Independent art curator William Huffman, left, recalls his week inside the G8 and G20 summit security zones. This report, especially the images, were not permitted to be disseminated before or during last week’s summit sessions.
The past two weeks added a few new entries to my personal lexicon, phrases like “prop wash”, “red zone”, “lock down”, “controlled access zone” and “sherpa room”. Welcome to my whirlwind introduction to summit-eze courtesy of a week of artwork installation at Metro Toronto Convention Centre (MTCC) and Deerhurst Resort in Huntsville, Ontario. Descriptively entitled Canadian Collection, the exhibition was a central component of the visual narrative (okay, interior decoration) for G8 and G20. Over the course of the week, me and my small team comprising reps from Art Dealers Association of Canada (ADAC) and a handful of preparators from PACART, transported, installed, maintained and eventually removed the two massive, back-to-back exhibitions. Below is a Brian Jungen goalie mask in the main MTCC hallway.
A little background . . . in addition to things like, say, security, the summit program also includes a significant fluffing component, which means loads of construction to transform and create spaces, lots of furniture brought to the sites and a little-known artwork strategy . . . that’s where we came in. For past summits, walls were filled with Group of Seven and assorted Canadiana, generally sourced by hired-gun consultants. Toronto and Huntsville strayed from that path by presenting rigorous (I think) installations of contemporary and modern art. You might want to visit James Bradshaw’s Globe and Mail article for an overview – it includes reader comments (some scathing) about my curatorial direction on this project . . . at least people are talking about Canadian art!
To be transparent about structure, this was a volunteer gig for me . . . no financial compensation waited for me at the end of the summit rainbow. But I did work closely with ADAC on the development and implementation and the ADAC Foundation will receive a financial contribution. These funds (the dollar figure I don’t know, it’s probably not that much) will form seed capital for an endowment aimed at providing its membership and individual artists with additional professional and developmental resources — not such a bad arrangement.
So, having carte blanche in the selection of work, we developed two divergent but connected exhibitions. Each played with subject matter and aesthetics that responded, naturally enough, to the general notion of summits but also acknowledged the two very different venues: in a nutshell the Toronto show is urban, diverse and architectural while Huntsville was green, natural, majestic. Pictured above is work by Robert Davidson in the Finance Ministers meeting room at MTCC, and below is work by Denyse Thomasos in the MTCC Sherpa meeting room.
Here’s an overview of some of the artists included in the project: in Toronto we featured work by David Alexander, Robert Davidson, Stan Denniston, KM Graham, Gershon Iskowitz, Brian Jungen, Rita Letendre, Rick Rivet, Louise Robert, Otto Rogers, Dionne Simpson, Ron Shuebrook, Francois Sullivan and Denyse Thomasos; in Huntsville we showcased David Alexander, Alex Cameron, Dean Drever, Ivan Eyre, Dorothy Knowles, Rita Letendre, Eamon Mac Mahon, Jean McEwen, Norval Morrisseau, Reinhard Reitzenstein, Jean Paul Riopelle, Jutai Toonoo (below, in the Leaders’ Dining Room at Deerhurst) and Ivan Wheale.
With more than 100 works all in (insured for a few million dollars), we approached placement within the space in exactly the same manner one would if the venue were a gallery – taking into account dialogue between works, sightlines and traffic flow. We had two big challenges: firstly, the relationship of spatial scale to the work (for instance, we contended with massive leaders’ lounges in both spaces where large walls could potentially eat-up work), and secondly, what to choose for the Prime Minister’s Office (think messaging, optics and ego)?
After some agonizing and lots of reconsiderations, I think we got it right. Here are the installation shots of the Prime Minister’s offices at MTCC above (works by Dionne Simpson) and below at Deerhurst (Dean Drever aluminum bears installed in wall sconce style).
Finally, I should thank a few people: (this is the dedicated ADAC support team) Johanna Robinson, Alex Costello, Pat Feheley, Tien Huang, Powell MacDougall, Amy Piotrowski, Miriam Shiell, Brad Van Der Zanden and Maddie Wilkes; (our PACART crew … both front line and behind the scenes) Chris Adams, Ross Bell, Gordon Butler, Nicolas Cadiac, Paul Charbonneau, Ray Charbonneau, Eric Chatelaine, Jason Cheong, Brett Coles, Owen Curnoe, Jamie Friel, Charles Giordano, Jay MacDonnell, Rick Pokuls, Bill Porter, Dan Purdie, Blake Starling, Brian Starling, Mark Starling, Thomas Tang, Michael Tureski and Bert Van Harmelen.
William Huffman (above, hanging out in the Leaders Lounge beneath a Dorothy Knowles canvas at Deerhurst) is an independent curator and educator, in addition to his current post as Associate Director of Toronto Arts Council.
Dionne Simpson flanks the PM’s desk at MTCC.
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well done.
What a daunting challenge, to try and represent the entire country. Of course there are nay sayers — I don’t envy you.
An impressive feat….and a great post to chronicle the project.
Kudos – please be proud of yourself.