May 2024
Spectra brings together new work by innovative members of Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography in an exhibition that represents a variety of different photographic concepts. As the name suggests the work demonstrates the many possibilities that are open to contemporary photographers and celebrates the diversity of artistic practice revealing the ways seemingly disparate work can intersect. Spectra, a changing collective of members, has been an active participant in CONTACT Photography Festival since its inception.
Ademola Oladipo, Alex Coley, Bryan Stewart, David Scriven, Ismayil Atmaca, Ivan Rupeš, Jack Martin, Jennifer Lee, Kate Young, Katherine Childs, Kye Marshall, Lilianne Schneider, Linda Briskin, Maisie Cu, Mike Lau, Nas Filho, Paula Razuri, Ross Stockwell, Theresa Ma
Layout design by Grace Wang
May 15 to May 26th, 2024
918 Bathurst Centre for Culture, Arts, Media and Education
Dance, Mexico City, 2023 Ademola Oladipo
Ademola Oladipo, an emerging artist in the world of photography, hails from the vibrant city of Lagos, Nigeria, and presently calls Toronto, Canada, his creative home.
Ademola's work is a captivating fusion of influences drawn from diverse artistic disciplines. His photography is enriched by the cinematic narrative, the abstract beauty of art, the evocative brushstrokes of impressionism, and the symbolic depth that transcends the mundane simplicity of life. This multi-layered approach infuses his art with depth, meaning, and a story waiting to be uncovered.
In 2023, Ademola earned recognition for his dedication to the craft when his photographs were featured in the prestigious "Blue" exhibit at Gallery 44. This milestone marked a significant step in his emerging career.
At the heart of Ademola's work lies a profound philosophy: "Even the simplest mundane moments of life can reflect beauty, despair, among other things." Through his lens, he invites viewers to delve deeper into life's everyday occurrences, to discover the extraordinary concealed within the ordinary.
His photography promises to continue resonating with audiences, offering a fresh perspective on the world around us and reminding us that art resides in the most unexpected places.
Helena, 2019 Jennifer Lee
Jennifer Lee (she/they) is a photographer based in Toronto. Specializing in candid and street photography, her practice serves as both a storytelling tool and a contemplative meditation on the evolving landscapes and interactions within our communities. She has actively lent her lens to various grassroots organizations and advocacy groups in Toronto, emphasizing community building and a sense of belonging. Through her body of work, Lee seamlessly integrates her passion for capturing candid moments in public spaces with a commitment to community engagement.
Lee’s more intimate and ongoing projects involve documenting her family and exploring their connections with both personal histories and the environments they inhabit.
Lee’s works have exhibited in the Scarborough Arts' Scarborough’s New View photography exhibit (2020), the Canada Council for the Arts and CBC-funded project The Time Being (2020), the Scarborough Museum's exhibit Awaken Your Senses (winter 2021/22), choa Magazine Volume 3: "Aging in Place" (2022), and Worth Gallery’s WorthyCirca 4x4 show (2023).
Melancholy Sonata, 2023 Ismayil Atmaca
Ismayil Atmaca, is a Toronto-based Street photographer renowned for his distinctive and captivating style. Utilizing Specializing in black and white, monochrome, and color photography, Atmaca's work is a mesmerizing fusion of abstract art, surrealism, and a discerning eye for geometry. Through his lens, he skillfully navigates the interplay of high contrast, revealing the diverse tapestry of human life.
I.Atmaca has his presence in the Canadian art scene, participating in numerous juried exhibitions. He has also captured the attention of the international art community, leading to his participation in the Other Art Fair by Saatchi Art in Los Angeles.
A significant milestone in I.Atmaca's artistic journey is his upcoming solo exhibition at the Assembly Hall, organized by the City of Toronto. Through I. Atmaca’s lens, viewers are invited to perceive the world in a new light, where each image narrates a story, and every moment is a masterpiece.
Future In Retrograde II, 2024 Kate Young
Kate Young is a Toronto-based photographer whose current practice emphasizes the use of black-and-white analog processes and the exploration of alternative printing techniques. Her photography has been featured in a variety of publications, including the Globe and Mail and Glamour FR. She has exhibited her work with John B. Aird Gallery as well as Gallery 1313 for the Muse Projects. As a participating artist in the ‘First Thursdays’ series at the Art Gallery of Ontario, she transformed the sculpture atrium with her visuals, both moving and still. She has also contributed her photography to a range of musicians, including Castle If, New Chance, Timber Timbre, and Austra.
Veolia Energie Kolín, Czechia, 2023 Ivan Rupeš
Ivan Rupeš is a Toronto-based photographer. In his work, Rupeš examines the complexities of the human relationship with the environment. He is especially drawn to probing the nuances and ironies of the ways humans affect their habitat and the ways it affects them back. Rupeš was born in what is now Czechia. He started out as a biomedical researcher whose career brought him first to the USA and then to Canada. Currently, he takes on documentary projects both in Canada and around the world. His ongoing work alongside the Indigenous Peoples of the northern Philippines was presented at the 2021 Earth Photo Exhibition.
9 Benlamond, 2023 David Scriven
David Scriven is a lens-based emerging artist living in Toronto. Using cameras inherited from his father and grounded in documentary photography, his photographs have explored decay and renewal in the urban ecosystem. Common Ground, an ongoing project, emerged out of ancestry research started during the COVID-19 pandemic. Images from this series were recently featured in the online Montreal-based magazine Carte Blanche, Issue 46. He has exhibited work at the MacKendrick Community Gallery, Artscape Youngplace, Gallery 44 Centre of Contemporary Photography in Toronto, as well as ViewPoint Gallery in Halifax. In November 2021, he self-published a photo book entitled Alexandra Park that captured a year in the complete demolition and rebuild of the Toronto west-end community housing project.
Forest Dream One, 2024 Katherine Childs
Katherine Childs is an urban landscape photographer living in Toronto since 2002. Past work Includes documentary landscapes of the diverse places of worship found in Toronto’s suburban employment areas and a series that explores the semiotic codes used to communicate ethnic, class and social identity found in the front yards of downtown Toronto’s neighbourhoods. More recently, Childs has been working with textiles, where screened photographic images are layered onto silk fabric. Childs has been in numerous group shows, including Gallery 44 Spectra shows, the Plus Arts Festival and “What She Said.” Childs has a BA from Reed College,Portland Oregon, a Fine Art Diploma from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and an MFA from the University of Washington, Seattle.
dancing, 2023 Theresa Ma
Theresa is a self-taught artist shaped by every image they’ve ever seen and every idea they’ve ever read. She has a formal education in computer science, cognitive science, and philosophy from the University of Toronto, and has a professional background of aligning stakeholders and increasing shareholder value.
She is interested in the web of multidisciplinary thought around what it means to be alive — boundaries between souls, qualia, intention, truth, interpretation — and what it means to be alive now with our generation’s particular existential anxieties and technological advances.
The work is driven by desire and ego — obsessions, fascinations, whims – and an exercise in attention and intention. She believes that if the work is good enough, some part of her may live in you, in a very real way.
Windmill 1, 2022 Kye Marshall
Kye Marshall is an eclectic musician, composer and cellist who brings to her photography her experience, vision and discipline as a professional musician. She studied photography with Freeman Patterson, Andre Gallant, and Tony Sweet. Her work is in multiple private collections, she has had solo shows at the Axis Gallery, Canadian Music Centre, Fairview Library, The Window Box, Yorkville Library and she has exhibited in multiple group shows. Marshall’s photography focuses on Nature. She is currently exploring Iphone photography, Multiple Exposure Photography and ICM –Intentional Camera Movement. Her opera Pomegranate was presented by the Canadian Opera Company in June 2023.
Crooked Cottage, 2024 Ross Stockwell
Ross Stockwell is an emerging artist based in Toronto, Ontario. He notices beauty, whimsy, and intrigue in unlikely places, capturing still moments borne of a mindful presence. His work is eclectic (landscape/urban, figure, and portraiture), unified by illuminating oddities and the play of patterns and geometric forms. His emerging projects emphasize narrative to connect, consolidate, and express subjective experience. He explores states of being, felt-sense moods, and emotions in an inanimate context. Stockwell previously showed his work at Contact 2022 (Spectra) “Hutchison Road” and G44’s Members Gallery (January 2023) “Dissolution.”
Turns, 2024 Paula Razuri
Paula Razuri is a photographer from Toronto. Her work incorporates a background in literature, comedy, video, and analog photography to produce personal and reflective images on the themes of isolation, self-improvement, mental health and nature. She combines text and images in self-published zines that attempt to assign meaning to missed memories and manual errors in photography.
Liverpool Station, 2023 Bryan Stewart
Bryan Stewart is an emerging, self-taught artist and photographer in Oakville, Ontario, Canada. He is interested in capturing energy, movement, and dynamics with still photographs, employing techniques like long exposure, multiple exposures, and intentional camera movements. His work covers a range of photographic genres, including street, landscape, nature, portrait, and figure studies, often featuring elements of expressionism and abstraction.
Stewart's photography has been exhibited at Gallery 44, Twist Gallery, Gallery 1313, and Oakville Gallery. Additionally, his work has been published in the literary magazine “Humana Obscura,” and reflects his growing presence in the art world. Looking to the future, Stewart aims to merge photographic methods with visual arts such as painting and drawing. This approach demonstrates his commitment to exploring and expanding the boundaries of photography.
Salon de mémoire, 2024 Linda Briskin
Linda Briskin is a writer and fine art photographer. She is inspired by the fluid crossover between the imagined and the real, the natural and the constructed, and the authentic and the fabricated. She embraces the fictive rather than representational.
She exhibits widely, has had numerous solo exhibitions, and participated in many group shows. Briskin’s images have been chosen for many online juried shows. Recently for Urban Landscapes sponsored by NY Photo Curator (Honourable Mention), Abandoned at Chateau Gallery (Kentucky) and The Same But Different Exhibition sponsored by NY Center for Photographic Art (Honorable Mention.) Her photographs have been published widely in literary journals and camera magazines: recently, in PhotoEd Canadian Camera, The Poeming Pidgeon, South85, Humana Obscura, and Masque & Spectacle. In 2023 The Commotion chose Sisters to represente in their gallery. Upcoming in 2024 is a solo exhibit at The Rushton in Toronto.
Hand, 2024 Lilianne Schneider
Lilianne Schneider is a self-taught photographer, born in Peru and residing in Toronto since the late 1980s. Drawing inspiration from Toronto's vibrant experimental film scene and her extensive travels, Schneider has developed a keen sensitivity to her surroundings, with a particular interest in capturing the intersection of society and cultural landscapes in urban settings. Her work has been recognized and showcased in various prestigious venues, including exhibitions at Toronto City Hall by the Patrons for Arts of Peru, the Peruvian Consulate in Toronto, Columbus Centre, PIX FILM Gallery, and Artscape's Spectra series from 2019 to 2023, among others. Schneider's photography, characterized by its experimental nature and attentiveness to often overlooked scenes, reflects her explorative approach to visual storytelling.
The Windows Series #1, 2009-2023 Alex Coley
Alex Coley is photo-based artist and printmaker in Toronto. She holds an Honours Bachelor of Arts in Visual Studies from the University of Toronto and a graduate certificate in Photography from NSCAD University. Her photography practice is process-based, often interdisciplinary and references the history of photography. To Alex, there is honesty to be found in work that is tangible and made with her hands like a darkroom print or screenprint. She has exhibited at Gallery 44, Queen West Art Crawl, Gladstone Hotel and Gallery 1313. This is her third time exhibiting with Spectra.
Facade of Smiles No.5, 2024 Mike Lau
Mike Lau is a British lens-based artist and photographer, was born in Hong Kong and is currently based in Toronto, Canada. He graduated from OCAD University with a BFA in photography in 2020. His body of work is primarily focusing on conceptual self-portrait, delving into both political and personal dimensions. Through his lens, he serves his body as a medium to unravel a diverse array of topics, all inspired by his rich life experiences.
Beyond the realm of conceptual arts, Lau demonstrates his artistic visions through works in nature, documentary and architecture using both traditional and experimental approaches. He is also recognized as an experienced photo technician showcasing a deep understanding of photographic theories, gear operations, photo finishing and maintenance.
Lau's work has been exhibited in "Spectra 2021" & "Blue" at Gallery 44, "GradEx 105" at OCAD University, and "Reflection" at UE Galerie in Germany.
Lineage, 2018 Maisie Cu
Maisie Cu is a documentary photographer based in Toronto, Canada. Her subject matter deals with the human conditions, her self-analysis, her love for Western Canada, a sense of oikophilia, and the need for home and dwelling alongside the symbolism of everyday walking life. As a keen observer, her pictures often carry a sense of being an outsider, somewhat detached from the images, yet profoundly involved and experimental with a personally intensified mood. Her sense of being and narrative are often placed within a physical and metaphysical space as a fast, automatic reflex to guide her storyline. She cites her influence as Sir Roger Scruton, Alfred Hitchcock, and Henri Cartier-Bresson. Her works were previously published and exhibited in both Canada and internationally in the Ada Slaight Gallery and 86 Logic.
I Want Candy, 2023 Jack Martin
Jack Martin is a music and documentary photographer based in Toronto. A long-time member of Gallery 44, he has exhibited in several Contact shows beginning in 1998. Two series, “Mexican Photographs” and “Jesus Rides the Bus: Pictures from El Salvador,” were shown at Toronto’s 52 Inc. His music photography was the subject of a profile in Taddle Creek Magazine, and his photographs have also appeared in Photo Life, Outpost and Queen’s Journal Magazine. In addition to his printed work, he maintains an online presence as sevres-babylone on Flickr and Instagram and on his music photography blogs. Photographic projects have taken him to Haiti, Bolivia, Argentina, India, and especially Mexico, but these days he is more likely to be found in Toronto’s music venues, camera in hand.
Tears, 2024 Nas Filho
Nas is a Toronto-based street photographer who seamlessly weaves intentional and casual expressions into the fabric of his work, reflecting his deep connection with Toronto's dynamic urban landscape, immersing viewers in its graffiti-adorned streets, atmospheric alleys, enigmatic mannequins, architectural marvels, and images becoming a conduit for societal dialogues—capturing protests against injustice and tender messages on walls and signs in a visual language through these
Nas has made a name for himself with exhibitions like as Spectra 2021 and 2022, and he is currently performing at Spectra 2024, revealing a profound tale through personal introspection.
Documentation by Ivan Rupeš