Multiple varnishing

𝗔𝗛𝗞𝗪𝗔𝗬𝗔𝗢𝗡𝗛𝗞𝗘𝗛
𝙏𝙨𝙞 𝙉𝙞 𝙄𝙤𝙝𝙨𝙠𝙖𝙩𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙣𝙞𝙤 / 𝘽𝙚𝙖𝙪𝙩𝙮 𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝘼𝙧𝙤𝙪𝙣𝙙
𝗠𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗻 𝗔𝗸𝘄𝗶𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗼𝗿𝗼𝗻 𝗟𝗼𝗳𝘁
In 1985, Martin Akwiranoron Loft initiated a project in which he wanted to photograph Montreal’s aboriginal community. A few years ago, he relaunched the project and photographed others from this community, as a tribute to the work he had done previously. “By highlighting our resilience and spirit through my images, I hope to inspire pride and empowerment within our communities, while educating and enlightening others about our history and experiences.”

𝗟’Œ𝗜𝗟 𝗗𝗘 𝗣𝗢𝗜𝗦𝗦𝗢𝗡
In the large gallery:
𝙋 𝙥𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙋𝙖𝙡𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙚 / 𝙋 𝙞𝙨 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙋𝙖𝙡𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙚
𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗶𝘀𝘀𝗮𝗶𝗿𝗲𝘀: Ariane De Blois & Muhammad Nour ElKhairy, 𝗔𝗿𝘁𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝘀: Bayan Abu Nahla, Amal Al Nakhala, Muhammad Nour ElKhairy, Nada El-Omari, Yara El-Ghadban, Mona Hatoum, Rana Nazzal Hamadeh & Rehab Nazzal
𝗨𝗻𝗲 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗲𝗻 𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗮𝘁 𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗰 𝗣𝗹𝗲𝗶𝗻 𝘀𝘂𝗱
𝘗 𝘱𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘗𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘦 / 𝘗 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘗𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘦 is a group exhibition that brings together conceptual, experimental and poetic works by artists from Palestine and its diaspora. Based on the premise that language is political, the exhibition focuses on semantic and discursive issues specific to Palestinian reality, both present and past. The works selected share a particular relationship with words – whether written, signed or spoken – to evoke, recount or name various aspects of the Palestinian experience. Personal and family narratives, echoing a common reality, emerge from the works. In a context where Palestinian voices are often censored or struggle to be heard, both in the media and in the arts, the exhibition takes the form of an agora, a space for encounters that amplifies some of them.
𝙇𝙚𝙨 𝙢𝙪𝙧𝙨 𝙙𝙪 𝙙𝙚́𝙨𝙤𝙧𝙙𝙧𝙚
𝗠𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗻 𝗕𝘂𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘂
Les murs du désordre is a multidisciplinary project intersecting painting, installation, video, documentary film and geopolitical research. At L’Œil de Poisson, the exhibition will unfold through six short documentaries. The Israeli-Palestinian separation wall, the Peace Lines in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and the U.S.-Mexican border wall express the whole range of issues surrounding border walls, from inter-confessional conflict to economic inequality, illegal trafficking and segregation. Above all, they affirm the mental barriers that afflict them.
In the small gallery:
𝙊𝙥𝙖𝙘𝙞𝙩𝙮 𝙙𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙨
𝗟𝗮𝗶̈𝗹𝗮 𝗠𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗿𝗶
Laïla Mestari’s interdisciplinary practice explores issues related to cultural identity and uprootedness. Drawing on the symbolic charge of objects that are part of her family history, she is interested in how North African identity persists and mutates through artistic and craft practices despite multiple attempts at colonial assimilation and the mass emigration of its recent diasporas. Here, the sculpture 𝘖𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 employs the form of a ‘djellaba’ to contain a search for textures and images. Fabric prints, quilting techniques and the integration of video screens into the textile material superimpose references to history with fragments of the artist’s everyday life and elements of the territory in order to explore points of rupture and points of continuity between her present-day reality and her cultural heritage. Thus, in harmony or dissonance, 𝘖𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 rearranges the symbolic anchors of a fragmented identity and embodies the complexity of a multilayered, multilingual, composite culture.

𝗘𝗡𝗚𝗥𝗔𝗠𝗠𝗘
𝙎𝙪𝙞𝙩𝙚 𝙇𝙞𝙘𝙝𝙚𝙣
𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗛𝗮𝗿𝘃𝗲𝘆
In the summer of 2022, Chantal Harvey meets a couple of lichenologists from Duke University. With them she goes to collect specimens in the territory and has the privilege of observing different varieties of lichen under the microscope. For her, this observation opened the door to a whole new world. Inspired by the science and passion of these two researchers, she continues her artistic research.
Suite Lichen deploys a colossal assemblage of lichen engravings on the gallery walls, modulating their compositions in harmony with the place and space they occupy, while evoking their blossoming in nature.
This work is accompanied by real lichens that are introduced to embossed and tinted papers recalling different textures of the natural environment where they are observed. They will form a set of miniature pieces, a sampling that evokes the methodical research work of lichenologists, but also brings us closer to nature as it is.

𝗩𝗨
𝙇𝙖 𝙘𝙤𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙞𝙖
𝗩𝗮𝗹𝗲́𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗠𝗮𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗮𝘂𝗱
“Since 2015, I’ve been traveling to Honduras, a small Central American country where my wife is from, and a country that lives under the yoke of endemic and paralyzing urban violence. The homicide rate there is thirty times higher than in Canada, and 95% of murders go unpunished.
In the course of my media travels, I have documented the “ecosystem of fear”.
In a 2010 study published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, two biologists noted that the range of large predators (sharks, wolves, etc.) was far greater than their actual area of movement. They dubbed this phenomenon “the ecosystem of fear”, i.e. how potential prey adapt their behavior in a large area where they feel threatened.
In 2014, the concept was taken up in a sociological study on fear in Honduras. I then decided to follow this lead to document the constituents of this ecosystem: the omnipresence of heavily armed security guards, dogs trained to defend, cars as protective bulwarks, the media as transmission belts, or accounts of assaults recreated in the studio.
I preferred to document the consequences of fear rather than the results of violence, already often documented by photojournalists. For example, I devoted a whole section of my work to the new safe zones: shopping malls in favor of abandoned downtowns, public parks surrounded by fences, and of course the closed, guarded neighborhoods where over a third of the population lives.”