Art Matters brings you Dear Diary, Saturday Only!

Dear Diary,

My landlord threw me out of the building and now all by belongings are sitting on a truck, destined for nowhere. And on top of all that, I have an art exhibition to put on!

Photo: Julie Inniss

The exhibition Dear Diary, part of Fine Arts Concordia’s Art Matters festival suffered a last minute blowback. Originally set to go on from March 1st until the 15th, the exhibition was reduced to a single evening on Saturday March 1st, due to a snafu with the landlord at Le Kop Shop.

But Rosie Prata and Laurie Filgiano put on a bold face and won the hearts of a local moving company which donated the inside of one of their moving trucks to be used as a gallery fro the artist’ work.

The two of them spent the next few days redecorating the inside of the truck so that people wouldn’t be able to tell that they were forced into a last minute location. Parked in front of the Belgo building on Saint-Catherine Ouest, the exhibition was home to a series of art pieces that deal with the way memories are linked with objects.

A more perfect metaphor for the exhibition couldn’t be found than in their current predicament, said Filgiano. Just as anyone who has experienced the thrill and terror of moving, the objects in their home begin to signify experiences and memories not to be left behind.

Maia Vidal’s My Life After Braces is an autobiographical installation featuring a mold of the artist’s teeth suspended above the gallery on a shelf lit with candlelight, like a holy relic of some lost saint. Even hated objects like braces become objects of sentimental value when the pain and displeasure associated with them are removed, and one is free to reminisce.

Photo: Julie Inniss

Julie Inniss’ series of 12 full color photographs, entitled Devushky (which means ‘young girl’ in Russian), deal with people as seen in their own environments, says Inniss, whose work features troubled adolescents between ages thirteen and seventeen. The eight girls in the exhibit emanate “defiant confidence developed through necessity and the instinctive drive for survival,” says Inniss, who says it was these “chameleon-like qualities” that made the girls so interesting.

Zach Hertzman’s Haunted, says co-curator Rosie, shows that memories are not just a thing of the past, but have a way of popping up in every day life, mostly from objects like a little girl’s party shoes and a beaten up water vein. Though that may not be your beaten up old typewriter on display, objects like these carry memorable associations for society as a whole, which come to be associated with human history.

With a little luck, the three artists in this year’s exhibition will one day be able to look back on these unfortunate events and smile.

The exhibition Dear Diary will be held outside the Belgo building on 372 rue Sainte-Catherine Ouest for one day only, March 1st, 2008.