PAUL BUTLER - Still Active

Paul Butler, a multi-disciplinary artist, curator and writer, has been a longstanding figure and important influence on the Canadian art world with a practice focusing around community, collaboration and artist-run activity. Recent works being exhibited in Still Active feature collage created from Artforum gallery advertisements where images and copy are carefully cut from their frames. The accessibility and immediacy of collage allows Butler to recycle what is discarded of mass media to comment on the overwhelming amount of visual information we consume every day. Looking to resources that function as communicators of information and knowledge, Butler exposes these often distant and rigid tastemakers in the commercial art world. The viewer is left with a minimal geometric composition and a newfound creative license to fill these novel empty spaces.

The series Whats Within functions somewhat differently by photographing his figurative collages created with images taken by Scott Schuman for his now infamous blog The Sartorialist in order to bring them back into their seductive and easily consumed format of glossy print. Butler uses this process as a critique on our consumption of mass media and how it impacts our ability to see contemporary art beyond a surface aesthetic. Furthermore, Butler has succeeded to surpass any limitations of scale that working in collage may present.

This current body of work draws on Butlers previous practices: The Collage Party, a touring interactive studio made open to the public; leading Reverse Pedagogy, an experimental residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts; and serving as the inaugural artist-in-residence at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Today Paul Butler leads as the Curator of Contemporary Art at the Winnipeg Art Gallery where he continues to challenge his identity as an artist and curator. This crossover will allow him to carry on the mission of making contemporary art accessible to a broader audience.

Paul Butler has exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; the Art Gallery of Ontario; White Columns, New York, and the Muse d'art contemporain, Montreal among others. Additionally, he has contributed writings to the book Decentre: Concerning Artist-run Culture, Border Crossings, Canadian Art, and The Life and Times of Bill Callahan.

WAKHAN, another AFGHANISTAN

In 2011, Varial and Fabrice embarked on a life-changing journey through the Wakhan Corridor in northeastern Afghanistan. Originally a quest to understand the enduring fascination for this part of the world by the likes of explorers such as Marco Polo or Joseph Kessel, the expedition rapidly became a personal voyage into raw human truths and what lies under social constructs that fill our days as Westerners. This project is not about the ongoing 30-year war in Afghanistan, but the fact that it was produced in a region of Afghanistan that is unaffected by conflict or the Taliban regime is, in and of itself, a political act.

This exhibition documents Varial and Fabrice Nadjari's 400km adventure along the Wakhan corridor, from the Himalayas and Hindu Kush mountain ranges to the border of China. In so doing, they were able to film and capture snapshots of the rural lives of two co-existing tribes, the Wakhi people and the Kyrgyz inhabitants. In the words of Varial, "the physical journey to capture the essence of peoples so resilient in their lifelong battle with the natural elements, was one comparable to the inherent process any artist must suffer to produce a body of work." This exhibition is intended to put on view the human spirit and culminates as a celebration of dignity and purity-devoid of any criticism.

WAKHAN, another AFGHANISTAN will include a feature length film 76 mins, along with a series of photographic works and video installations that allow us to partake in the reliving of this very physical journey of human discovery in these natural settings.

Photographer and multidisciplinary artist, Varial Cdric Houin has garnered international acclaim for his arresting visual and creative prowess on artistic, cultural and commercial projects over the past 10 years. Varial's work in the Wakhan region has also garnered him such prestigious prizes as the National Geographic Traveller Photo Contest 2012, PDN Annual 2012 and Artist Wanted/See Me, Exposure 2011. Most recently, the artist was honoured with the prestigious Pierre and Yolande Perrault Award, presented by Loto Qubec, for his modern ability to approach the arts within the realm of classic documentary making.