Outside of Time

Group show with Béchard Hudon, Elena Willis, Adam Basanta, Christopher Payne and Meredith Snider

Curated by Christine Redfern, part of Montreal Digital Spring 2017

April 13 – May 13 , 2017

ELLEPHANT is pleased to present Outside of Time, a group show featuring artworks that take us out of the structured, tick-tock of the everyday and places us in a world that is timeless – seemingly prehistoric, contemporary and futuristic at  once – a world inhabiting geological, as opposed to human time. Bringing to mind the movement of the planets, the forming of metals, where sound waves are visible and time flows, bends, speeds up, slows down, and stops, the exhibition brings together artists from Ottawa and Montreal, whose black and white artworks touch upon science, technology, culture, the environment and human nature.

An Outside with an Inside Inside I, is part of a series of kinetic wall sculptures made by duo Béchard Hudon with asymmetric geometrical lines, forms and parallel planes built out of wood, motors, geometry sets and fiberglass fishing rods. This work continues the investigations of the pioneers Frank Kupka, Kasimir Malevich and Piet Mondrian, whose abstractions were influenced by fourth dimensional theories and non-Euclidean geometry. Sound is the focus in the minimalist pieces of Christopher Payne, where sound waves are replicated in three-dimensions using folded paper. And also in Pirouette by Adam Basanta, in which a microphone rotates slowly, like a life-sized ballerina atop a music box. As the microphone hovers over seven different speakers in sequence, a haunting tonal melody emerges. Throughout nine full rotations, a skeletal version of the main theme from Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake ballet can be heard.

The aluminum sculpture A Thousand Thirsts by Meredith Snider is made out of 1000 empty tall cans of beer melted into a puddle. Nearby, two other elements from the Periodic Table are present in Elena Willis’ photographs Scandium and Thulium. These two works are part of a larger photographic series by Willis of seventeen Rare Earth Elements (REEs). REEs are essential to create green technologies, but ironically, the extraction of these elements requires mining practices that are heavy polluters.

Special thanks to Joe Friday for loaning Meredith Snider’s One Thousand Thirsts to ELLEPHANT for the Outside of Time exhibition and to Danny Hussey and Bridget Thompson at Central Art Garage.