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Open today from 10AM - 5PM
Open

Monday: Closed

Tuesday: Closed

Wednesday: 10AM - 5PM

Thursday: 10AM - 9PM

Friday: 10AM - 9PM

Saturday: 10AM - 5PM

Sunday: 10AM - 5PM

An Apology, A Pill, A Ritual, A Resistance

An apology, a pill, a ritual, a resistance clusters together works exploring or enacting methods of healing and the pain that often must be endured to get better. Specific subjects range from Indigenous responses to smallpox and the 1918 influenza pandemic, to iconic works by artists grappling with the HIV/AIDS crisis, and apologies and acts of reconciliation that move toward healing relations fractured by colonialism. 

Event/Exhibition meta autogenerated block.

Where

Remai Modern

Adrian Stimson, Iini Sookumapii: Guess who’s coming to dinner?, 2019, mixed media installation. Remai Modern Collection. Purchased with funds from the Remai Modern Foundation, 2021. Photo: Blaine Campbell.

The artists featured in the exhibition attend to the sick or disabled body as it intersects with societal injustices, and propose alternate frameworks for care and wellbeing rooted in relation to community and the non-human world. Within philosophy, the term pharmakon is a composite of three meanings: remedy, poison and scapegoat. The indeterminacy of medicine to simultaneously heal and harm, and its capacity to produce altered bodies and states of consciousness, is addressed throughout the exhibition. As anxieties of contagion remain hyper-visible, attached to bodies as much as to viruses, the concept of pharmakon becomes a useful lens through which to consider our current moment. What rituals do we enact, whether daily or ceremonial, for our wellbeing, and what must be expelled—or conversely, taken in—in order to heal?

Les Levine, Chest X-ray, 1965, serigraph on acetate, 65.8 x 50.5 cm. The Mendel Art Gallery Collection at Remai Modern. Purchased with funds from a Canada Council grant for the acquisition of works by contemporary Canadian artists, 1965. Photo: Blaine Campbell

Featured artists include Ruth Cuthand, Wally Dion, Guo Fengyi, Sharona Franklin, General Idea, Jeffrey Gibson, Carsten Höller, Clara Hume, Brian Jungen, Kapwani Kiwanga, Kite, Carolyn Lazard, Candice Lin, Les Levine, Paul Maheke, Dylan Miner, Jane Ash Poitras, Skeena Reece, Allen Sapp, P. Staff, Adrian Stimson, Alberta Whittle and Linda Young.

Clara Hume, Saskatchewan Flowers from Spring to Fall, 1974, acrylic on card, 35.5 x 28 cm. The Mendel Art Gallery Collection at Remai Modern. Purchased with funds donated by the Picture Sales and Rental Committee, Women’s Auxiliary, Saskatoon Art Centre, 1975.

The exhibition takes place in both the Connect Gallery on the ground floor and the Marquee Gallery on Level 3. A screening of work by Alberta Whittle will take place in the SaskTel Theatre at 11:30, 1, 2:30 & 4 PM on all Saturdays and Sundays during the exhibition’s run.

P. Staff, Weed Killer (video still), 2017, 16:45 min, installation view, Remai Modern, 2021. Photo: Blaine Campbell.

The exhibition runs until August 8 in the Connect Gallery and August 22 in the Marquee Gallery.

Flowers provided by Blossoms

Brian Jungen, Plague Mask, 2020, Nike Air Jordans, 34 x 69 x41 cm. Collection of Claridge Collection. Courtesy Catriona Jeffries, Vancouver. Photo: Blaine Campbell.
General Idea, One month of AZT, installation view, Remai Modern, 2021. Photo: Blaine Campbell
Alberta Whittle, RESET, 2020, video; 32 min. Courtesy of the artist and Copperfield, London. Installation view, An apology, a pill, a ritual, a resistance, Remai Modern, 2021.
Paul Maheke, Mutual Survival, Lorde’s Manifesto, 2015, HD video, 17:50 min (diptych). Courtesy of the artist and Galeria Sultuna.
Carolyn Lazard, CRIP TIME, 2018. Installation view, Remai Modern, 2021. Photo Carey Shaw