CONTACT 2021: Call for Submissions

Free registration to celebrate the Festival's 25th Anniversary

130 Commissioners Street

Demolishing the Cooper's Iron & Metal building – a study by Vid Ingelevics and Ryan Walker.

2020 Burtynsky Grant

Pamila Matharu wins $5,000 towards the publication of their photobook "Index: Some of All Parts"

2020 Online Programs and Exhibitions

New initiatives that adapt and activate this year's Festival including profiles, conversations, screenings and readings.

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@contactphoto

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Nov 21

As Toronto begins a 28-day lockdown to curb the ri

As Toronto begins a 28-day lockdown to curb the rise of COVID-19 cases, CONTACT’s 2020 exhibitions in museums and galleries are closed until further notice.

Several outdoor Public Installations projects are ongoing, and can be safely viewed while venturing out for essential travel and exercise, and our online Programs continue to activate this year's Festival through a range of timely new initiatives.

Please keep yourself and others safe during this challenging time! Visit @topublichealth for more guidelines and information.

Photo: Installation view, Vid Ingelevics & Ryan Walker, "Framework," 2020. Public Installation at 312 Cherry St & Villiers St Median, Toronto. Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid.

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Nov 16

Lyla Rye "Mirage" #CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition

Lyla Rye
"Mirage"
#CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition

Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art
On view through Nov 28
Wed–Sat 12–5pm or by appt

"Prefix ICA presents 'Mirage,' a solo exhibition of the work of Toronto-based artist Lyla Rye. Throughout the gallery, Rye uses still and moving images to offer a nuanced vision that allows viewers to contemplate the influence of architecture and how it impacts living in the world. The exhibition actively engages viewers optically, physically, and conceptually, while aiming to complicate their perceptions of space and time.

'Mirage' features the Canadian premiere of 'A Meditation' (2019), a video installation that expands upon the artist’s use of strategies referencing architectural scale, along with her focus on slowness, intricacy, and material shifts in producing embodied encounters with space that unfold over time."

📷 Installation views of Lyla Rye, Mirage at Prefix ICA. Photos by Toni Hafkenscheid.

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Nov 11

Michelle Forsyth "Our relationship is beautiful du

Michelle Forsyth
"Our relationship is beautiful due to the distance"

#CONTACT2020 Featured Exhibition
Corkin Gallery

On view through Nov 21

"Michelle Forsyth’s multidisciplinary practice opens up new conversations between sculpture and photography. Her first solo exhibition with Corkin Gallery presents work made over the last five years.

Forsyth works closely with textiles, using clothing and patterns found in her own closet, referencing personal memories. The artist’s earlier sculptural works took the form of wrapped fabric bundles, sewn or woven together and presented on plinths painted to reference the textiles used. These sculptures were then photographed, resulting in two-dimensional images that flatten and accentuate the planes of colour and pattern.

Forsyth’s new body of work, Improvisations, continues her engagement with documenting her life through textiles.It features garments made to accommodate her body and her gestures as she navigates the effects of Parkinson’s disease. The finished garments are displayed on custom-built hangers alongside performative self-portraits, set against painted backdrops."

Installation views courtesy of Corkin Gallery and the artist @corkingallery @mmforsyth

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Nov 6

In May 2021, the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Fe

In May 2021, the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival will celebrate its 25th anniversary. To mark this occasion, CONTACT is offering free registration for lens-based artists to participate in the Featured and Open Call exhibition programs.

While CONTACT enthusiastically plans for the Festival in May 2021, preparations are in place to adjust appropriately to evolving COVID-19 health and safety regulations.

Deadlines: Featured submissions are due Dec. 4.
Open Call registration closes on Dec. 18.

Visit our website for full submission details for both exhibition programs.

📷 Installation view of "Three-Thirty" at Malvern Public Library. Artwork by Aaron Jones, photo by Toni Hafkenscheid.

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Nov 5

Final days to see "Diane Arbus: Photographs, 1956-

Final days to see "Diane Arbus: Photographs, 1956-1971" at the Art Gallery of Ontario! This #CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition closes Sun, Nov 8.

📷 Diane Arbus, Mrs. Martin Luther King, Jr. on her front lawn, Atlanta, Ga. 1968. Gelatin silver print, sheet: 50.8 x 40.6 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario. Gift of Phil Lind, 2016. Copyright © The Estate of Diane Arbus.

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Nov 4

Spreads from the three Honourable Mentions for the

Spreads from the three Honourable Mentions for the 2020 Burtynsky Grant:

1. Leyla Godfrey, "Four Walls With No Entrance"

2. Esmond Lee, "Below the City"

3. Laurence Philomene, "Puberty"

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Nov 4

CONTACT is pleased to announce Toronto-based artis

CONTACT is pleased to announce Toronto-based artist Pamila Matharu as the 2020 Burtynsky Grant winner for their book project "Index: Some of All Parts." @pamila_matharu

In 2016, photographer Edward Burtynsky and CONTACT established the Burtynsky Grant to foster the creation of photobooks by Canadians. The $5,000 annual grant supports artists and photographers who are at the advanced stages of developing a cohesive, rigorous body of work presented in book form.

“Through a combination of photography, collage, and archival material, 'Index: Some of All Parts' by Pamila Matharu responds to the questions of what voices survive in the narrative of Canadian art history, and what voices are erased. Exploding with ideas and presented with little compromise between concept and images, Matharu’s striking photobook addresses crucial gaps in representation during this time of ongoing reckoning with the photographic canon.” – the jury

The jury members—Edward Burtynsky, Kotama Bouabane, Letticia Cosbert Miller, Cat Lachowskyj, Brian Paul Lamotte, and Marcus Schubert—had the pleasure of reviewing a wide range of compelling photobook proposals from across the country.

The jury would like to acknowledge the following Honourable Mentions:

Leyla Godfrey, "Four Walls With No Entrance" @leylagodfrey

Esmond Lee, "Below the City" @esmondcklee

Laurence Philomene, "Puberty" @laurencephilomene

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Nov 3

Documents, 1960s – 1970s #CONTACT2020 Core Exhi

Documents, 1960s – 1970s
#CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition
Art Gallery of Ontario

On view through April 18, 2021

"In the 1960s and 1970s, documentary photography took on new power and meanings. In the aftermath of the Second World War, interactions between citizens and their governments, between colonizers and the newly independent, and other sociocultural relationships shifted. Documents, 1960s –1970s, on view in the Art Gallery of Ontario’s (AGO) Edmond G. Odette Family Gallery, looks at how photographers around the world—from Bamako to Mumbai, Pretoria to Toronto—used their medium to witness, celebrate, and critique their worlds in new ways."

📷 1. David Goldblatt, "Women at 39 Soper Road, Berea, Johannesburg," May 1972. Gelatin silver print, Image: 26.7 × 26.7 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario. Gift of Stephen Bulger and Catherine Lash, 2016. © The David Goldblatt Legacy Trust, courtesy Goodman Gallery, 2016/1060.

2. Paul Kodjo, "Untitled," 1970s. Gelatin silver print, 50 x 40 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchase, with funds from the Photography Curatorial Committee, 2020. © Paul Kodjo, courtesy Les Rencontres du Sud 2019/2330.

3. Ming Smith, "Sun Ra space II," New York, NY, 1978. Gelatin silver print, 40.6 x 50.8 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchase, with funds generously donated by Cindy and Shon Barnett, 2018. © Ming Smith 2018/35.

4. Ian Wallace, "Pan Am Scan," (detail), 1970. Gelatin silver print, 40 x 60.1 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Gift of Sandra Simpson, 2017. © Ian Wallace, courtesy Catriona Jeffries 2017/236.1–.5.

5. Charles Gagnon, "Cabines téléphonique," 1965. Gelatin silver print, 27.8 x 35.3 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Gift of Michiko Yajima Gagnon, 2010. © The Estate of Charles Gagnon 2010/270.

6. Garry Winogrand, "Los Angeles, California," 1969. Gelatin silver print, 21.6 × 32.8 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchase, with funds generously donated by Martha LA McCain, 2015. © The Estate of Garry Winogrand, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco 2014/1569.11.

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Nov 2

Dawoud Bey, John Edmonds, Wardell Milan #CONTACT20

Dawoud Bey, John Edmonds, Wardell Milan
#CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition
Art Gallery of Ontario

On view through April 18, 2021

"This group exhibition in the AGO’s Robert & Cheryl McEwen Gallery includes the work of  three contemporary African American artists from three generations—Dawoud Bey (b. 1953), John Edmonds (b. 1990), and Wardell Milan (b. 1977)—who each deeply consider how photographs can relay something authentic about Black American experiences and identity. Central to their approach is the question of what photographs can, in fact, document. Can they convey the experience of a past time? Do they generalize too much? Can they be reworked to question the original context of their making? In these recent works, Bey, Edmonds, and Milan—who are all based in New York—grapple with the history of African American visual representations over time."

📷 1. Wardell Milan, "Michael Ross," 2018. From the series "Parisian Landscapes" (2013–2019). Printed paper, gelatin silver prints, watercolour, and graphite, 40.6 x 26.4 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchase, with funds from the Photography Curatorial Committee, 2019. © Wardell Milan 2019/2250.

2. Dawoud Bey, "Untitled #20 (Farmhouse and Picket Fence II)," 2017. From the series "Night Coming Tenderly, Black" (2016–2017). Gelatin silver print, 121.9 x 149.9 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchase, with funds from the Photography Curatorial Committee, 2019. © Dawoud Bey 2019/2251.

3. John Edmonds, "Untitled (Du-Rag 3)," 2017. Archival pigment print on Japanese silk, 150.5 x 107.5 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario, Purchased with the assistance of Art Toronto 2017 Opening Night Preview, 2017. © John Edmonds 2017/42.

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Oct 23

Fatma Bucak, Krista Belle Stewart "Acts of Erasure

Fatma Bucak, Krista Belle Stewart
"Acts of Erasure"
#CONTACT2020 Core Exhibition

MOCA Toronto
On view through Jan 3, 2021
Open Thu–Sun 11am–6pm, open late Friday 11am–9pm

Online artist talk with @gabbymoser Oct 23, 1pm on Zoom

"Acts of Erasure brings the two distinct artistic practices of Fatma Bucak and Krista Belle Stewart into dialogue. This pairing opens space for conversations around political identity concerning land and heritage, methodologies of historical repression and interpretation, and the act and effects of erasure.

Bucak was born in eastern Turkey and identifies as both Kurdish and Turkish, an identity inherently tied to the social realities of border landscapes. Her work expresses a negotiation and interrogation of the ideological and conceptual conditions of these liminal spaces. Stewart is a member of the Upper Nicola Band of the Syilx (Okanagan) Nation in British Columbia. Her practice draws out personal and political narratives inherent in archival materials, while questioning their articulation in institutional histories.

Despite their very different personal heritages and experiences, both Bucak and Stewart interrogate perceptions of cultural identity, indigeneity, and the notion of the nation-state. Through collaborative, research-focused art practices they probe shared historical constructions and fallacies. Their resulting works present encounters with truths that are both revealing and oftentimes unsettling.
—November Paynter"

📷 Installation views by Toni Hafkenscheid

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