905ArtTalk: Couch Surfing + Illunating Peace

On view until March 22 at the Art Gallery of Mississauga

Couch surfing in Mississauga/Couch surfing in Syracuse

Alison S.M. Kobayashi and Christina Kolozsvary

Curated by Su-Ying Lee with co-operation from Emily Vey Duke & Cooper Battersby

Two emerging artists were invited to become hosts and guests, guiding the other through the mundane, peculiar and fantastic aspects of life where they reside, in the periphery of a major city. Raised in Mississauga, Alison S.M. Kobayashi studies Art and Art History at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Christina Kolozsvary, originally from Miami, Florida, lives in Syracuse where she studies Art Video at Syracuse University.

While the process this has lead to is not strictly collaborative, the artists have worked on the projects for this exhibition through co-operation, exchange and the spirit of partnership. Kobayashi and Kolozsvary have come upon converging concerns, both formal and conceptual, in their practices.

Alison Kobayshi's project, based on her early experiences as a Brownie and Girl Guide, invites viewers to DO GOOD, much as she was encouraged to do during her formative years. Kobayashi's work examines the inception of those "good" values and how they have since evolved.

Christina Kolozsvary addresses the implications of her early
childhood fixation with Elvis Presley in the installation King of My
Heart. Kolozsvary examines the assimilation of her puerile attraction
two-fold, in both the idealization of Elvis as a romantic partner and the
power
of assuming his persona.

amy loewan Illuminating Peace

a collaboration with the Robert Mc Laughlin Gallery, Oshawa

"My art is the melding of Chinese painting sensibilities and western post-modernist art practices. My work is about the promotion of peace, harmony and understanding."-Amy Loewan

Eight large woven banners made from rice paper strips are suspended in the
Gallery space. On these strips written in calligraphy and computer generated
type, in over thirty languages are the values that Loewan sees as vital to world
peace; compassion kindness, tolerance, respect, understanding, patience,
gentleness and forgiveness.
Illuminating Peace adds a three dimensional component to The Peace Project. Using the same rice paper weaving and the eight values Loewan has committed to in her world vision of human relations she has created a column. This column is illuminated from within and transforms the Gallery into a contemplative sanctuary.

Amy was born in Hong Kong at the end of WWII and immigrated to Canada in the late 70s. She was trained and still practices as an occupational therapist but later studied art, receiving her Master's in Fine Art from the University of Alberta.

This exhibition is an extension of The Peace Project which has been exhibited in nine Canadian venues in the west as well as showings in Shanghai and Hong Kong. The AGM has collaborated on this exhibition with the Robert McLaughlin Gallery in Oshawa and the Yukon Art Centre in Whitehorse.