arts+letters
Arts+Letters
Arts + Letters Collective, established in 2017 by artists Jenn Law and Penelope Stewart, is an independent, not-for-profit experimental platform. The vision from the beginning was to create a platform that would develop and create artistic projects, installations, exhibitions, performances, screenings and foster multi-format conversations linking the analogue with the virtual.
Our an initial project was the creation of a serial publication art+reading which highlights artistic projects and conversations with artists locally, across Canada and with a global reach. Our first edition profiled an in-depth interview with Toronto based artist Ed Pien. During the conversation the theme of rupture emerged, and this became the prompt for the subsequent artist projects. In our second edition we were interested in the links between artists, scientists and collaboration. Our main interview was with Dianne Bos (artist/photographer) and Doug Welch (astrophysicist) who share an interest in lensless photography and the history of astronomy. These interests became the starting point for their exhibition collaboration Light Echoes at MacMaster University. Deep Time and Entanglements became the thread that tied this issue where our conversations explored an artistic approach to geology (Suzanne Nacha and Meghan Price), vibrations and water (Gayle Young, composer and sound artist) to indigenous knowledge, and deep time, (Inuit artist asinnajaq)
System Sounds (commission performance) 2020
One of the highlights of Issue 2 was the spin off commission from System Sounds,
Matt Russo (astrophysicist/musician) Andrew Santaguida (musician).This musical collaborative team use sonification and visualization to explore the rhythms and harmony of the cosmos. The composition created measured the lunar impacts which in turn triggered musical notes creating unique musical scores. Further, the visual component showed asteroids striking the surface of the revolving Moon. This performance was presented at The Power Plant, Toronto, January 2020.
evolve (curatorial project digital online) 2021
We had further planned to create other spin off events but unfortunately these were cancelled due to the Pandemic. After many lengthy conversations we began to ‘rethink’ and consider how to think digitally. Communication had an urgency about it and so we decided to curate 20 online projects using Instagram as both a modality and a platform. Each artist or artist team would create a project that spanned 1 week and became a series of material interventions, multi-platform conversations, process videos and reflections, time-based installations, walkabouts, sound and music projects, poetic experiments, hyperlinks and creative engagements all occurring between May - December 2021.
art+reading (evolve) 2022-2023
With the success of this online project and continued conversations with the artists involved we decided to create art+reading anew. It would not be a catalogue, or documentation of the online projects but rather it would reflect the curatorial conversations and become the “spin off”. Each artist created new projects which were bound in this new format. Themes emerged such as cyclical change, growth, decay and renewal. We had all changed during this period of “sheltering in place” and we were asking ourselves questions for an unknown future.
Jenn Law
Jenn Law is an artist, writer, and researcher living in Toronto. A member of Loop Gallery and Open Studio Contemporary Printmaking Centre, her multi-disciplinary practice explores book culture, the historical archive/library, and print-based strategies of preservation and problem-solving. Law holds a PhD in Anthropology from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, England, a BA in Anthropology from McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, and a BFA from Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario. She has exhibited her work internationally and has worked as a lecturer, curator, and editor in Canada, the UK, and South Africa, publishing on South African, Caribbean, and Canadian contemporary art and print culture. Law has been the recipient of several awards and research grants including from SSHRC, the British Council, and the British Academy. She is the co-editor, with Tara Cooper, of Printopolis, published in 2016 by Open Studio, Toronto.
Penelope Stewart
Penelope Stewart is an artist, curator and publisher whose practice is multi-disciplinary, encompassing expansive installations, sculpture, photography with deep roots in print culture. Her practise has included the creation of prints, artist books, multiples, monographs and collaborative print portfolios. She is a member of Open Studio Contemporary Printmaking Centre and has been both artist and curator of joint projects between Open Studio Artists and print shops in Québec and Australia. In 2013 Stewart was a participant at Impact 8 in Dundee, Scotland, Wacousta panel and the presentation of the Boundless and Borderless portfolio.
Stewart was born in Montréal, Québec. She received a BFA from York University, Toronto and an MFA from the State University of New York at Buffalo. Stewart is the recipient of numerous grants and awards from the Toronto, Ontario and Canada Arts Council’s. Her large scale photographs received First Prize at Photo-Op, Toronto, and at the prestigious Centre for the Perceptual Arts, (CEPA), New York. In 2010 she was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of the Arts (RCA).
She has exhibited extensively in solo and group exhibitions in both national and international venues including such notable institutions as The Albright-Knox Art Gallery, New York; Musée d'Art de Joliette, Québec; Lotusland, California; Musée Barthétè, Boussan, France; Koffler Gallery, Toronto; Oakville Galleries, Ontario; Tom Thomson Art Gallery, Ontario; The Military Museums, Alberta; ACT Design Museum Canberra, Australia; Poimena Gallery, Launceston, Australia.
Stewart currently lives and works in Toronto, Canada.