Public Intimacies
with works by Jon Wang, Dani Restack, and Sheilah Restack
14-16 April, 12PM-5PM (each day)
The Super 8 Hotel, 222 Spadina Ave. 
FREE

Co-presented in partnership with Toronto Design Offsite Festival, Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, and Art Spin

"Public Intimacies" is an exhibition of moving image installations taking place in hotel rooms at the Super 8 Hotel in Toronto’s Chinatown. Speaking to the boundaries between public and private space, the works challenge our notions of domesticity and contemplate themes of intimacy, expressions of sexuality, desire, and identity.

Monday, April 16, 3-4PM
A conversation between Jon Wang, Dani Restack, and Sheila Restack, our featured artists at the Super 8 Hotel moderated by Richard Fung

WORKS

From Its Mouth Came a River of High End Residential Appliances
Jon Wang
HONGKO NG/USA, 2018, DIGITAL VIDEO, 22 MIN
At the edge of Hong Kong, high rise buildings stand as gates to the city’s frontiers. A series of rectangular voids are designed to allow for the passage of dragons. This contemporary architectural manifestation of “feng shui” prioritizes the flow of energy between the natural and built environments. A buoyant camera takes the audience on a passage through these holes as a disembodied voice meditates on the desire for queer futures.

A Hand in Two Ways (Fisted)
Dani Restack and Sheilah Restack
USA/CANADA, 2017, DIGITALVIDEO, 7 MIN
A two-way portrait composed from a series of intimate and banal excerpts from the artists’ lives together, we are sent through a looping meditation of bodily encounters. Guided by a collective intuition, a fluid movement begins through opaque landscapes of flesh, into nocturnal mystery, and erotic expressions.

BIOGRAPHIES

Jon Wang (b. 1986, US; lives and works in New York) is an artist and filmmaker whose work has been exhibited inter- nationally at venues such as Sculptu- reCenter, Petzel Gallery, the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Anonymous Gallery (Mexico City), and CAS Gallery (Cape Town). 

Dani’s work is made with an emotional logic, questioning cultural, personal, and animal realities. Dani has screened at the Union Docs, Oberhausen, Rotterdam, MoMA PS1, Anthology Film Archives, Views from the Avant- Garde, and Projections. 

Sheilah uses photography, video, and text as performative and documentary tools to trace body movement between environments of fact and fiction. Sheilah has had exhibitions at New Zealand City Art Gallery, Enjoy Gallery, CCA Santa Fe, Knockdown Center, Antioch College and Lennon Weinberg. 

ABOUT IMAGES FESTIVAL

Established in 1987, the Images Festival is the largest festival in North America for experimental and independent film, video and other time-based media. Images Festival is excited to announce its 31st edition, taking place from April 12 - 20, 2018 across Toronto. Focusing on local, national, and international contemporary moving image culture, Images Festival continues to present vanguard projects across cinematic, exhibition, and live platforms.

Images Festival acknowledges the generous support from our public funders. The Canada Council for the Arts | Conseil des Arts du Canada, Ontario Arts Council - Conseil des arts de l'Ontario, Toronto Arts Council, the Department of Canadian Heritage, Telefilm Canada, the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, and TD Bank.