Menu
Digital Arts Resource Centre (DARC)’ is pleased to have hosted a conversation between Jean-Michel Quirion and artist Hélène Lefebvre about her commissioned video work ‘Open Water’ – the first projection in DARC’s public art series Imagining Publics, featuring five local artists projecting commissioned video works at five different sites in Ottawa from July-October 2019. Lefebvre’s captivating and daring performance in Open Water, which she shot this past winter on the Ottawa river, was projected large-scale onto the facade of the Les Suites parking garage from July 27th-August 10th, nightly from 9pm-11pm, except for August 3rd-5th.
The dialogue focused on Lefebvre’s work as a unique performance document intended for playback in public space, engaging with a pre-existing architecture and addressing a transitory viewership. An immersive screening of the work was played inside Knot Project Space prior to the dialogue between Quirion and Lefebvre and questions from the audience. Following the discussion, Lefebvre’s work was projected on the exterior facade Les Suites parking garage, across the street from the Arts Court.
This conversation was delivered in French.
Based in Ottawa, Canada, Hélène Lefebvre’s practice is an inquiry into identity and alterity, all the while weaving links between visual art, culture, and society. The body in movement and sensorial active listening (epicentre of performance action) have been sustained interests of hers since Les Moissons in 2009. Recently, her work has taken the form of performance, installation and video. Her practice in corporeality takes inspiration from studies in visual art, contemporary dance, and authentic movement—a form in which improvisation.
Jean-Michel Quirion is an MA candidate in museology at Université du Québec en Outaouais (UQO). He currently works as Artistic Coordinator at AXENÉO7 artist-run centre, in Gatineau, Quirion is also a member of Montreal-based research collective CIÉCO: Collections et impératif événementiel / The Convulsive collections. As an independent curator, his most recent project, the veil of deception, was presented at Galerie Laroche / Joncas in Montreal in 2019. He regularly publishes in art magazines such as esse art + opinions, ESPACE art actuel, Inter art actuel, and Ciel variable.
67 Nicholas St, Ottawa, ON K1N 7B9