Ed Ackerman, Sharon Alward, Graham Asmundson, Louis Bakó, Paul Butler, Sharron Zenith Corne, Shawna Dempsey and Lorri Millan, Dan Donaldson, Cliff Eyland, Karel Funk, Tim Gardner, General Idea, Krisjanis Kaktins-Gorsline, Jake Kosciuk, Guy Maddin, Bonnie Marin, Doug Melnyk & Larry Glawson, Robert Pasternak, Linda Pearce, Paul Robles, Melanie Rocan, The Slomotion, Kevin Stafford, Diana Thorneycroft, Andrew Valko, Jordan Van Sewell, Gord Wilding, Richard Williams

Exhibition reception: Tuesday, April 26 from 18:00 to 21:00 as part of the Prairie Scene gallery crawl.

Presented at Ottawa Dance Directive Studio, 2 Daly, 4th floor, Ottawa, Ontario (Arts Court Building)

Winter Kept Us Warm is a group exhibition that explores Winnipeg, Manitoba as a mytho-poetic territory of the body and desire. The exhibition builds upon the burgeoning recognition of Winnipeg as a site of uniquely personal and diverse (often gleefully perverse) art production. On its surface, Winnipeg may strike visitors as flat, dangerous, grey and unremittingly cold. But tempering this surface are artists, collectively a vital force in our city because they remind us to look beyond our shivering individual experience.

This complex environment has provided a distinct matrix for cultural commentary and inspiration. Winter Kept Us Warm, takes its name from David Secter’s 1965 film, Canada’s first entry into the Cannes Film Festival, which in turn took its name from T.S. Eliot’s “Wasteland.” In order to create a sense of this “other” place, the exhibition features a broad range of artistic media, from video art to sculptural objects and photography, all in multiple ways connected to the city’s ethereal, physical aura.

Co-organized by Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art, the National Arts Centre (Prairie Scene), University of Manitoba Gallery 111, la Maison Rouge Paris, Musée International des Arts Modestes de Sète.
Taavo Soodor, Exhibition Design

Winter Kept Us Warm will form a component of the My Winnipeg exhibition at la Maison Rouge, Paris, which opens the evening of June 22, 2011, and will tour to the Musée international des arts modestes de Sète (France).