Your world soon...
A powerful exhibit of ecologically inspired art; paintings, collage, film and augmented reality with works by Emma Lee Fleury, Gail Root, Sean Rees, and more!
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Followed By
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Hard Wire
A performance that follows two scientists through a psychological journey and an embodied study of rocks and permanency. Their archeological dig leads to a deeper reflection on life in the face of a climate in crisis. Felt through the lens of two millennial-ish women, they fight to reconcile with humanity’s inaction and deflection in determining how, and if we move forward.
Orillia Opera House
Thur. Sept 26th, 2024 at 12:30 p.m.
(Doors open at 12:00)
Hard Wire Bios
Bare Nerve (Instagram)
Bare Nerve is the choreographic collective of dance artists Emma Kerson and Jane-Alison McKinney. Acting as the formalization of their 15-year artistic relationship, the project-based collective seeks to create multifaceted, piercingly visceral performance works. Their new work “hard wire” has been in development since 2019 supported through residencies at Shawbrook Residential (Ireland) and the National Ballet of Canada’s CreativAction. They were thrilled to continue the development through Arts Orillia’s Dance + Design residency in 2023. Following two scientists in an embodied study of rocks and permanency, “hard wire” plays with unexpected, fragmented moods and dramatic shifts of physicalized states, ultimately leading to a deeper reflection on life in the face of a climate in crisis.
Emma Kerson (website)
Raised by the sea in Kjipuktuk (Halifax), Emma Kerson is a dance artist drawn to making as a means to understand one another through collaborative experiences. Her work has been developed in residencies thanks to adelheid, Citadel + Compagnie, Mocean Dance, MOonhORsE Dance Theatre, the National Ballet of Canada, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, and Shawbrook Residential (Ireland). Her work has been commissioned by Blue Ceiling Dance, The School of Toronto Dance Theatre, and has been presented by platforms across Canada. Emma has interpreted works of artists including Julia Aplin, Patricia Beatty, Elizabeth Chitty, Jennifer Dallas, Robert Desrosiers, David Earle, Sylvain Émard, Lisa Phinney-Langley, Michael Sean Marye, Jane-Alison McKinney, Sharon Moore, Peter Randazzo, Simon Renaud, and Tedd Robinson.
Jane-Alison McKinney (website)
Originally from New Brunswick, Jane-Alison McKinney is a dance artist inspired by the power of liveness, collaboration, and reactivity. In 2016, she was awarded a Metcalf Foundation Internship with adelheid under the mentorship of Heidi Strauss. She recently performed in Strauss’ “on air”, which was nominated for a Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble. Jane-Alison’s choreography has been presented nationally by platforms such as Luminato (Creative Current), Chinook Series, Summerworks, Guelph Dance Festival, Citadel + Compagnie, and Tangente. Her work has been developed in residency through Toronto Dance Theatre, Peggy Baker Dance Projects/ Canada’s National Ballet, Connection Dance Works, the National Ballet of Canada, and Shawbrook Residential (Ireland).
Noah Feaver (website)
Noah Feaver is a Dora Award nominated lighting designer. He works frequently in Dance and Opera and has designed for companies such as: Edmonton Opera, Toronto Dance Theatre, Tapestry Opera, Human Body Expression, Holla Jazz, Citadel + Compagnie, Zata Omm, The Royal Conservatory of Music, Against the Grain Theatre, and Rock Bottom Movement. Noah holds a BFA from Toronto Metropolitan University’s Performance Production program and spent two summers as a lighting design practicum at The Banff Centre. Noah is a member of the Associated Designers of Canada.
Your world soon... Bios
Emma Lee Fleury (website)
Emma Lee Fleury is a multidisciplinary artist and musician from Niagara, Ontario who is currently located in the Horseshoe Valley, Ontario. Her artworks and musical collaborations have ventured through an array of venues and festivals in Southern Ontario and West/Northwest of Canada. She studied Sculpture and Fine Art at the University of Fraser Valley, BC, received her bachelor’s degree in Studio Arts at Brock University, ON and she received the Standards Readers' Choice Diamond Best Local Artist Award of 2020. The concepts of her work revolve around perceptions of the Earth, the Universe and the Abyss fused with theories about environmental issues as they pass though the human vessel in waves of love and mixed mediums. Currently, her landscape works focus on representing the effects of climate change on the Earth and its' inhabitants in efforts to raise environmental awareness and ignite change. Her creations bloom and morph into sculptures, recycled art, earth art, set design, installations, paintings, music, words and more. Over her artistic career, she has developed a cohesive style within the genre of landscape painting, it’s an ethereal merge of realism and expressionism with the hovering conceptualization of the human connection to the natural world.
Gail Root (website)
Gail Root is a graduate of the University of Toronto, where she received an honours Fine Art Degree. She spent her working years as an art educator in the school system. In her retirement, she has taken workshops to enhance-e her own art education as well as giving workshops to interested adults.
Gail has been involved in several group and solo shows throughout southern Ontario. She is the founder of an 8 women artists’ collective called “The Octarines”. They have had several successful shows in the Guelph/Fergus/Elora area. This is where her artistic focus has been for the past 10 years.
Currently, Gail resides in Rockwood, Ontario since 1973.
Derek Owens (website)
"Sampling, remixing, and mashing are at the core of my visual practice. Both the mixed media paintings on canvas and fabric, as well as collages mounted on watercolor paper, can involve ink, paint, vintage photos, paper ephemera, AI blendings, text, dried plants, barbed wire, and various found materials. Themes within the work tend to touch on time, memory, and myth. This desire to salvage and redesign is my way of responding to "solastalgia", the melancholia of living here in the anthropocene. Whether drawing from vintage flea market photos or the kitschy poetics of the paranormal, channeling echoes of a forgotten past can bring into focus the ephemeral nature of one's own brief existence. One feels haunted, in other words, while also being a haunt oneself. I aim to have a mixture of mourning and wonderment, disquiet and delight, echoing throughout the work."
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Sean Rees (website)
Sean Rees is an artist and educator with a practice in photography, graphic design, illustration, and fabric art. He has spent the last decade creating typefaces, logos, and websites for companies and individuals in the United States, Canada, and Europe. His work has been presented in galleries across North America and in Germany. Sean is also a university professor in graphic and web design where he teaches branding, typography, user experience, web design, and drawing. As an artist and designer Sean likes to look closely at the small details searching for patterns and aberrations.