Shannon Reynolds: facelift (You're a great audience)

January 12 - March 25, 2007
Curated by Allan MacKay, KW|AG

Public Opening: Friday, January 12, 2007, 7 - 9 p.m.

Shannon Reynolds, You're A Great Audience, 2006. Image courtesy of the artist and KW|AG. Photo: K.J. Bedford.

Kitchener-based artist Shannon Reynolds continues her thematic exploration of audience and theatrical performance in this specially commissioned project. This project is another instalment of KW|AG's faceLIFT series, a focused look at contemporary approaches to portraiture.

Reynolds has described her Audience Paintings as an "attempt to discover how the missing, mysterious side of my borrowed actor/director/audience metaphor might look and sound."  In preparation for this work Reynolds solicited local actors as models for her "audience" and created audio clips of their responses to visual art. These audio clips and a motion sensor were then integrated into the painting. The result is an artwork that inverts the expectations of art and audience within a gallery context.

About Shannon Reynolds
Shannon Reynolds received both her BA in Fine and Studio Arts (1992) and an MA in English Literature (1994) at the University of Waterloo. Her works have been included in exhibitions at Glenhyrst Art Gallery of Brant, Brantford; Rotunda Gallery, Kitchener City Hall; and the Gallery on 4, Hamilton Public Library. Work by Reynolds is also featured in the Shakespeare: Made in Canada exhibition currently on display at the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre in Guelph. Reynolds lives and works in Kitchener.