EMMEDIA presents:

Fresh Short Shorts

Wednesday, August 19, 2015 @ 9:00 PM
Broken City Patio - 613 11 Avenue SW, Calgary, Alberta
FREE Admission

EMMEDIA is proud to present a summer series of free outdoor screenings at the relaxing Broken City Patio, showcasing works from different media art centres coast to coast. Starting with the east coast of Halifax and ending in the west coast of Vancouver, experience a unique collection of Canadian video art from across Canada. Join us on a warm summer night as we survey contemporary and historical media artworks that experiment with the medium of video, while enjoying a refreshing pint!

August 19 @ 9-10PM - VIVO Media Arts Centre showcase (Vancouver)

Video Out was founded in 1980 as a component of the Satellite Video Exchange Society (SVES). The distribution services and the over 4,000 title collection we manage are an integral part of the VIVO Media Arts Centre (formerly SVES) in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Video Out is a non-profit, non-exclusive distributor of media art on video to galleries, festivals, educational institution collections and broadcasters nationally and internationally. The primary activity of Video Out is to provide artist driven distribution services that promote the practices of independent media art and earn revenue for independent media artists. In addition, we provide curatorial, exhibition and research support through communication about the videotape collection. The foundation of both these activities is ongoing collection management and preservation activity. For more information, go to: www.vivomediaarts.com

"Urban Decay"
Curated by Shauna Jean Doherty

The works that comprise this program were drawn from a call for submissions based on the theme “Urban Decay” initiated by Video Out in April 2015. The works selected together articulate the outlook of the artists featured, who have looked upon their environment and determined that despite the decay of the landscapes presented they are capable of renewal. The video works when viewed together offer a distinct yet conflicted portrait of urban life. The video producers express a recurring sense of unsettlement through their use of a variety of video formats (16mm film, digital video, and computer generated imagery). The degraded landscapes that are consistently invoked are depicted using film stock or video cameras that are themselves damaged producing physically decayed, distorted, fragmented, or glitched images. The abundance of images presented herein deploy the motif of breakdown anticipated by the call, but also elaborate, contemplating decay in relation to transition and regrowth.

Scenes from Berlin, to Milan, from Vancouver, to Montreal each illustrate the effects of living on the physical landscape. Each work included in the program operates as a provocation – a portrait of humanity’s surroundings cast with a lens of unnerving pessimism. Despite an overarching quality of doubt the artists seem to retain a faith that a place is defined by those who animate it and it is up to those occupy space to resurrect sites that are considered by most, too far gone.

- Excerpt from curatorial statement by Shauna Jean Doherty, Distribution and Outreach Manager, Video Out

SCREENING PROGRAM:

The Everden by Clint Enns (2013, 16:33 min.)
Ocean Falls by Ryan Ermacora, Jessica Johnson, Aidan Whitley (2015, 13:14 min.)
The Ninth Floor by Jessica Thalmann (2015, 8 min.)
All That is Solid by Eva Kolcze (2014, 15:58 min.)
Simulacra by Theo Tagholm (2015, 3:56 min.)
Urban Cuts by Matteo Pasin (2015, 5:14 min.)

About the Curator:

Shauna Jean Doherty holds an MFA in Criticism and Curatorial Practice from OCAD U, and a BA (Hons) from the University of Toronto, where she double majored in Book and Media Studies and Semiotic Theory and Communications. Shauna Jean has curated exhibitions and events for Vtape (Toronto), Xpace Cultural Centre (Toronto), Centre for Art Tapes (Halifax), The Images Festival (Toronto), and The Art Gallery of Ontario, and has held various curatorial and programming positions at VIVO Media Arts Centre (Vancouver), Hashtag Gallery (Toronto), the Art Gallery of Ontario, and Hamilton Artists Inc. Her writing has appeared in C Magazine, the Journal of Curatorial Studies, and Carbon Paper. Shauna Jean currently lives and works in Vancouver.

EMMEDIA's Fresh Short Shorts Series

July 15 - Centre for Art Tapes showcase (Halifax) >
July 29 - Video Pool showcase (Winnipeg) >
August 5 - The Banff Centre showcase (Banff) >
August 19 - VIVO Media Arts Centre showcase (Vancouver) >

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