Dan Bernyk, John Ganis, Adam Glover Check Out This Sprawl May 23–June 21, 2008
Dan Bernyk presents Urban Landmines, a large installation of fabricated steel sculptures and found objects and materials including concrete, asphalt and lawn fragments. Bernyk states: “Although visually convincing, the fabricated objects mimic the physical and aesthetic qualities of their surroundings while resonating a machine-like and synthetic presence–that of the landmine.”
John Ganis, a Detroit-based photographer who has photographed the human impacts on the American Landscape for over twenty years, presents a selection of photographs on sprawl and human intervention on the environment. Ganis’ colour photograph Housing Development, Southern California, exemplifies a situation that is taking place across North America: a ‘cookie-cutter’ housing development seemingly plopped onto a tree-less, hilly expanse, away from any other sign of human life or neighbourhood infrastructure.
Adam Glover presents Man-made, a video installation showcasing short video loops and video images based on a process of fragmentation that is achieved using discarded technologies. Glover states: “Man-made is an installation based on selectively choosing and displaying some of the video images from my ever-growing collection of urban subject matter across a series of out-dated televisions at random looping intervals. These images address the issue of urban sprawl but from the point of view of an individual trying to look for the soul within it. There is a terrible beauty within the face of mass-production.”
Also to be displayed on the gallery’s 37 foot long west Wall, is an unjuried photographic installation, Check Out This Sprawl (borrowing the same name as the exhibition) featuring works by Windsor-Essex and Detroit area artists and community members. This collaborative photo installation will investigate/highlight general issues of “sprawl” in the Windsor-Essex and Detroit areas, including but not limited to: community/economic/social impact of big box and suburban development, historic buildings lost to new development, under-utilized and ailing buildings and neighbourhoods, urban blight; other impact on the environment and/or community; positive changes and impacts that are taking place, such as: revitalized neighbourhoods, buildings, green spaces and more.
Current participants for this project include: Christine Burchnall, Andrew Foot, Anna Frenette, Suzanne Friemann, Susan Gold, Gerry Kaiser, Linda Renaud-Fisher, Ed Janzen and George Palmer, with additional contributors TBA. Sprawl Wall photographic entries will be accepted through the exhibition run, until June 14, 2008.
