Photo: Katie Bethune-Leamen, still from A Third and Final Part: Peary & Ahnighito, 2012, 13:51, HD video, compositing & editing: Nathan Saliwonchyk, 3D CGI: David Girard, sound: Andy McCluskey. Thanks to the Ontario Arts Council, © 2012 Katie Bethune-Leamen


Art Gallery of Ontario

Toronto Now
Katie Bethune-Leamen: Shiny, Object, Person
June 9 – August 5, 2012
Opening reception: Wednesday, June 13, 6-8pm, in the Young Gallery beside Frank Restaurant, with the artist in attendance


The Art Gallery of Ontario is pleased to announce that the Toronto Now series continues with an exhibition by local artist Katie Bethune-Leamen.

Shiny, Object, Person brings together a number of new works: a video, a series of works on paper, a sculpture, and a bookwork. Arctic explorer Robert Peary, the Cape York meteorites housed at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, dazzle camouflage and ghost-costumed and draped forms, are some of the multifarious allusions that linger in the background of Bethune-Leamen's work. But while it is an intricate set of experiences and references that leads her to make the things that she makes, the people, places and stories that exist in her titles are simply there as hints of what inspires her ongoing inquiry into the nature of objects.

About the artist: Katie Bethune-Leamen is a Toronto-based artist. She has participated in numerous group exhibitions, most recently Cognitive Dissonance (Cottage Gallery, Los Angeles) and On N'Enchaine Pas Les Volcans (Toulouse, France). Recent solo exhibitions include Older, Sadder, And All in White This Time (Latcham Gallery, Ontario) and Dazzle Shizzle (MKG127, Toronto). She has recently participated in residencies on Fogo Island (Newfoundland), Reykjavik (Iceland), Toulouse (France), Banff (Alberta) and Venice (Italy), with residencies forthcoming at the Ilulissat Art Museum (Greenland) and the American Museum of Natural History (New York City). Her writing has appeared in Canadian Art, C Magazine, Border Crossings and other publications. She holds a BFA from Concordia University (Montreal) and an MFA from the University of Guelph. For more information about the artist visit www.katiebethuneleamen.com

Toronto Now spotlights local artists and offers the public an opportunity to see exciting contemporary art projects free of charge. The series inhabits the Young Gallery, a free, street-level space adjacent to Frank restaurant, facing Dundas Street.

Toronto Now is generously supported by The Contemporary Circle.

Contemporary programming at the AGO is supported the Canada Council for the Arts.

For more images and more information, contact: Andrea-Jo Wilson, 416-979-6660 ext. 403, andrea-jo_wilson@ago.net

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