Undertones
Nelson Henricks

March 13 - April 12, 2008
Opening Reception at Gallery 44: Saturday April 5, 2 - 5 PM

Artist Walk Through with Nelson Henricks and RM Vaughan:
Saturday April 5th, 3pm
Screening: Friday April 4th 7pm at Joseph Workman Theatre
(1001 Queen Street West at Ossington) Admission: $10 General, $8 Students, Seniors, Members


Image: Nelson Henricks, Countdown, multimedia installation, 2007

Undertones is part of the Canadian Artist Spotlight co-presented by Images Festival and Gallery 44. We are pleased to
present the world premiere of The Sirens and the Toronto premiere of Countdown. The Sirens is a new sound and video
installation incorporating 16mm, Super 8 and video, guitar amps and a “slide” show. In this work, Henricks continues to
explore themes of sound and music, textual elements, repetition and the body. Henricks locates the body within sound,
the physicality of sound and its reactions and effects on the physical. Extreme close ups of technology related to sound
recording and production reveal this relationship: a hand places the needle on the record, a UV meter quivers, acupuncture
needles seem to tremble and water ripples rhythmically from sound vibrations. Countdown is a silent single screen
video installation. Henricks uses items found within his home to create a numerical countdown from 30 to 1 in 30 seconds.
Shot and edited in camera on Super 8 the artist used his internal clock to intuitively estimate the one-second intervals.
Books, vitamin bottles, videocassette labels, measuring tape and playing cards are used to construct the countdown.
Countdown looks at how numbers pervade our daily life through time, money and communication, how the body exists in
intervals and how intervals subsequently are imposed on the body.

Biographies

Nelson Henricks was born in Bow Island, Alberta and is a graduate of the Alberta College of Art (1986). He moved to Montréal in 1991, where he received a BFA from Concordia University (1994). Henricks lives and works in Montréal, where he has taught at Concordia University (1995 - present), McGill University (2001- 2003) and Université du Québec à Montréal (1999, 2003). He has also taught at the University of Toronto (2003). A musician, writer, curator and artist, Henricks is best known for his videotapes, which have been exhibited worldwide. A focus on his video work was presented at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, as part of the Video Viewpoints series (2000). His writings have been published in Fuse, Public, Coil magazines, and in the anthologies So, To Speak (Editions Artexte, 1999), Lux (YYZ Press, 2000) and Caught in the Act (YYZ Press, 2004). With Steve Reinke, Henricks co-edited an anthology of artists’ video scripts entitled By the Skin of Their Tongues (YYZ Press, 1997). Henricks was the recipient of the Bell Canada Award in Video Art (2002) and the Board of Governors’ Alumni Award of Excellence from the Alberta College of Art and Design (2005). For more information, go to www.nelsonhenricks.com

Essayist: Jon Davis holds an MA in film and video, critical and historical studies from York University. His writing has been published in the periodicals GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, Animation Journal, Canadian Journal of Film Studies, C Magazine, Canadian Art, Cinema Scope, Prefix Photo, NY Arts and Xtra! He has curated film and video for several venues in Toronto and elsewhere, and is currently working on a major exhibition of work by Colin Campbell for the Oakville Galleries that will open in December 2008. He also serves on the boards of Pleasure Dom and Gallery TPW.

Moderator: RM Vanghan is a Toronto writer and video artist. He is the author of eight books (including the forthcoming Troubled, Coach House
Books, April 2008), and writes a weekly celebrity interview column for The Globe and Mail. Vaughan’s videos play in galleries and festivals across Canada and internationally, and will be featured in the Entzaubert Festival in Berlin in May. Please visit www.rmvaughan.ca

EXHIBITION BROCHURE AND ESSAY BY JOHN DAVIS