tempadmin, Author at SUM GALLERY

Mirrors — Michael Morris and Dion Smith-Dokkie

Feb 6 – Apr 4, 2025

Mirrors presents a series of watercolour nudes created by Michael Morris during his Berlin residency in the 1980s. Unique in Morris’ predominantly abstract oeuvre, these paintings depict hustlers, artists, and friends, many of them posing in front of a mirror, so that their form could be captured from different angles. Some three dozen nudes, none of which have ever been exhibited publicly, are presented alongside six newly commissioned paintings — “reflections” on Morris’ work — by West Moberly First Nations artist Dion Smith-Dokkie. Curated by Rodney Sharman, Mirrors reflects on how the queer community’s relationship with AIDS has changed over the last forty years while highlighting the myriad issues that younger queer people continue to face today. Morris’ nudes, painted daily during the height of the AIDS crisis, create a body of overtly queer expression that is sensual, colourful, and safe, a private reflection of community at a time when queer people were very much villainized. By contrast, Smith-Dokkie’s works turn the viewer’s gaze upon himself: these nude self-portraits, situated in the bedroom or the bathhouse, are a sensuous, intimate, and vulnerable departure from the artist’s otherwise abstract body of work.

Join us for the opening reception on February 6, from 6 – 9pm, where both Smith-Dokkie and Sharman will be in attendance. SUM gallery is grateful for the time, guidance, and generosity of Michael Morris’ longtime partner, Rahmi Emin, as well as the support of the Parachute Foundation, the Audain Foundation, the Deux Mille Foundation, and the BC Arts Council.

ABOUT MICHAEL MORRIS

Michael Morris (1942–2022), a pioneering abstract painter and printmaker, made enduring contributions to film, photography, video, installation, and performance. Achieving international acclaim early, he helped shape Vancouver’s 1960s art scene and is celebrated for his collaborative practice and versatility as an artist, curator, and cultural leader. In 1970, Morris co-founded Image Bank with Vincent Trasov, a conceptual platform for mail art projects involving figures like Eric Metcalfe and General Idea. He later co-founded the Western Front Society, an artist-run centre for new art across disciplines. Morris passed away in Victoria, BC, on November 18, 2022, at age 80.

ABOUT DION SMITH-DOKKIE

Dion Smith-Dokkie (he/they) lives and works between northeast BC and Vancouver. A painter by trade, he is interested in topics like location and place, infrastructure, communication, and the body. This body of work marks a return to figuration and easel painting, in the wake of Michael Morris and in response to his watercolour nudes. Dion holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia. Recent shows include The Inaugural Lind Biennial at the Polygon Gallery, Land Breaths at the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie, and it hides in the light at The Bows in Calgary. Artistic philandering aside, Dion is a shy gay man and a member of West Moberly First Nations.

ABOUT RODNEY SHARMAN

Rodney Sharman, curator, is an internationally acclaimed composer, performer, educator, and arts advocate based on Musqueam territory in Vancouver. Currently the Victoria Symphony’s Composer-Mentor-in-Residence, he has held residencies with Early Music Vancouver, the Victoria Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Dr. Sharman was President of the Canadian League of Composers (1993–98) and the Canadian Section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (1991–95), returning in 2016 to support Vancouver’s World New Music Days. He has served as President of the ISCM’s Canadian Section since 2019, continuing a career dedicated to championing contemporary music and fostering artistic collaboration.

SUM AiR—January 2025

Jan 7 – 31, 2025

SUM-AiR is excited to announce January’s artist residency. Paige Bowman (@birdfingersss), Soren Dyck (@taliruq), Addison Finch (@zebrafiinches), Jamie Lauder (@mxlauder), Liam Murley (@liam.lovelock) and Dee Twentee (@dees20stitches) will be using this residency to create work for a group exhibition at the SUM Gallery in the fall of 2025. Each artist will be creating work in response to their individual relationship to gender as non-binary, gender non-conforming and trans artists.

Through this residency + subsequent exhibition the group aims to not only shed light on these important issues, but also to celebrate the diversity of gender identity within us all.

Winter Auction Items

ñ (enye)—ilvs strauss

Nov 19 – 29, 2024

ñ (enye) is a multimedia bilingual installation / listening party by ilvs strauss (ilvs pronounced “elvis”). Visitors are asked to bring their ears for a guided journey through a labyrinth of intentional sound, audible and otherwise. Along the way, we’ll flip through the catalog of basic human needs and delve into an inquiry re: the advent of language, amongst other things. Ultimately, ñ (enye) raises the questions: What is it we hear? What is it we want to hear?

This exhibition also features strauss’ illustrated zine, “everything i heard over the course of my day all at once,” which was the original inspiration for her installation.

Join us at SUM gallery on Nov 19 for the opening reception of a new multimedia bilingual installation by ilvs strauss.

ABOUT ILVS STRAUSS

From a sociodemographic standpoint, I am a 45 year old educated, queer, mixed-race, white-passing, female bodied, Honduran-American artist. From a non-sociodemographic standpoint, I’m still those things, but manifest in 3D by the ethereal: experience, values, judgement, desire, need, love, motivation, inspiration, etc. The list goes on, but for now I’ll focus on the last three.

I love language and how it relates to the body.

I love surtitles, subtitles, and translation studies.

I love blurring the line between technician and performer.

I love the science and philosophy of sound – What is sound even? What are the effects of sound on our body, in our minds? How do our bodies/brains receive and interpret sound?

I’m motivated by considerations of accessibility – the show I am working on relies heavily on projected text, it is a lot to ask of an audience, to read for a sustained amount of time. How can I change the work to become accessible to those of different vision/hearing levels while maintaining the spirit and integrity of the piece?

The physics of sound inspires me. Sound is not a singular tiny object that travels along a wavy line from Point A to Point B. It is vibration – not a thing at all. Something (a voice, the slamming shut of a book, bird song) makes a molecule vibrate, which in turn makes the adjacent molecules vibrate, etc. A chain reaction radiating out in 3D. This has been a vital paradigm shift for me, a shift from thinking of singular entities on solo journeys to communities of entities vibrating in an iterative process.

I’m inspired to stop calling my ‘solo’ show a ‘solo’ show, for there is absolutely nothing I have done or will do that does not require the help/contribution/support/assistance of another.

Sacred Sacrilegious—Sujit Vaidya

Dec 3 – 13, 2024

SUM gallery brings 2024 to a close with Sacred Sacrilegious, a film by bharatanatyam-trained dancer and choreographer Sujit Vaidya, with videographer Robert Kingsbury and sound designer Parmela Attariwala.

Sacred Sacrilegious is a 40-minute film that explores the body as an offering to the five elements in accordance with Hindu philosophy (Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space). It is an abstraction of ideas that are placed through the body as moving landscapes. With his collaborators, Kingsbury and Attariwala, Vaidya has created virtual worlds for the body to inhabit an idea or a feeling through a series of visuals, each visual carrying something deeper within it. The viewer’s gaze is invited to stand on the edge of the visuals and make their own relationships with what’s being offered. “Sacred” and “Sacrilege” are offered as invitations to the viewer’s gaze.

On Dec. 3 at 7pm SUM gallery hosts a free public screening and Vancouver premiere of Sacred Sacrilegious, with Vaidya, Attariwala and Kingsbury in attendance, kicking off a ten-day mini-exhibition.

Film duration: 41 minutes

Note: Sacred Sacrilegious contains partial nudity.

Choreography/ Concept: Sujit Vaidya

Dancer: Sujit Vaidya

Videography and Editing: Robert Kingsbury

Sound Design: Parmela Attariwala

Outside Eye: Lee Su-Feh

Sacred Sacrilegious was made possible thanks to the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and Anandam Dance Theatre.

Sacred Sacrilegious runs at SUM gallery Dec. 3 – 13.

SUM gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday, noon – 6pm.

ABOUT SUJIT VAIDYA

sujitvaidya.ca

My dance training is in a “traditional” dance form from India, called bharatanatyam. However, my way of engaging with the form is to situate my queerness within the rootedness of tradition and intergenerational knowledge. Some curiosities/ ideas I engage with around Body, Eroticism, Gaze, Queer shame, Queer intimacy and Stillness have been showing up in my work consistently. Slowing down movement and reclaiming/ re- aligning gaze around virtuosity through a non- Eurocentric lens interests me. I like to give the viewer the agency of meaning making. I’m not interested in putting across literal ideas. I like to sense and sculpt spaces for my audience’s imagination to inhabit. Rest, leisure, intimacy, stillness, gaze and erotic body are some themes I have explored in Sacred Sacrilegious.

“Traditional” bharatanatyam as practiced and performed today, is a practice of privileged able bodied persons from caste and class hierarchies. It caters to an Eurocentric gaze, with emphasis placed on physical virtuosity. My attempt in my works, including Sacred Sacrilegious, is to dismantle this gaze by using prolonged, sometimes uncomfortable silences to bring attention to the moment and invite ways of being present inside of it. – SV

SUM AiR—House of Andromeda

Oct 15 – Nov 1, 2024

We’re excited to welcome House of Andromeda as a SUM-AiR artist-in-residence from October 15 – November 1, 2024. They’ll be using the gallery as their base of operations as they prepare for The Andromeda Ball 2024 on October 27 at the Birdhouse!

ABOUT HOUSE OF ANDROMEDA

The Kiki House of Andromeda is a collective of queer & trans artists, formed in 2019. Operating out of the QTBIPOC-lead Ballroom community, members support each other’s individual goals and practices not only as a creative collective, but as a necessary chosen family. Amongst the house members, the fields of dance, fashion, photography, drag and performance are woven together. Andromeda aims to always provide unique and authentic experiences that tap into the heart, the beauty, and oddity of our inner worlds colliding.

Known and Unknown—Album Release Concert

Nov 2, 7:30 pm

Join us at the Canadian Music Centre on Nov. 2nd with “piano virtuoso and avant-garde muse” Rachel Kiyo Iwaasa as she performs in recital, celebrating her recent CD, Known and Unknown: Solo piano works by Rodney Sharman. This is the first monograph recording to feature Sharman, described by Louis Andriessen as “the most distinguished Canadian composer of his generation.” The concert programme will include Sharman’s elegant Opera Transcriptions and trademark works for speaking pianist, including an uncensored rendition of his notorious collaboration with playwright Peter Eliot Weiss, The Garden, described as “a perfect combination of lust, innocence, tenderness, and yearning.” Iwaasa performs Sharman in context with work by compositional colleagues Linda Catlin Smith and Jocelyn Morlock. Download cards of Known and Unknown, released on Redshift Records, included in the ticket price.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Rachel Kiyo Iwaasa is among Canada’s foremost contemporary music pianists, hailed as a “keyboard virtuoso and avant-garde muse” (Georgia Straight) whose “emotional intensity” transforms music “from notes on a page to a stunning work of art” (Victoria Times Colonist). Iwaasa’s reputation has drawn many notable Canadian composers to write for her, including Hildegard Westerkamp, Nicole Lizée, Farshid Samandari, Emily Doolittle, Jeffrey Ryan, Leslie Uyeda, Jordan Nobles, and the late Jocelyn Morlock. The Canadian League of Composers recently commissioned Cris Derksen to compose a piece for her, which was chosen as the Offcial Canadian Selection for ISCM World New Music Days 2023 in Johannesburg. Iwaasa has performed with the likes of Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Mark Takeshi McGregor, Judith Forst, Quatuor Bozzini, Heather Pawsey, Gabriel Kahane, Caroline Shaw, and Richard Reed Parry. Rachel’s interdisciplinary adventures include work with visual artists SD Holman, Nettie Wild, Tania Willard, and Camille Georgeson-Usher; playwright/director David Bloom; choreographers Idan Cohen, Jennifer Mascall and Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg; and multi-media provocateur Paul Wong. Iwaasa has performed in the Netherlands, Germany, US and across Canada, with engagements that include the ISCM World New Music Days, Muziekweek Gaudeamus, Music on Main, Vancouver New Music, Western Front, Vancouver Symphony, Victoria Symphony, Aventa Ensemble (Victoria), CONTACT Contemporary Music (Toronto), New Works Calgary, Groundswell New Music (Winnipeg), and more. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of British Columbia, a Master of Music from Indiana University Bloomington, and a Bachelor of Music from the University of Victoria, where she earned the Victoria Medal as the top graduating student in Fine Arts.

Rodney Sharman lives on traditional Musqueam territory in Vancouver, Canada. He teaches composition at the Vancouver Symphony School of Music, and is the Victoria Symphony’s Mentor-Composer. He has been Composer-in-Residence of Early Music Vancouver’s “New Music for Old Instruments”, the Victoria Symphony, National Youth Orchestra of Canada, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, and Composer-Host of the Calgary Philharmonic’s New Music Festival, “Hear and Now”. In addition to concert music, Sharman writes music for cabaret, opera and dance. He sings, conducts, plays recorders and flutes. He works regularly with choreographer James Kudelka, for whom he has written scores for Oregon Ballet Theatre, San Francisco Ballet and Citadel & Compagnie (Toronto). His chamber opera, Elsewhereless, with text and direction by Atom Egoyan, was staged in Toronto, Vancouver, and Ottawa, and performed in concert excerpts in Amsterdam, New York City, Montreal, Victoria, and Rome. Sharman was awarded First Prize in the 1984 CBC Competition for Young Composers, the 1990 Kranichsteiner Prize in Music (Darmstadt, Germany), the 2013 Dora Mavor Moore Award for outstanding sound design/composition (Toronto), and is the recipient of the 2017 Walter Carsen Prize for Excellence in the Performing Arts. Website: www.rodneysharman.com

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY—Rafael Zen + Khalil Alomar

Nov 7 – 16, 2024

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY is both a multimedia installation + sound performance. First, conceptually and fantastically – it is a conversation between an old tree + a cyber-bug through experimental electronic music, sound performance, hauntology, and eco-dreaming; then, materially, as an exploration of art fields that interest artists Rafael Zen and Khalil Alomar – multispecies collaboration (combining the sounds of humans + nature : birds > bugs > waves > wind), speculative environmental composition (by imagining a future when nature can only be accessed through screens and projections), and improvisational sound art (live performance of the speculative soundscape of an electro-forest).

The opening reception takes place on November 7, from 7 – 9pm, with Zen and Alomar performing live in the gallery. FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY runs at SUM gallery, Tuesday to Saturday from noon – 6pm, until November 16, 2024.

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ABOUT THE ARTISTS

RAFAEL ZEN /// The world is in convulsion, and so are we.* Rafael Zen is a queer and fiery Brazilian-Canadian multimedia artist and sound performer, currently living on the land of the Coast Salish peoples – Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam. There, he researches intersections between new media, performance, and environmental hauntology/speculative environmental composition/performance mediated with/through technology. In colonially-called Vancouver, he organizes Durations, an independent sound art and video art festival that offers an open stage for emerging artists exploring the fields of new media, sound, video art, and live performance. Academically, he holds a Master’s degree in Visual Arts – Contemporary Artistic Processes, where he researches anti-colonial and anti-capitalist poetic practices, and political counterattacks through contemporary art. Currently, he is researching New Media and Sound Art at Emily Carr University.

*Brazilian theorist Suely Rolnik (Spheres of Insurrection / 2017).

KHALIL ALOMAR /// Khalil Alomar is a queer Lebanese-Canadian artist whose creative practice primarily revolves around sound art, multimedia installation, and performance. He works through anti-colonial, anti-capitalist, and anti-establishment theory and practice. Currently, he is pursuing a degree in New Media and Sound Art at Emily Carr University. Alomar lives in the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Selíl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. His recent practice is centered on sound, video/paper collage, and photography as mediums that provide a platform for critiquing systemic aggressions and abuse.

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY: Sound Performance
November 16, 2-4 pm

Join us at SUM gallery for the final day of our exhibition, FOREST / FLUX/ FREQUENCY by Khalil Alomar and Rafael Zen, for a special performance by the artists. This free, improvisational sound-based performance evokes an electro-forest in a future when nature can only be accessed through screens and projections

Saturday, November 16 at 2pm

SUM gallery (#425 – 268 Keefer St.)

SUM AiR—SJ Kirsch

Sept 5 – 27, 2024

We’re excited to welcome SJ Kirsch as a SUM-AiR artist-in-residence from September 5 – 27, 2024. SJ will use this residency to expand their fluency in a number software programs, providing the foundation of their multimedia, interdisciplinary project, Enbian Love Songs: experiential odes for the liminally-inclined. This site-specific project will explore liminality as a safe space through community sound gatherings, installation, and performances.

ABOUT

An accomplished interpreter of western art music, SJ Kirsch (they/she) has performed across Canada, in Europe and West Asia as a soloist and collaborator. They have been hailed as “…one of the finest contemporary dramatic vocalists in Canada today,” (Calgary Herald) “…with the ability to get under the skin of everything she sings,” (Winnipeg Free Press).

Beyond opera and oratorio, SJ curates and produces sociopolitically relevant art song experiences of works from the last three centuries. An avid and capable interpreter of new music, they have premiered more than 30 new works for voice by Canadian composers. Chorally, SJ currently serves as a section leader for the Vancouver Bach Choir family and will join the ranks of Musica Intima for the 2022-23 season.

As a creator/composer, SJ weaves electroacoustic tapestries inspired by the primally physical nature of resonance. As a pundit, they lecture on the ins and outs of western art music, wholistic programming, and vocal liberation for cultural and educational institutions, on podcasts, and on CiTR 101.9 FM. As a pedagog, they keep a small studio of private students from around the world.

SJ earned their BMus at the University of Colorado Boulder College of Music and MMus from the University of Manitoba Desautels Faculty of Music. They are also a laureate of the Eckhardt-Gramatté National Music Competition and have received project and commissioning support from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council, the Winnipeg Arts Council, the Women’s Musical Club of Winnipeg and many generous individuals for whom they are deeply grateful.

SUM AiR—Rafael Zen + Khalil Alomar

Aug 12 – 30, 2024

We’re pleased to welcome our SUM gallery artists-in-residence (SUM-AiR), Rafael Zen and Khalil Alomar, to SUM gallery, Aug 12 – Aug 30, 2024. Throughout the month of August Rafael and Khalil will be developing their project, FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY : QUEERING ECO-UTOPIAS: a new media artwork inspired by eco-futurism, queer futurities, and speculative environmental composition and expressed through field-recording, multispecies composition, and multimedia installation.

ABOUT

RAFAEL ZEN is a queer Latinx media artist + performer, currently living in the land of the Coast Salish peoples – Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam. Here, he researches intersections between new media, performance, and cultural identity, and organizes Durations, an independent sound art + video art festival that offers an open stage for emerging artists. Rafael works at Emily Carr University as a Research Assistant for the New Media + Sound Art program. Academically, he holds a Master’s degree in Visual Arts – Contemporary Artistic Processes, researching anti-colonial + anti-capitalist poetic practices, and political counterattacks through artistic practices. Currently he is pursuing a degree in New Media + Sound Art at Emily Carr University.

KHALIL ALOMAR is a queer Lebanese-Canadian artist whose creative practice primarily revolves around collage, multimedia installation, and performance. He works through anti-colonial, anti-capitalist, and anti establishment theory and practice. Currently, Kahlil is pursuing a degree in New Media +Sound Art at Emily Carr University. He lives in the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Selíl witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. His recent practice is centered on sound, video/paper collage, and photography as mediums that provide a platform for critiquing systemic aggressions and abuse.

Rafael Zen + Khalil Alomar: OPEN REHEARSAL
August 27, 6:30-7:30 pm

Join SUM-AiR Artists-in-Residence Rafael Zen and Khalil Alomar on Tuesday, August 27, from 6:30pm – 7:30pm for an Open Rehearsal of their new media project-in-progress, FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY : QUEERING ECO-UTOPIAS. Rafael and Khalil will present a half hour demonstration of live electronics and visuals, followed by an opportunity for audience interaction where guests will be invited to interact with audio equipment and contribute their own sounds to the forest.