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CRITICAL READING GROUP
"Art With” with Leah Decter
Wednesday, February 16, 2011, 7-9 pm at MAWA
(2 subsequent meetings to be decided upon in consultation with the group)
Free for MAWA members - Just e-mail programs @mawa.ca to get the first readings (put “CRG” in the subject heading)
The terms social sculpture, community art, relational practice, arts based community development, community cultural development, dialogic practice, public art and new genre public art are all associated with practices in which artists engage with ‘community’. Although these practices are far from new, they have risen to greater prominence in recent years in a resurgence marked by the involvement of prominent artists, targeted arts funding, and burgeoning academic programming and research.
Approaches to these practices are as varied as they are contested. Through the review of relevant articles and projects/artworks, this reading series looks at issues surrounding the ways that artists engage with ‘community’ in the context of contemporary cultural landscapes. Within this territory, topics of discussion will be guided by the interest of participants and may include questions of methodology, aesthetics, ethics, and the position of these practices in contemporary art milieus.
Based in Winnipeg, Leah Decter is an interdisciplinary artist working in installation, sculpture, video, photography, performance and socially engaged practices. She has exhibited widely in Canada including at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Grunt Gallery, and the Dunlop Art Gallery, and internationally in the US, UK, Australia and Europe. Video screenings of her work include Images Festival in Toronto and the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Her work is held in the collection of the Winnipeg Art Gallery and private collections in Canada, US and UK. Decter has undertaken socially engaged work, including large-scale community involved public art and intervention projects, in Vancouver, Toronto and Winnipeg. She has worked as an educator, mentor and curator and holds an MFA in New Media from Transart Institute. Her work is held in the collection of the WInnipeg Art Gallery and eHerAs well as developing ongoing bodies of work, she is currently supervising graduate students in the New Media program at Transart Institute, and is the artist in residence at Resource Assistance for Youth.
Leah Decter with guests stitching official denial: trade value (in progress), 2010 and ongoing.
