Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art Presents: The Unmanageable Artist, A Respondent Talk by Howie Chen

On Thursday, March 16^th, Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art presents a respondent talk with New York based artist, writer, educator and curator, Howie Chen. Chen’s background in economics conjoins with a visual acuity resulting in a unique critical perspective towards the production and dissemination of art. For this talk, Chen will take up managerial technologies in Western democratic societies as they have been shaped by increased demand for autonomy and a creative life. As a template for self-sufficiency, the ‘unmanageable’ artist now faces a critical crisis of contradictions and precarity. Using Managerialism as a backdrop, he will examine current dissonance within art discourse and its relation to the rise of neoliberalism and reactionary politics today.

As a respondent, Chen’s poetic, critical and interdisciplinary methodology resonates with Keefer’s treatment of class, interest in the visual language of marketing, exploitation of public trust, and abstracted circulation of information addressed in her solo exhibition, FIRST CLASS, SECOND THOUGHTS, INTERMINABLE SWELL currently on display at Plug In.

Howie Chen is a New York–based curator engaged in collaborative art production and research. His curatorial and institutional work experience includes the Whitney Museum of American Art and MoMA PS1 (New York). He is a founder of Dispatch, a NYC curatorial production office and JEQU, a research project to assess how sociological and cultural economic approaches to art world debates can augment artistic critique. In 2003, with artist Mika Tajima, he formed New Humans, a moniker for collaborations with musicians, artists and designers that was included in the 2008 Whitney Biennial and has more recently undertaken projects at SFMOMA (San Francisco) and South London Gallery.  Writings include IRL (Primary Information) and Transformers(Badlands Unlimited). Chen was recently the Jane Farver Memorial curator in residence at the International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP).

The exhibition FIRST CLASS, SECOND THOUGHTS, INTERMINABLE SWELL by Angie Keefer is generously sponsored by Video Pool and William F. White International Inc., Winnipeg.

Plug In ICA extends our gratitude to our generous donors, valued members and dedicated volunteers.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council and Winnipeg Arts Council. We thank the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts for their support of our 2016 and 2017 program, as well as Investors Group and Wawanesa Insurance for the direct support of our youth programs.

Plug In ICA relies on community support to remain free and accessible to all, and enable us to continue to present excellent programs. Please consider becoming a member of Plug In ICA and a donor at https://plugin.org/supportor by contacting Angela Forget: angela@plugin.org

For media inquiries please contact: Sarah Nesbitt at sarah@plugin.org or by phone at (204) 942-1043
For general information please contact: info@plugin.org.