Curtis Talwst Santiago at 259 Lake Shore Blvd E

Curtis Talwst Santiago, *Infinity Series,* 2012-2019, mixed-media dioramas in reclaimed jewelry box. On view at 259 Lake Shore Blvd E as part of the Toronto Biennial of Art (2019). Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid. Courtesy Toronto Biennial of Art.

Curtis Talwst Santiago, *Deluge VII,* 2016, mixed-media diorama in reclaimed jewelry box. On view at 259 Lake Shore Blvd E as part of the Toronto Biennial of Art (2019). Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid. Courtesy Toronto Biennial of Art.

Curtis Talwst Santiago, *I Know Places,* 2012, mixed-media diorama in reclaimed jewelry box. On view at 259 Lake Shore Blvd E as part of the Toronto Biennial of Art (2019). Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid. Courtesy Toronto Biennial of Art.

Curtis Talwst Santiago, *Golden Hour,* 2018, mixed-media diorama in reclaimed jewelry box. On view at 259 Lake Shore Blvd E as part of the Toronto Biennial of Art (2019). Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid. Courtesy Toronto Biennial of Art.

This installation brings together forty-eight works from Santiago’s Infinity Series, which consists of miniature dioramas housed in reclaimed jewelry boxes that are often assembled using found materials to convey an interior world. Since 2012, Santiago has developed a robust body of work that reflects the complex, intertwined elements of individual identity, alternative histories, and personal narratives. The small dioramas contained within reflect layered historical references—decontextualized and temporally collapsed—that offer a meditation on diaspora and in-betweenness.

A related installation by Santiago, J’ouvert Temple, is currently on view at 55 Unwin Ave (Giant Containers).

Bio

Curtis Talwst Santiago

Curtis Talwst Santiago (born in Edmonton, Canada) is an artist with a decentralized practice. Curtis studied as an apprentice to Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun and has exhibited internationally at venues such as the New Museum, New York; the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; the Pérez Art Museum Miami; and SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah. The artist’s work was also featured in the Biennale de Dakar and SITE Santa Fe, both 2018, and is in the permanent collection of the Studio Museum in Harlem.

Exhibition Site

259 Lake Shore Blvd East

The life of this nondescript building reveals the area’s economic history. Its first tenant in 1945, the Standard Chemical Company, produced methanol, formaldehyde, and charcoal. A railway line to the south tethered the site to the movement of goods. By 1954, the building was divided into a warehouse and a showroom, a configuration that remained intact over the course of various leaseholders, including oil and electrical supply companies and a series of car dealerships. (The advertising of its most recent tenant, Volvo, is still visible on the façade.) This building’s fate is indeterminate, as real estate development is increasingly filling the voids left by industrial decline.

259 Lake Shore Blvd East
Toronto ON
M5A 3T7