A roving art event that moves from city to city every couple of years, the Villa project works with international art galleries to create a temporary, ongoing art community. Accompanying the exhibition, in cooperation with local art organizations, will be a series of special events throughout the city.
Presented by Raster in association with Art Metropole
Participants:
Art Metropole (Toronto)
Jessica Bradley (Toronto)
Cooper Cole (Toronto)
Diaz Contemporary (Toronto)
Daniel Faria (Toronto)
Hollybush Gardens (London)
i8 (Reykjavik)
IBID Projects (London/LA)
Johann König (Berlin)
LABOR (Mexico City)
Misako & Rosen (Tokyo)
MKG127 (Toronto)
Plan B (Berlin/Cluj)
Projecte SD (Barcelona)
RaebervonStenglin (Zurich)
Raster (Warsaw)
Clint Roenisch (Toronto)
Erin Stump Projects (Toronto)
Jocelyn Wolff (Paris)
Zero (Milan)
Concept: Łukasz Gorczyca & Michał Kaczyński
Project Manager: Kamila Bondar
Project Coordinator: Stu Monck
Project Assistants: Meg Down, Shellie Zhang
Visual Identification: Jakub de Barbaro
A roving art event that moves from city to city every couple of
years, the Villa project works with international art galleries to
create a temporary, ongoing art community that is dynamic and
ever-expanding. This January Villa touches down in Toronto to
present an exhibition of contemporary art at Union Station.
Villa Toronto, presented by Warsaw’s Raster Gallery in association
with Toronto’s Art Metropole, brings over nineteen local and
international art galleries and their artists to Union Station’s
Great Hall from January 16th to 23rd, 2015. Accompanying this
presentation, in cooperation with local art organizations, will
be a series of special events throughout the city, featuring
among others a performance by Ragnar Kjartansson and a talk
with Michael Snow. The one-week program is free and open
to the public.
Villa Toronto is the most recent in a series of international gallery
meetings initiated by Raster. Previous editions took place in
Warsaw (2006), Reykjavik (2010) and Tokyo (2011). The event
is not an art fair. Rather,
Villa
aims to use the curatorial
experience of private galleries to create encounters with the general
public and local art communities that are innovative, stimulating,
and not merely market driven.
Villa
recognizes the decisive role
private galleries play in determining the field of contemporary
art and the type of explorations that take place within it.
Villa
encourages the cross-cultural circulation of art, artists and cultural
workers, and dedicates its resources and focus to facilitate such
an exchange, throughout the project and in the years to come.
Raster Gallery is thrilled to be working with Union Station as
the host venue for Villa Toronto. Toronto’s main rail transportation
hub, Union Station is undergoing a major revitalization. Under
the auspices of developer OsmingtonInc, the Villa partnership
signals a striking vision for the revitalized space, one in which
art will play a significant role in the daily life of the train station.
Osmington’s commitment to bringing art to the site will continue
with Art Metropole’s upcoming mobile shop-structure at Union
Station.
The AM Station at Union Station
will, starting this summer,
distribute artists’ and art books, magazines, multiples, as well
as host art events such as readings and conversations with artists
at its home base on the York Promenade. But also introduce
site-specific programs, of which
Villa
is the first.
Villa Toronto is co-financed by the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, City of Warsaw, Toronto Arts Council and the Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Toronto. In parthership with the Consulate General of France. Villa Toronto is also supported by Osmington Inc., British Council, Goethe Institut, Gallery Express, The Drake Hotel, Wondereur, SOCAN Foundation, Canadian Art, C Magazine.
Please join us for the launch of the VILLA TORONTO publication,
Saturday, January 17, 6-8PM, at Art Metropole:
How to communicate better. With Sylwia Serafinowicz, Lukasz Gorczyca and Rosemary Heather alongside a display including materials resulting from the Contextual Art Symposium as initated by Jan Swidzinski and Amerigo Marras and held at the Centre for Experimental Art and Communication in Toronto in 1976, and complementing ephemera including a set of Mail-Outs by the artist duo KwieKulik. The display will be on view until January 31.
Press/Project Coordinator
Stu Monck phone: +1 647 668 2745 villa@rastergallery.com
Union Station’s Great Hall (and other locations)
65 Front St West, Toronto, ON, M5J 1E6