Focus Exhibition

Can you give us a glimpse into your vision for the Focus Exhibition? What themes or ideas are you hoping to explore?

Guided by a Vera Frankel quote: "if one generation goes mute, the next generation can't hear them," I envisioned from the very start an intergenerational conversation between artworks. I also turned to Toronto-based poet Olive Senior. There is so much in her short verses about anticipation and disquiet, community and gender, fear and hope. The poet's observations are powerful allegories; her words practically become pictures in their own right. Her poem "Birdshooting Season" ends with the lines

Little girls whispering:

Fly Birds Fly

And so, the Focus exhibition entitled Fly Birds Fly invokes hope, longing and wishful thinking. See you there!

How does your experience working internationally shape your approach to showcasing Canadian art on a global stage?

Having had the privilege of working with Canadian artists abroad such as co-commissioning Lotus L. Kang's first major exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery in London with the CAG Vancouver -- and then seeing its phenomenal reception and subsequent acquisition at the Whitney in New York, it reminds me that nothing is ever gained from parochialism or insular thinking.

Commissioning a clever-beyond-belief public art fountain by Abbas Akhavan along AlSerkal Avenue in Dubai, it was a daily pleasure to see people happen upon the work and embrace it as their own. (Though it really belongs to a legendary local feral cat named Chunky who gave it the ultimate honour of being his preferred watering hole!)

From the Venice Biennale to Soul of a Nation, you’ve curated exhibitions with powerful cultural narratives. How do you approach storytelling through art?

I try my best to listen to artists. To follow where they lead and to share the stories they are telling, rather than try to impose a narrative.

What role do you think art fairs like Art Toronto play in fostering global conversations about contemporary art?

Art Toronto has an important role to play as Canada's only international art fair. My lens on it has been to explore how Canada's artists and galleries forge connections, and how Canada has been such a vital creative home to artists from all walks of life -- from a vanguard figure such as Vera Frenkel leading the way for socially engaged art and new media, to seeing Shuvinai Ashoona in the current Sao Paulo Bienal [sic]. Sometimes art fairs do their best work when reminding us locally of just exactly how influential and respected one's own artists are internationally.