SCOTIABANK CONTACT PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL POINTS THE LENS OUTWARD AS IT EXPLORES THIS YEAR’S THEME: PUBLIC
Story by Nina Cherry
The 2012 Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival has arrived, this year featuring more than 1,000 artists at more than 130 venues across Toronto. Are you excited? Because we are pumped!
This year’s festival theme is “Public”. The exhibits provoke viewers to question the relationship between private life and public space and explores how collective experiences inform a public identity. There is a focus on the increasing popularity of street photography.
We urge you to see as much as you can of this great festival – the largest photography festival in the world. These are our top five must sees.
Harley Valentine, Paris
Neubacher Shor Contemporary, May 3–31
Everyone fell in love with Paris (and Owen Wilson) all over again in Midnight in Paris, but Valentine confronts our view of the city of lights. The Paris we know from books, movies and photographs, he says, is a fantasy which never existed. Get a glimpse of Valentine’s large scale black and white works – which feature cut-ups of historic iconic images and architecture from Paris – and Judge for yourself if the Paris you think you know is real.
Harley Valentine, Gateway to Champs-Élysées
Sport Collection, Women of SPORT
Distillery Historic District — Sport Gallery, May 3–31
No doubt women knew how to look chic at sports events in the 1940s and 50s. In vibrant colours, Sport Collection takes a look at the various roles of women in sports as athletes, spectators, wives and models. We are now wearing lipstick the gym.
Women of Sport
Ted Witek, Bogota in Berlin
Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany, May 1–31
In 2004, Witek stumbled across the Hotel Bogota in Berlin. The famous hotel has a long photographic history, and once housed the studio of the first female fashion photographer, Yva (Else Simon). Witek has been photographing the hotel since 2004. The photos are all black and white, and hauntingly beautiful. Grainy, blurred, and sometimes out of focus, the images feel like memories themselves.
Ted Witek, Hotel Bogota #1106
Rebecca Wood, What Feels To Be True
Mercury Espresso, May 1 – June 30
What makes us certain something is true or false? If we see it with our own eyes? Wood’s What Feels To Be True exhibit is like a dream: soft, fluid – like wisps of smoke. The photos are tangible yet out of reach. They are set in a fictional reality, a dreamscape Wood invites us into.
Rebecca Wood
Jennifer Reedie, iPhoneography
Wychwood Barns Community Gallery, May 22–31
Photography has become much more accessible now that the iPhone can snap quality images. Reedie’s explores this new medium with an exhibit of pictures captured, edited and processed with an iPhone. There is a skill and an art to Reedie’s photos that makes us wish we were as savvy with our phones. Check out the exhibit and take away some inspiration for your own iPhoneography.
Jennifer Reedie, Cakes
