Then + Then Again
Proudly presented by AKA Gallery and PAVED Arts.
Clive Robertson – Kingston, Ontario.
June 26th to July 31st, 2009
Then + Then Again – Practices within an artist-run culture, 1969-2006 is an archival retrospective exhibition curated by media artist and artist-run centre pioneer and theorist, Clive Robertson. The show consists of 5 DVDs, 6 CDs and a series of 24 photo-texts that mix a history of Robertson's performance, video and audiowork practices alongside his community-building curatorial and publishing collaborations.
Then + Then Again provides a unique opportunity to revisit the "how's" and "why's" of artist collectives networking within an ever-changing alternative culture and the productivity of intergenerational exchanges. Robertson himself worked as an artist and emerging curator with various members of the 1960s Fluxus movement including Robert Filliou, Dick Higgins and Alison Knowles, and Joseph Beuys.
Highlights of this exhibition that successfully toured Ontario and Québec in 2007 include genealogies of the 1970's Calgary-based performance and publishing collective, W.O.R.K.S.; the cultural journalism activisms of Centerfold/Fuse magazine; curatorial contributions to the start up of Canadian performance and independent video festivals; and new re-editioned CDs from the indie cassette and vinyl Voicespondence label including albums from De Dub Poets, The Government, the Gayap Rhythm Drummers, Clive Robertson, and Nerve Theory. Also featured are historic music rap and spoken word videos.
Then + Then Again has been compiled from an archive of some 600 images, 40 hours of videotape and 60 hours of audio materials. The exhibition includes a collectibles display of rubber stamps, artists books, and other ephemera.
Clive Robertson is a media artist, cultural critic and publisher who first emigrated to Traynor, Saskatchewan in 1957. Completing an art college education in Plymouth, Liverpool and Cardiff and at the University of Reading (UK), Robertson re-emigrated to Calgary in 1971 and has subsequently lived and worked in Toronto, Ottawa, Montréal and Kingston. His recent book, Policy Matters – Administrations of Art and Culture was published by YYZBooks, Toronto in 2006. He is the co-editor with Alain-Martin Richard of Performance art in/au Canada 1970-1990, Éditions Intervention, 1991. Clive Robertson currently teaches contemporary art history, cultural policy and performance studies at Queen's University.