MICHAEL A. ROBINSON | THE ORIGIN OF IDEAS
SATURDAY 10 MAY-SATURDAY 05 JULY 2014
OPENING RECEPTION
FRIDAY 09 MAY, 8:00PM TO 10:00PM
MICHAEL A. ROBINSON | THE ORIGIN OF IDEAS
Through two large sculptural installations and a series of cast wall panels, Michael A. Robinson displays his creative reflections on the idea of spectatorship and non-objectivity in art. Inspired by Russian Suprematist artist Kasimir Malevich and his White on White painting, Robinson has spent 20 years pondering the material aspect of the object, which is often indivisible from its concept.
Subject to Scrutiny consist of several rolling cameras focused on one wall and Panoptic Illumination is composed of dozens of lamps all pointing toward the center of the work, recalling Michel Foucault’s concept of the Panopticon. Robinson’s techniques of assemblage and accumulation of objects in midair challenge their main purpose as well as the relationships between subject and object, artist and medium, spectator and work. In both pieces, the cameras and lamps are pointed at the epicenter referring to the meaning of the works.
MICHAEL A. ROBINSON holds a BFA from Concordia University and an MFA from Universit de Paris I/Panthon-Sorbonne. He qualifies his own practice as the result of tangled ideas, thoughts and experiences which esteem transparency over rigor, practice over the final product, transformation and opening over conclusions and affirmations. His most recent group shows include Art Histories, VOX Centre de l’image, (2012), Qubec Gold, Reims, France (2008), la Biennale nationale de sculpture contemporaine, Trois-Rivires (2006), and Avancer dans le brouillard, Muse national des beaux-arts du Qubec (2004). He has had many solo exhibitions, most recently at gallery Antoine Ertaskiran, Montreal (2013), who represents him in Montral. His works are part of numerous public and private collections, such as the Muse d’art contemporain de Montral, the Muse national des beaux-arts du Qubec, and the Canada Council Art Bank. Robinson lives and works in Montral where he teaches part-time at UQAM’s Department of Visual and Media Arts.
Read Close Encounters by DEBORAH KIRK, an essay published along side MICHAEL A. ROBINSON‘S exhibition.
Michael Robinson: The Origin of Ideas, 2014. Photo credit: Allan Kosmajac
