Jon Sasaki | Emily Carr Speaker Series

A Talk That Will Possibly Make You Laugh and Make You Cry, Hopefully Both At the Same Time

Presented in conjunction with Comedown, a show of new work by Jon Sasaki at  Access Artist Run Centre from September 11 - October 30, 2010.

Working in the vein of “romantic conceptualism,” Jon Sasaki utilizes primarily performance-for-video, objects, installations and interventions in work that mixes humor and pathos, often with gently antagonistic results. His work has been presented in recent solo exhibitions at The Doris McCarthy Gallery, (University of Toronto, Scarborough) 126, (Galway, Ireland), Centre Clark (Montreal), and Latitude 53 (Edmonton). He has participated in group exhibitions at VOX (Montreal), The Vancouver Art Gallery, the Owens Art Gallery, (Mount Allison University, Sackville, NB), Simon Fraser University Gallery (Burnaby, BC), as well as the 2006 and 2008 editions of Toronto’s Nuit Blanche. Jon was an active member of the Instant Coffee art collective between 2002 and 2007. He lives and works in Toronto and is represented by Jessica Bradley Art + Projects. 

Utilizing film, video, objects, performance and installation, this work takes cynicism, futility and tragedy as starting points, then counters the thematic heaviness with dry, comic delivery. Often structured like the familiar “shaggy dog joke,” much of this work is a deadpan escalation of expectations, followed by an anticlimactic punch line. It is a celebration of futility, resignation and pathos. 

There is strong skepticism toward themes of development, transformation and emergence, whether applied to art practice itself, or taken in a broader sense. In the video work, repeated use of an earnest “everyman” character in short looping videos suggest an inescapable cycle of trial and failure, in many ways a reflection on the mechanics of making artwork and the frustrations that can accompany its presentation. However, though the work may be cynical on the surface, it invariably asserts a fervent, unabashed optimism lying just below. 

Emily Carr Lecture Theatre, Room 301