GAE | PROJECTS // LIBRALATO

 

944 Queen St W, Toronto, ON M6J 1G8
Wednesday – Saturday
11am – 5pm, and by appointment

 

Galerie Antoine Ertaskiran in association with LIBRALATO is proud to present Jon Rafman’s HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL. In this exhibition, Rafman continues his exploration of the deep web. Combining sculpture, installation, and video, Rafman captures contemporary experience as mediated through virtual worlds. Pulling from the visual vernacular of internet troll caves, and obscure online subcultures, Rafman finds the sublime in the abject – revealing both the possibilities and limitations of digital technologies.

As 4chan user anon 40254871 said of Rafman’s work:

this shit would have been cool in 2005 but you’re on goddamn 4chan in 2013, one of the
biggest sites for “SUCH A LOSER ?_?” people to ever browse the internet people someone
didn’t found out your dirty secret life and reveal it to everyone else we’ve been doing it
since the early/mid 2000’s
it isn’t special
get over it

HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL is presented in parallel to Jon Rafman’s installation during The Power Ball, The Power Plant’s yearly fundraiser, which this year pays tribute to the transformations that have occurred as a result of the digital revolution.

Jon Rafman (b.1981) lives and works in Montreal, he holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He has exhibited at the New Museum (New York), Palais de Tokyo (Paris), Saatchi Gallery (London), the Contemporary Art Museum of Saint-Louis, and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art (Toronto). Rafman’s work has been featured in Art in America, Modern Painters, Artforum, Frieze, and the New York Times. He has recently been nominated for the Sobey Art Award 2014 and has been the recipient of awards from the Canada Council for the Arts and National Film Board of Canada.