September 21 – December 1, 2019
Reihana’s two-channel video, Tai Whetuki—House of Death Redux, depicts Māori and Pacific Islander cultural practices surrounding death and mourning. A reflection on grief and the transition of the spirit, these haunting and evocative images are accompanied by an elemental soundscape. In this sombre vignette, a goddess guides the spirit of a Māori Warrior to the underworld, reconnecting the body to the land through death. The work was filmed at Karekare, a site of massacre on the West Coast of Aotearoa | New Zealand.
A related exhibition entitled Lisa Reihana: In Pursuit of Venus [infected], curated by Julie Nagam, is currently on view at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Presented in partnership with imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival, it is free of charge for visitors 25 and under and the general public on Wednesday evenings from 6pm to 9pm. For more information, please visit ago.ca.
Bio
Lisa Reihana (Maori – Nga Puhi, born in 1964 and lives in Auckland, Aotearoa, New Zealand) is a multidisciplinary artist who received a BFA from the Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland and a Master in Design degree from UNITEC Institute of Technology, School of Visual Art and Design, Auckland. She represented New Zealand at the 57th Venice Biennale (2017) and has contributed in important ways to multimedia, photography, sculpture and screen culture in Aotearoa, New Zealand.
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