EVENTS:

The Body is Now
Roundtable Panel
with Farheen HaQ, Diana Burgoyne, and Paul Coulliard
moderated by Linda Rae Dornan
web essayist Jayne Wark

Saturday September 27, 7:30pm. Reception to follow.

Presence & Absence: The Body Now
The human body’s presence generates connections both symbolic and physical within every area of our social system. From the political to the spiritual the body is discussed, controlled, manipulated, fought over and abused (be that the female or the male). Current discourse on technological promises and possibilities, virtual space interaction, body enhancements, and robotic workers for example, all have as their basis the human endeavour to understand and explore the body’s possibilities, sometimes with the desire to exist non-organically.

The body has become a contested site. Questions about moral issues, and social and corporate control are raised in fields such as reproductive technology, disease, bionics and prostheses as well in the arts. Who owns the human body? The lines between the organic and non-organic, the natural and unnatural, and the self and other are increasingly undefined in our present realities.

The panel will be moderated by Linda Rae Dornan, and an essay will be written for the website by Jayne Wark.

The artists invited to participate in our panel approach the subject matter of body in their art practices from both similar and opposite perspectives.

Paul Couillard’s performances focus on the body’s presence as vessels of experience, knowledge and spirit in the search for a language to convey personal history, and cultural/social specificity. His solo practice is particularly concerned with duration and the effects of time.

Fareen Haq does videos and video installations about the body as a site of struggle in opposition to closed and rigid systems. Her practice is informed by gender and ritual as well as formal and aesthetic properties.

Diane Burgoyne has been a visual artist working with technology since 1982. She is particularly interested in juxtaposing the body in performance with technology to discuss society, technology and environment.

Recommended Reading for the Panel:
"The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet" by Margaret Wertheim