Motorbikes, camels and carcasses

Last week, I headed to Art Mûr (5826 St-Hubert) to take a look at Diana Thorneycroft’s Doll Mouth Series, but it was the exhibition Headlights by Eric Raymond that really caught my eye.

Raymond’s work seamlessly combines electronics and sculpture to look at the natural world through our increasingly technologically enhanced 21st-century vision. In “Linescape,” the landscape is not experienced by moving our eyes and body. Instead, it is slowly revealed to us as we follow the video footage displayed on two TV monitors as they travel back and forth horizontally on a mechanical pulley in front of us.

In “Mirage,” two camels made from motorcycle parts drink from a container filled with black ink that reflects a film of rushing water playing on two TVs suspended above. In “Nature Morte,” Raymond paints a copy of Rembrandt’s “The Slaughtered Ox” (1638) and mounts the “carcass” of an old snowmobile next to it.

The powerful look at the natural and industrialised world we inhabit runs until Sept. 23, info: 933-0711. —Christine Redfern

Works in progress

As its name implies, USINE 106U, which opens this week, is more than just a space where art is hung on white walls. “It’s a space where art is not only shown, but created on the spot,” says founder and cartoonist Eric Braün. “It’s kind of a lab gallery—a gallery workspace.”

To that end, artists featured in the USINE’s exhibitions don’t just show up for the vernissage, but rather are encouraged to set up shop in the gallery and create new pieces. Thus shows there are, as Braün says, “always a work in progress.” Fittingly, the space is also a fermenting pot for Sans Issue, Braün’s ongoing anthology of wordless art from around the world, which he says is committed to “breaking the language barrier with the language of pictures.”

The gallery/atelier’s opening show features works from nine artists, including Zombie, Rosa Roquette, Kikou, René Donais, Iris, the Mirror’s Rupert Bottenberg and others. USINE 106U is located at 112 Mont-Royal E., 2nd floor, and the show runs Sept. 1-29, during which time you can drop by and see some of the artists at work. Vernissage Sept. 1, 6 p.m. —Mark Slutsky

Carré dance

Local production company La 2e Porte à Gauche has always been about giving the public free access to contemporary dance and interacting with their audience. Their latest project is no exception. Running with the success of their Simons shop window performance in 2005, co-founder Frédérick Gravel says, “We wanted to remove the glass and get closer to people.” So this time they’re taking the show outdoors.

More than a dozen choreographers have been invited to participate in The Art (prononcez dehors), a dance event that will take over the pedestrian section of Prince Arthur and Carré St-Louis. From Sept. 1–4, you’ll be sure to intersect with one of the 13 dance teams that will present works at noon and 6 p.m. After, head over to the dance department at UQÀM (840 Cherrier) for discussions between artists and public from 6–7 p.m. For more details, visit www.la2eporteagauche.ca. —Marites Carino

Yay Paris

Don’t let the title Summertime in Paris fool you, the artworks now on view at the Parisian Laundry (3550 St-Antoine W.) are all home-grown. This exhibition features the work of nine artists and in the big space (now with ping-pong table) you get to see many works by each of them.

In the drawings of Theresa Sapergia you’ll come across a menagerie of wild animals—bears, wolves, deer—all loosely and deftly rendered on paper. The rest of the artists show paintings in a wide range of styles: from Dil Hildebrand’s theatrical portrayals of nature to Jennifer Lefort’s abstract swirls of paint.

The Parisian Laundry is a large, bright and airy space, yet, oddly enough, whenever I go there I always like the windowless basement “bunker” the most. For this exhibition it contains small works by all of the artists, hung salon-style on the concrete bricks. An animation by Nathan J. Wasserbauer, with a happy, trippy soundtrack gives the room a good vibe. Check it out fast, last day is this Saturday, Sept. 2. —Christine Redfern

Is it Art?

GO NORTH: Since Icelander Leif Erikson discovered the new world in 1000, we’ve come to expect innovation from the northern isle. A more recent example comes from Stefan Petur Solveigarson, artist and designer of Go, which we’ll let him describe: “Go is a backpack, plastic picnic carpet, little tent and a raincoat. It’s ideal for camping with a lot of people like in really big gatherings or festivals. For if you don't like the idiots around you, you can just turn your tent into a raincoat and take a little walk to find a more suitable place with better and more interesting people.” Visit Solveigarson’s Web site at http://honnun.lhi.is:16080/~stefanpetur/ to see his radio-inside-a-pillow, Icelandic marinade-application utensil and other examples of his creations.

ArtsHole

CARLITO, OUAIS: Carlito Delceggio’s series of paintings and drawings Art = Science + Intuition has proven such a successful formula that Galerie [sas] (372 Ste-Catherine W., #416) has extended the show until Sept. 16. • MILE-END MARKETING: Count Articule in as one of Mile-End’s newest artsy residents. The gallery left its Berri digs behind over the summer and inaugurates the new space (262 Fairmount W.) on Sept. 8 with Pavilion Projects’ new conceptual marketing firm The Enterprise, opening at 7 p.m. • VISIBLE MAN: Toronto experimental filmmaker Mike Hoolboom’s work moves from the theatre to the gallery for the first time this week as Concordia’s Leonard and Bina Ellen Gallery presents The Invisible Man. Hoolboom’s images stem mostly from appropriated images from Hollywood flicks, documentary footage and home movies. It continues until Oct. 7.

ARTISTAT: Number of artists giving rise to a new world order in a project conceived by Éric Ladouceur and influenced by the board game Risk, Réingénerie du Monde, opening today, Aug. 31 at the Maison de la culture du Plateau Mont-Royal (485 Mont-Royal E.), and continuing until Oct. 1: 24

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