Video Pool Programming

Video Pool presents Dominic Gagnon’s RIP IN PIECES AMERICA

Video Pool is very excited to present the North American premiere of Dominic Gagnon’s RIP IN PIECES AMERICA, a feature-length single-channel projection of banned homemade short videos.

As Gagnon watched video on the Internet, he noticed that certain homemade clips were flagged for their content. As they were disappearing from free hosting sites, he started to save and edit them in a capsule format. Working in a gray zone of copyright law, Gagnon’s collection and grouping of the videos acts as a means of contextualization and preservation.

Dominic Gagnon is an inventor, director, installer and active performer. He considers cinema as a technique for measuring the immeasurable or as a discipline of chaos. Since 1996, he has made public presentations of moving images and installations, invented machines and concepts, and performed sound works at galleries, festivals and biennials around the world. His recent work, RIP IN PIECES AMERICA, premiered at the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

Please join us for this exciting and provocative exhibition:

December 7, 2009 – January 8, 2010

Video Pool Studio – 3^rd Floor, 100 Arthur St (Artspace building)

Exhibition Hours

Tuesday - Saturday:  12:00 – 4:00

Annual Members’ Screening

Please join us for the Annual Members’ Screening

December 9, 2009 at 7:00pm

The Park Theatre & Movie Café – 698 Osborne St

Free admission!

Submission deadline: December 1, 2009 at 5:00pm.

It’s that time of year again! Video Pool is excited to share your videos with the local community. This is a great time for friends to get together and look back on an exciting year of videos produced by our members!

Submission Guidelines:

Please note there are no exceptions to these requirements.

No late submissions will be accepted.

*Single-channel standard definition videos up to 7 minutes in length will be accepted. If your video is longer, feel free to send an excerpt you would like to show.

*Videos must be submitted as standard definition .mov files or .avi files (Mac OS compatible. No obscure codecs, please).

*If your video is already in Video Pool distribution and you do not have another copy, you must retrieve the video and digitize it.

*If your file is too large to burn to a DVD, it may be deposited in the MEMBERS_SCREENING_DROPBOX folder on the desktop of either FCP HD1 or HD2 computers.

Video Pool at the WAG - Lateral Collateral

Thursday, November 19, 2009 – 7:00pm

Winnipeg Art Gallery – 300 Memorial Blvd

Included with Gallery admission. WAG and Video Pool members free.

Your favorite media arts night is back! Video Pool and the WAG have another exciting line-up of programs featuring your video favourites from the 80s, 90s, and today.

This month’s guest is multi-disciplinary artist, hannah_g. Wishing to become acquainted with Video Pool's library, hannah_g began her exploration in an orderly manner, that is alphabetically. She has thus far viewed an eclectic electric selection from the margins of the sidelines of video from Winnipeg and beyond. This evening hannah_g and a special guest, who is himself somewhat of an outsider, will host a show-and-tell about the videos that have particularly struck her in her ongoing voyage.

hannah_g is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Winnipeg. Narrative is at the heart of her practice whether it’s in the magic realist stories she makes in response to environment and conversation, or public space interventions created to spark ideas and dialogue about enchantment and social justice. hannah has used sound, storytelling, writing, collage, chalking, stencils screenprinting and postering to this end. She is also a fledgling drag performer, her most recent persona being Frederick Jacques, a New York Sailor who sings and banters whilst wearing his heart of fool’s gold on his dirty sleeve. She is now the Program Co-ordinator of aceartinc., an artist-run centre in Winnipeg.

Artist Talk by Adam Pendleton - Presented by Plug In ICA & Video Pool Media Arts Centre

Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art presents an artist talk by Adam Pendleton Saturday, November 14 at 3:00 pm. The talk is co-presented by Video Pool Media Arts Centre.

Adam Pendleton is a New York-based artist. Pendleton shifts the meaning of cultural forms, language and images.

Pendleton's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally notably at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art, Indiana; the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; the Studio Museum, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; and the Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin. Recent biennials and exhibitions include The Generational: Younger Than Jesus, New Museum, New York; Performa 07, New York; Manifesta 7, Trentino-South Tyrol, Italy; Object, The Undeniable Success of Operations, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; The Future as Disruption, The Kitchen, New York; Sympathy for the Devil: Art and Rock n' Roll since 1967, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago; After 1968: Contemporary Artists and the Civil Rights Legacy, High Museum, Atlanta; Hey Hey Glossolalia, Creative Time, New York; and Manifesto Marathon at The Serpentine Gallery, London amongst many others.

Taking place at Plug In ICA (286 McDermot Ave), the talk is open to the public, free and everyone is welcome to attend.

Ken Gregory - wind coil sound flow

Gallery 1C03 at The University of Winnipeg and Video Pool Media Arts Centre proudly present wind coil sound flow.

If the wind could speak to us, what might it say? wind coil sound flow is an acoustic electromechanical system built by Gregory that aims to find out by transforming wind-generated vibrations on a kite's towline into harmonic frequencies. The first stage of this multi-part project, based on the principles of an Aeolian Harp, involved a large, one-stringed guitar played by the wind outdoors. The sounds generated through this system were recorded digitally and will be used to activate the long strings in the sculptural installation presented in Gallery 1C03 that will, in turn, create new and complex sounds conveyed through kite-shaped audio speakers.

Gregory has long been interested in exploring the complex relationship between humans and technology, and extends his practice now to investigations concerning the state of the natural world. He began thinking about kites while re-introducing the notion of play into his work, which led him into a deeply interesting sphere of research about the physics of flight, the historic, spiritual, and cultural significance of kites, and their mysterious, poetic, and metaphoric aspects. This project is the outcome of five years of development, during which time Gregory learned to design, build, and fly kites with a view to creating wind instruments. The Aeolian Kite Instrument gives the wind a voice that is similar to our own vocal chords. Gregory asks: if we learn to listen to the wind in new ways, might we soon be able to decode its songs? In light of climate change and other ecological urgencies, it seems critical that we consider such possibilities with creative sensitivity.

Artist biography
Ken Gregory has been working with do-it-yourself interface design, hardware hacking, audio, video, and computer programming for over 20 years. His creative performance and installation work has shown publicly across Canada, and at many international media and sound art festivals. His works are presented in the form of gallery installations, live performances, live radio broadcasts, and audio compact discs. Recent career highlights, among others, include the acquisition of a large sound installation, 12 Motor Bells, by the National Gallery of Canada as well as a solo survey exhibition, Cheap Meat Dreams and Acorns, that has toured to The Confederation Centre in Charlottetown (Prince Edward Island), The Art Gallery of Hamilton, and The Art Gallery of Windsor (both in Ontario). For more information about Gregory’s work, please visit: cheapmeats.net.

wind coil sound flow will be available for viewing October 1 – 31, 2009
Exhibition launch: Thursday, October 1 from 4:00 – 6:00 p.m. (1st Floor, Centennial Hall)
Artist talk: Friday, October 2 beginning at 12:30 p.m. in Room 2C15 (2nd Floor, Centennial Hall)
Gallery hours: Monday – Friday: 12:00 – 4:00 p.m.; Saturday: 1:00 – 4:00 p.m. Closed Thanksgiving.
Admission is always free and all are welcome!

This exhibition is recognized as adjunct programming of the 11th edition of send+receive: a festival of sound.

Members of the media are invited to arrange interviews with the artist at any time.

Gallery 1C03, Video Pool Media Arts Centre, and the artist wish to acknowledge the generous financial support of the Manitoba Arts Council, the Winnipeg Arts Council, and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Gallery 1C03 also wishes to thank the Department of Canadian Heritage.

For more information, please contact Milena Placentile, Gallery 1C03, The University of Winnipeg
515 Portage Ave, Winnipeg MB R3B 2E9
204.786.9253 | m [dot] placentile [at] uwinnipeg [dot] ca
uwinnipeg.ca/index/artgallery-index | gallery1C03.blogspot.com

Turner Prize* - Summer of Dreams 2009

The dream and dream analysis has been an unfashionable topic in the art world since the 1930s heyday of surrealism. Turner Prize* has chosen to reclaim this neglected subject matter for their art practice. Unlike the Surrealists, however, Turner Prize* recognizes the impossibility of representing objectively that which is wholly subjective. It is this disjuncture between the dream and the representation of the dream, or more generally, the disjuncture between experience and representation, that motivates Turner Prize*'s project.

The artists have been traveling to various locations, asking participants to recall a dream and share it with them. To assist participants in their dream recall, the collective uses an auditory visual stimulation device, a machine that uses sound and light to alter brainwave frequencies, producing a meditative or dreamlike state. This machine, The Mind's Eye Plus, allows a participant and a member of the collective to "dream" simultaneously - while one member empathy-dreams with the participant, another records the dreamer's dialogue and takes notes. These transcripts and notes are then used to conduct a subjective aesthetic analysis of each dream, whereby dream-images are reimagined by the collective. The results of this interpretative process will then be mailed back to the original participants.

Turner Prize* is a Regina-based art collective comprised of members Jason Cawood, Blair Fornwald, and John Hampton. Though they have been together since the beginning of 2008, they have already mounted an early works retrospective, entitled “Early Works”. Their medium of choice is performative photography; in their work they challenge the nature of documentation, representation, presence/absence, and the relationship between art and reality.

*Turner Prize is in no way affiliated with the actual Turner Prize.

Manufacturing Malfunction 3.0

Manufacturing Stream

Please join us for the opening reception on Friday, June 5, 7:30PM - 9:30PM in the Video Pool studio, 300-100 Arthur Street.
The Output event continues Saturday, 12:00PM - 5:00PM and Sunday, 1:00PM - 4:00PM. Formal presentation: June 7th, 2009 at 7:30 PM

Deluxe multimedia artist Murray Toews will isolate himself in the main studio of Video Pool over two days. At the end of his self-imposed imprisonment, he will “manufacture” a series of animated drawings set against live, experimental music. Using this strict deadline, Toews will collide together a collection of drawings, sketches and doodles that he has created over four months into a series of manufactured and malfunctioning animation.

OUTPUT EVENT: ONE is one of three events in 2009 that will demonstrate the process-driven animated thoughts and meanderings of Murray Toews. This Video Pool Artist in Residence project “Manufacturing Malfunction 3.0” is in a state of evolution and is represented in these Output events. The event is accessible to the public and you will be able to view the progress on-line.

“OUTPUT EVENT:ONE is an opportunity for (me) to share and expose the anxiety and chaos of the artistic process with everyone. I’m hoping that it will break some artist stereotypes in the process and, if I’m lucky, create some new ones…”

Murray Toews is a multidisciplinary artist; his creative work spans the mediums of drawing, video, computer-animation, audio and the production of Blender TV, a public television series showcasing Manitoba video artists (1996). In 2004, he was the curator for a Video Pool, animation retrospective named ‘Animator/Reanimator’ that showcased the technological evolution of independent experimental animators in the Canadian Prairies from 1990 to 2004. This show toured throughout Canada and into the ground-breaking art market of Japan. He received a Bachelor of Fine Arts first class Honors degree from the University of Manitoba in 1992 with a thesis in advanced Drawing.

Recently, his has focused his energies on animation, audio-art music and the development of digital interactive environments. Among his latest works ‘Complications’ (2007) and ‘Even in Sleep’ (2008) represent a new, on-going acknowledge of the role of process in the creation of animation and drawing. More recently he is Video Pool’s “Artist in Residence” for 2009 and has received a video production grant from the Manitoba Arts Council for a series of process-driven animations named “A Series of Malfunctions”.

Video Pool and the artist acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council, and Winnipeg Arts Council for their support.

The Endurance - New work by Collin Zipp

The Endurance - new work by Collin Zipp
June 4 - July 2 at Gallery 1C03 - University of Winnipeg, 515 Portage Avenue
Exhibition hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00PM - 4:00PM

Please join us for the opening reception on Thursday, June 4 at 4:00PM.

Using a non-linear narrative, Zipp deconstructs the story of a failed arctic voyage. Known as the Endurance, this ship was trapped in sea ice and frozen fast for ten months. The ship was crushed and destroyed by flowing ice packs, ultimately sinking to the sea floor. Contrasting this story of mans ultimate yielding to natural forces are multiple images of ice breaking on open waters. Projected onto a constructed multi-layered screen, these images create a two part video
installation exploring the haunting beauty of failure and consequence.

Collin Zipp is a multidisciplinary video/digital artist who obtained his BFA from the University of Manitoba's School of Art in 2005. His work uses experimental techniques such as scratching, hand processing, and digital re-touching to push the capacity of the video medium into uncharted and unfamiliar territory. Zipp has exhibited his video work widely throughout North America and overseas in both gallery exhibitions and video screenings.

Video Pool acknowledges the support of the University of Winnipeg, Gallery 1C03, the Canada Council for the Arts, and Manitoba Arts Council for their support.

Dangerous Headbands: New-Wave Videos from the Vault

 

Join us for the launch of Video Pool at the WAG, presented by Hope Peterson.

Thursday, April 16, 2009

7:00pm - 9:00pm

Winnipeg Art Gallery

300 Memorial Blvd

 

 

Winnipeg’s Video Pool Media Arts Centre is home to an unbelievably rich and important resource of Canadian video and media art. Now it’s joining forces with The Winnipeg Art Gallery to present a monthly series of media arts nights that explore the connections between various types of art-making practices. Local visual artists will offer new perspectives on Video Pool’s archive with these special screenings highlighting long buried gems of the video art genre.

The series launches at 7pm on Thursday, April 16, at The Winnipeg Art Gallery with artist Hope Peterson. As Video Pool’s Distribution Co-ordinator, Peterson has a an intimate knowledge of the centre’s collection, and she has dug deeply into their vault to present a collection of new-wave hits that rarely see the light of day. A post-screening discussion will follow. The evening is included with the cost of WAG admission; WAG and Video Pool members free..

“Each program will draw on Video Pool’s remarkable archive of some 1,800 works to showcase some of Canada’s most original artists and videos,” says Anna Wiebe, WAG Associate Art Educator. “They will be featured in connection with current Gallery exhibitions. The point is to shine a spotlight on the amazing talent in Winnipeg and to explore how different forms of art-making intersect thematically and conceptually.”

“Video Pool is an exemplary organization that holds an impressive collection and I am delighted that this partnership has come to fruition, says Mary Reid, WAG Curator of Contemporary Art and Photography. “This program will be highly stimulating and enriching while at the same time exposing a wider audience to the exceptional work produced by some of the best talent in this country.”

“We are really excited about this new program and look forward to sharing our videos and artists with interested Winnipeggers,’ adds Przemek Pyszczek, Video Pool Programming Co-ordinator.

Video Pool at the WAG nights will also take place on May 21 and June 18.


Dangerous Headbands: New-Wave Videos from the Vault
Presented by Hope Peterson

1. Johnny Zhivago rock video (1983) 5:00 - Michael Drabot and The Vengeance Phonographic Society
2. Polytechnic World (1984) 12:00 - Rick Raxlen
3. Anarchist Weekly (1981) 7:50 - Al Rushton
4. Shoes (1986) 2:30 - Robert Hamilton
5. International Band (1982) 8:00 - Susan Britton
6. Ballistics (1981) 7:49 - Gerry Kisil
7. Sinfonia Domestica (1985) 20:00 - Clark Nikolai (featuring Sheila Urbanowski)

Presenting Arnait Video Productions

Video Pool Media Arts Centre presents the video works of Arnait Video Productions, curated by Jenny Western, in conjunction with Art and Cold Cash, presented by PLATFORM centre for photographic + digital arts.

Arnait’s videos offer insight into traditional and contemporary Inuit styles of narration through the use of oral traditions, songs, and reenactments of traditional activities. The videos produced celebrate the specificity of the culture of the women in Igloolik.

Since 1991, the women of Arnait Video Productions have used video to build connections to their traditions and the lives of their ancestors. Their work actively resists monoculture by preserving traditional language and folklore; it also seeks to preserve Inuit lifestyle and aesthetic sensibility by embracing video production in ways that speak to and reflect traditional cultural values.

While the video works situate themselves in the specificity of their production, they are universal in their motivation for expression. It is this combination that has resonated with and secured diverse audiences across the Arctic, South America, Europe, the United States, and Canada.

Please join us on Saturday, April 4th, 2:00 PM, at Cinematheque (100 Arthur Street) for this unique view into Inuit life. A post-screening discussion will follow. As always, this program is free of charge, and all are welcome.