Beijing-Vancouver  (2009)

Beijing-Vancouver was a two-person show with Garry Neill Kennedy at Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art in 2009. This exhibition was a summary of work presented previously at Pickled Art Centre (Beijing, China, 2007-2008) as part of my and Garry's artist residencies there. 

During our trips to Beijing, I amassed a collection of branding imagery including pictures of t-shirts, food labels from the local grocery story, wall paintings and large scale vinyl advertisements which became the source material for my subsequent installations and accompanying publications. For Whatever I Like (2007) I compiled photos of people wearing English-language message t-shirts in Beijing, then transposed a sampling of messages to fill the gallery wall. I designed the stencils for the wall-texts to resemble propaganda message-painting, echoing the once ubiquitous propaganda wall paintings of the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 70s. With Your Choice (2008) I looked at packaging, both supermarket packaging and oversized vinyl banners found throughout the city, to consider ideas about marketing and branding during the Beijing 2008 Olympics. 

For Beijing-Vancouver, I created four large panels, entitled Beijing Cube (2009), from images of these previous exhibitions (two were 435 cm x 475 cm and the other two were 435 cm x 385 cm) which were reconfigured as a centrally located square structure. This work was paired with Garry's wall painting, I Don’t Want to Pay the Full Price (2008/9), which wrapped the walls of the gallery.