O.W.N. (Object Work Notation)

Curated by Richard Sewell

Featuring: Yael Brotman, Laura Bydlowska, Pamela Dodds, Elizabeth Forrest, Libby Hague, Isabelle Hémard, Jae Lee, Liz Menard, Liz Parkinson, Irina Schestakowich and Penelope Stewart.

O.W.N. is a visual occurrence of 33 located objects by 11 Open Studio members, curated by Richard Sewell, one of the co-founders of Open Studio. O.W.N. as occurrence is evolved from pre-literate chanting—retaining its regard for the observer as object-participant, of incantation as ritual, and of rhythmic pattern: as occurrence. Within O.W.N., these enable each object, work and notation, to occur—one about the other, and about one located—as observer. O.W.N. as occurrence-of-objects is about links rhymed by colour notation: to locations; to objects; to each other, and to the artist who made, selected, and notated within this occurrence. The artists include Yael Brotman, Laura Bydlowska, Pamela Dodds, Elizabeth Forrest, Libby Hague, Isabelle Hémard, Jae Lee, Liz Menard, Liz Parkinson, Irina Schestakowich and Penelope Stewart.

Since 1970, Richard Sewell has been an exhibiting artist and artist collaborator (dance/music/ performance/print), and a printmaker, printer, publisher, teacher, and administrator/manager in the arts and in education with: Open Studio, OCADU, ACAD, the University of Saskatchewan, and the joint Art and Art History Program of Sheridan College, Oakville, and the University of Toronto Mississauga. Mr. Sewell co-founded Toronto’s Open Studio in 1970, and in1982 began to teach in the Sheridan programs of Art and Art History, Art Fundamentals, and Crafts and Design. Retiring as Studio Professor Emeritus in 2011, Mr. Sewell is now resident in Grand Bend, Ontario, where as image investigationist, he pursues wherelocal/geoplasticimage/gpi—an investigation of image as to locusethics, sequencing, and observation.

An audio file of Richard Sewell’s curator’s talk is available below.