Toronto in over 20 years.  The Contingent Image comprises three large-scale wall-based assemblages of 170+ paintings selected from a series of over 250 panels. Following a decisive…Find out more

OCAD University’s RBC Centre for Emerging Artists & Designers (CEAD), in partnership with Critical Distance Centre for Curators (CDCC), is pleased to present this Public Art Billboard and Exhibition Essay Career Launcher featuring artwork by Jenelle Smith and a commissioned essay by Kathleen Foran-Spragge.

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Critical Distance is pleased to welcome you to STUDY HALL, our newest initiative in support of critical curatorial inquiry, community, and practice. This Winter we’re opening up our space and our program to explore more nimble, flexible, responsive and mutually supportive frameworks for curatorial commoning and collaboration. 

All are welcome to drop in and visit, ask questions, peruse our featured publications, and join in the conversation on curating today. Outside public hours, visit our Instagram page @critical.distance for links to our survey, e-Shop, and newsletter subscription form, so you can be in the know on upcoming programs, events, and other ways to get involved.

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In 2023, we embarked upon a yearlong research and community consultation process under the banner of New Directions for Critical Distance. Still reeling from pandemic-related setbacks, we had identified strategic and financial planning as key to our recovery. Thanks to the Government of Canada’s Community Services Recovery Fund, we were able to design an integrated, multi-phase process that began in consultation with key mentors, curatorial peers, and stakeholders from across the sector. Through an in-depth survey developed in collaboration with senior market analyst and consultant Marina Mandić, plus over 40 hours of face-to-face community consultations between CDCC Director Shani Khoo Parsons and emerging, midcareer, and established curators from across Canada, we engaged a representative sampling of ~150 curatorial colleagues in conversation and critical questions…Find out more

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

All curators featured through this program receive an updatable profile in a special section of Critical Distance’s searchable online Directory, through which researchers and potential collaborators can search by location, specialization, and interest in order to connect on opportunities in curating, writing, speaking, teaching, consulting, studio visits, and more.

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