October 27 – December 9, 2006

Haraldur Jónsson and Steingrímur Eyfjörð
Curated/ Organised by Hannes Lárusson and Birna Bjarnadóttir

Opening Friday, October 27 @ 7:30pm
Artist talk by Haraldur Jónsson: Saturday, 28 October, 2pm

Exhibition sponsored by: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government of Iceland, Department of Icelandic Language and Literature, Páll Guðmundsson Memorial Scholarship, University of Manitoba.

Haraldur Jónsson: The Gap, the Wound
There are those who view art as being separated from reality and artists as the true exiles. However, in the case of Haraldur Jónsson’s artwork, one could make the opposite observation,
viewing art as reality, or as the medium that brings about the only possible reflections of reality. Far from in exile, the artist is here and now, his perception being of a moonlike quality, stimulating the ebb and flow of the countless reflections of reality, as if reality itself gravitates towards this human attribute. Thereby, one would not wish to disregard the human condition. Reality is hard to grasp, in particular the one that can only be perceived from within, or the reality of inner experiences.

October 13 – November 18, 2006

Shelly Low

Reception: Friday 13th October, 7:30pm (Artist in Attendance)
Artist talk: Saturday 14th October, 2pm

Critical Distance by Iris Yudai

This current work springs from the research in Low’s previous project: La Pagode Royale, and explores the commodification and manufacturing of culture. La Pagode Royale takes its name from the Polynesian/Chinese restaurant, which Low’s parents owned and worked in during the late seventies and eighties.

This project experiments with the use of food, and involves building a large scale Pagoda out of rice krispie squares. Rice krispies are a processed, sweetened derivative of rice. Rice krispies “squares” are a familiar North American treat, with its’ golden color alluring and desirable. The main sculptural element of this project takes the name of Low’s parent’s restaurant and materializes it into a 9 foot pagoda made up of over a thousand rice krispie squares. Already, a golden pagoda is trivial in terms of representing what it is to be ‘Chinese’. And to be built out of a North American processed treat (rice krispie squares), further enhances a ‘served up’ idea of culture.

August 18 – September 30, 2006

Rebecca Belmore

Artists’ Reception: Friday August 18 at 7:30pm

As part of Parallel, aceartinc. presents Architecture For A Colonial Landscape, an exhibition consisting of two video-based works; the video component of Fountain, presented at the 51st Venice Biennial and a new video installation called Architecture For A Colonial Landscape.

Both works reference historic and current cycles of oppression, greed and theft – theft of land, theft of language, theft of identity and theft of human rights. Both works counter such moral abandon with a last-gasp, guttural act of defiance and self-determination through gesture and action.

Thursday August 10, 2006

an open members show of video works
7pm to 11pm at the PARK THEATRE, 698 Osborne St. S. $3 at the door.

June 16th – July 30th, 2006

Recent work by Daniel Barrow

Closing Reception 7:30pm, July 30th

Critical Distance by Steven Matijcio

Every Time I See Your Picture I Cry

A new performance by Daniel Barrow
Presented by ace art inc. in collaboration with the Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival

July 19th-30th, 2006: Performance 7pm nightly
2pm matinée closing performance on Sunday, July 30th

For more information please contact aceartinc. or the Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival Box Office.

Aceartinc. and Daniel Barrow would like to make a special thank you to Manitoba Arts Council, Winnipeg Arts Council The Canada Council for the Arts and Jessica Bradley Projects, The Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival, VideoPool, PlugIn ICA, and Lloyd Branson.

Julie Deamer: Director of Outpost for Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Lecture: 7pm, Tuesday 23rd May 2006

Sarah Glennie: Commissioner of Ireland’s participation at the 51st Venice Biennale 2005
Lecture: 7pm, Friday 9th June 2006

Matt Keegan: Independent Curator, Artist and Publisher, New York
Lecture: 7pm, Thursday 29th June 2006

This series is designed to increase the visibility of local artists to artists and curators outside of Winnipeg, and, conversely, to provide the opportunity for local artists and cultural producers to become more familiar with artists and curators from away. This program is a valuable opportunity to look at issues, trends and changing standards in professional practice within the International contemporary arts scene as well as fulfilling our role to demonstrate commitment to professional and artistic development of Manitoban artists.

May 5 – 20, 2006

Students from the University of Manitoba

Reception: May 5, 7.30pm

mark saunders, krisjanis kaktins-gorsline, takashi iwasaki, peter kralik, kelsey braun, elaine stocki, kazuteru miyauchi, dominika dratwa, denise c. miller, nora kobrinsky, josh dudych, jenny moore koslowsky, alexis dirks, ryan klatt, john small, melody white

March 10 – April 22

Sarah Crawley
Artists’ Reception: March 10 – April 22
Artists’ talk: Artist Talk Saturday March 11, 2pm

“At 10 years of age, I developed a unique compulsive, repetitive behaviour. I blew on my hands. Having difficulty describing this past behaviour to a friend, I reenacted the gesture only to be flooded with sensory impressions and memories from that time in my life. I was struck by the physical nature of my response.”

During the research and production of her last body of work, ala lingua, Sarah Crawley developed an interest in line, the repetition of line and pattern, and how these conjure memory. Recreating more repetitive gestures from her past, Crawley began to consider the lines and patterns created on the skin as a result of these gestures, to be permanent micro versions of the transient lines left on the sky by the migratory geese in ala lingua. Both are a result of repetitive actions, both are linked to physical memory.

January 20 – February 25

Brian Flynn
Reception Friday March 10, 7.30 – 10 pm

Brian Flynn uses carpet underlay and his fingers to produce these huge portraits by removing the black bits. While the faces are of real persons, their identity is deliberately swept “under the carpet” of assumptions. The removal of verifiable identity both of persons and the character of the material -underlay- affords these works of art to be inventive and political, ethical and cognitive. The cover images are as mass produced as is the underlay, forging an unflattering link. On a deeper level, the material evokes a hidden existence.

Flynn remarked: “you see the underlay only before the carpet is laid or when it is spent”.

The cover images, a staple diet of culture obsessed by celebrities of all kinds, point not only to the fragile temporaneity but also to the beings “before and after” – where the actual time is not given. Unsettling as both the removal of identity and of presence may be, the scale increases the impact. The persons are not innocent bystanders, they seem to be harbouring guilt. For that is guilt, if anything be guilt, not to increase freedom. Flynn’s visits to Northern Ireland throughout his youth formed his individual voice that aims at revealing the ambivalence of historical truths.

Dr Slavka Sverakova
(Catalogue Essay from Brian Flynn, Cover Series: Belfast Portraits)

Image: Brian Flynn, Wake (detail), carpet underlay, 10 x 20 feet, 2005

Brian Flynn gratefully acknowledges the support of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts