The Agnes Etherington Art Centre launched its winter season Thursday evening with the introduction of two new exhibitions.

Attendees of the launch event were able to view the new exhibitions – Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts, an immersive and evolving experience of Indigenous cultures, and Rome, Capital of Painting, which reveals the place Rome occupied in the mind of 17th-century artists.

“Our two new winter shows are gorgeous and revelatory. Rome, Capital of Painting, offers insights into the art of early modern Europe through The Bader Collection, while Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts reveals Indigenous cultures of North America through newly commissioned works by 14 contemporary artists,” says Agnes Director Jan Allen. “With the performative and evolving nature of the works in Soundings, its layers of meaning will unfold best through multiple visits. I hope the entire community responds fully to this invitation to explore decolonization and what it can be.”   

FEATURE EXHIBITIONS

SOUNDINGS: AN EXHIBITION IN FIVE PARTS

How can a score be a call and tool for decolonization? Curated by Candice Hopkins (Tlingit) and Dylan Robinson (Stó:lō), Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts features newly-commissioned scores and sounds for decolonization by Indigenous artists who attempt to answer this question. The scores take the form of video, objects, graphic notation, museological objects, and written instructions. At different moments during the exhibition these scores are activated by musicians, dancers, performers and members of the public, gradually filling the gallery and surrounding public spaces with sound and action.  The exhibition is accumulative, gaining new artists and players throughout the run of the show. Soundings artists include Raven Chacon and Cristóbal Martínez, Sebastian De Line, Camille Georgeson-Usher, Cheryl L’Hirondelle, Kite, Tanya Lukin Linklater, Ogimaa Mikana, Peter Morin, Lisa C. Ravensbergen, Heidi Senungetuk, Olivia Whetung and Tania Willard.

Soundings will be accompanied by a postcard publication of scores designed by Sébastien Aubin and a public listening series entitled “Against Hungry Listening,” which includes notable composers, musicians, scholars and artists discussing de-colonial, queer, feminist, black and Indigenous-specific forms of listening.

Public art installations by Raven Chacon, Camille Georgeson-Usher, Ogimaa Mikana and a curatorial score are on view on Queen’s main campus. These outdoor artworks are generously supported through the Isabel & Alfred Bader Fund of Bader Philanthropies. 

Soundings is affiliated with The Isabel Bader Centre for the Performing Arts’ concurrent Ka’tarohkwi Festival of Indigenous Arts. Visit The Isabel website for details on a diverse array of performances by acclaimed Indigenous artists working across theatre, dance, music, film and performance art.

Soundings is one of the 200 exceptional projects funded through the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter program.

ROME, CAPITAL OF PAINTING

Rome, Capital of Painting reveals the place that the Eternal City occupied in the minds of 17th-century artists. From prints after famous relics of antiquity to paintings reflecting the most revolutionary artistic developments of the period, this show probes Rome’s layered appeal and invokes the pioneering manners of Adam Elsheimer, Nicolas Poussin, Michelangelo da Caravaggio and Annibale Carracci. Curated by Jacquelyn N. Coutré, the exhibition sheds light on the artistic attractions that prompted painter and theorist Karel van Mander to refer to Rome as “the capital of painting.”

Other artists featured in the show include Etienne Allegrain, Stefano Della Bella, Sébastien Bourdon, Leonard Bramer, Jean Ducamps, Adam Elsheimer, Hendrik Goltzius, Johann König, Antoine Lafréry, Johannes Lingelbach, François Perrier, Cornelis van Poelenburgh, Jacob Symonsz. Pynas, Michael Sweerts and Moses van Uyttenbroeck.

CONTINUING EXHIBITIONS

To April 7, 2019: In the Present: The Zacks Gift of 1962

To April 12, 2020: The Art of African Ivory