Chun Hua Catherine Dong [Montreal, QC] and Arantxa Araujo [Mexico/NYC] This event will remain online until November 20, 2020
We begin our Autumn season with a season-long focus on Nature, beginning with a time-lapse video-performance by Chun Hua and next we present a journey with Arantxa, but filmed this fall in their respective home areas, Quebec and Mexico.
CHUN HUA CATHERINE DONG [MONTREAL, QUEBEC]
I Have Been There: 1.5 Hours in Montreal (Performance 1.5 Hours / Video 1:16 Min)
Chun Hua Catherine Dong is a Chinese born Montreal based visual artist working with performance, photography, and video. She received an MFA at Intermedia from Concordia University and a BFA at Visual Art from Emily Carr University Art & Design in Canada. She has exhibited her works at Quebec City Biennial, MOMENTA | Biennale de l’image, Kaunas Biennial, The Musée d’Art Contemporain du Val-de-Marne in Paris, The Aine Art Museum in Tornio, Bury Art Museum in Manchester, Museo de la Cancillería in Mexico City, Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, DongGong Museum of Photograph in South Korea, HuBei Museum of Fine Art in China, Art Museum at University of Toronto, and so on.
She has performed in multiple international performance art festivals, such as Rapid Pulse International Performance Art Festival in Chicago, 7a*11d International Festival of Performance Art in Toronto, ENCUENTRO Performance in Santiago, The Great American Performance Art in New York, Place des Arts in Montreal, Infr’Action in Venice, Dublin Live Art Festival in Dublin, Experimental Action/ Performance Art in Houston, Internationales Festival für Performance in Mannheim, Inverse Performance Art Festival in California, Miami Performance International Festival, Visualeyez Performance Festival in Edmonton, M:ST Performance Art Festival in Calgary, and so on.
Her video work has been screened in Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Colombia, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Scotland, Spain, Sweden, UK, USA, and so on.
Among many other awards and grants, she is the recipient of Franklin Furnace Award for contemporary avant-garde art in New York in 2014. She is listed the “10 Artists Who Are Reinventing History” by Canadian Art in 2017 and a finalist for Contemporary Art Award at Le Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec ( Prix en art actuel du MNBAQ) in 2020.
Artist Statement
Body is political. Working within the gap between body as image and body as experienced reality, Chun Hua Catherine Dong uses the body—often her own body— as a visual territory in her work and a primary material to activate social commentary on gender, race, and immigration. By encapsulating these global issues in microcosm or magnifying personal predicaments until they become universally visible, she presents the body as an embodiment of dynamic human relations, locating herself at the nexus of author, artwork and audience.
Her artistic practice is based in performance art, photography and video within the contemporary context of global feminism. Her work deals mainly with cultural intersections created by globalization and asks what it means to be a citizen of the world today. She opens dialogues about “deterritorialization” and “disessentialization” in culture and how to transform socio-political landscapes through performative gestures. The gestures in her work are symbolic and metaphoric—at times subversive, meditative, subtle and/or humorous. They express her desire to transform everyday political life into art, as she strives to instill a model for social transformation.
In her earlier works, the body represented an ideological confrontation or political alienation. She developed the idea of representation as a political tool to give visibility to those made invisible by dominant ideologies. In her newer works, she views the body as a bridge connecting East and West, past and present, creating a new version of hybridity and striving to transcend and mend.
http://chunhuacatherinedong.com
ARANTXA ARAUJO [MEXICO CITY / NEW YORK CITY]
Emanate (Performance Video 33:33 Min)
Arantxa Araujo is a Mexican multidisciplinary feminist artist with a background in neuroscience based in NYC. She is interested in repetition and duration to access heightened states of awareness. Her work explores biobehavioral research, gender constructions and politics of migration; its affects and consequences in the construction of identity and performativity by using photography, video, mapping, LEDs and performance. Her work has been shown in the Brooklyn Museum at the Radical Women Latin American Art Exhibit (2018), Chashama Space to Present, Grace Exhibition Space, Glasshouse Gallery, Queens Museum, Panoply Lab, Art in Odd Places in NYC; El Monumento a la Revolución, La Explanada del MUAC during the Hemispheric Institute’s Encuentro (2019) and El Vicio, in Mexico; RAW during Miami Art Week; The Semel and Huret & Spector Gallery in Boston; and SPACE Gallery and Bunker Projects in Pittsburgh; Nuit Blanche Festival in Saskatoon, Canada. Araujo is an LMCC 2019 grantee, will be part of the Hemispheric Institute Encuentro 2019 and was part of EMERGENYC (2017), ITP Camp (2018, 2019). Araujo was awarded a full scholarship from Mexican Government Institution CONACYT (2012). She holds an MA in Motor Learning and Control from Teachers College, Columbia University.
// @ArantxaAraujo //
ABOUT GRACE EXHIBITION SPACE
182 AVENUE C NEW YORK, NY 10009
Facebook Instagram Twitter
GRACE:
Grace, n. - simple elegance or refinement of movement
Grace Period - an extended period granted as a special favor
The Three Graces (Greek Mythology) - charm, grace, and beauty
Opened in 2006, Grace Exhibition Space is devoted exclusively to Performance Art. We offer an opportunity to experience visceral and challenging works by the current generation of international performance artists whether emerging, mid-career or established. Our events are presented on the floor, not on a stage, dissolving the boundary between artist and viewer. This is how performance art is meant to be experienced and our mission is the glorification of performance art.
Grace Exhibition Space presents over 30 curated live performance art exhibitions each year, showcasing new work by more than 400 performance artists from across the United States and the world since 2006.
Grace Exhibition Space for International Performance Art Space IRS tax-exempt 501(c)3 status in 2015.
Grace Exhibition Space follows the We Have a Voice Collectives Code of Conduct to Promote Safe(r) Workplaces in the Performing Arts For more information and resources, visit: www.wehavevoice.org