Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art is pleased to present the exhibition “her rain” by Canadian artist Lani Maestro. Using minimal and simple visual language, Maestro’s work addresses the complexities of human nature and dignity in the conditions of the social, cultural and political realities we experience in everyday life. Her works are poetic and powerful; they defy conventional interpretation.

Plug In has commissioned and will present for the first time a new installation entitled she laughs. “her rain” is a highly poetic, text-based show that was first exhibited at Centre A, Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art and has been adapted to the new Plug In facilities at 460 Portage Avenue, acting as a response to the architecture and central location of the gallery. With the installation entitled No Pain Like This Body, Maestro transforms the gallery space into a large sculpture, with the placement of very minimal elements: a text articulated in neon, and its reflection on the floor reiterating a “mindful presence.” These two works are accompanied by a third, brenda console , a video that act simultaneously as sculpture, architecture and body posing questions of voice. Who is speaking? The work raises questions of subjectivity, agency and worldview that ultimately bring us to a coming to “difference.”

Lani Maestro was born in the Philippines in 1957. She came to Canada in 1983 and pursued an MFA at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax in 1989. In that period, Maestro’s work was included in the Segunda Bienal de la Habana in Cuba (1985) where it received the Bienal Prize. Since then, Maestro has received increasing international recognition for her work and she has exhibited widely across the world. Last year, Maestro mounted two exhibitions in Canada, “l’oubli de l’air”, in collaboration with American composer Malcolm Goldstein at the Darling Foundry in Montreal, and “her rain” at the Centre A, Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art co-organized by Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art.

The forthcoming exhibition publication includes an essay by the award-winning Montréal-based poet Erin Mouré and an introduction by curator, Makiko Hara.

Opening Reception: Friday, October 28, 2011, 7:00 p.m., Plug In ICA
Artist Lecture: Saturday, October 29, 2011, 3:00 p.m., Plug In ICA
Lecture series supporter: BMO Financial Group.

With the support of l’INSTITUT FRANCAIS – Ministère des Affaires étrangères et européenes.

The commission of “her rain” was made possible with the funds from Arts Partnership Creative Development (BC).

This event is free for all and all are welcome.