Nicholas Rees - Remnants: The Kitchener Industrial Artefacts Project

Vernacular Series

September 11 - November 20, 2005

Organized to Complement the 2005 CAFKA  Contemporary Art Forum | Kitchener and Area)Theme of X Industria

Exhibition Sponsor: City of Kitchener

Dedicated to working men and women, the Kitchener Industrial Artefacts Project was founded in 1996 by Nicholas Rees to preserve the rich manufacturing heritage of Waterloo Region. The project is centred on the placement of selected pieces of machinery in indoor and outdoor public locations which convey various themes of the industrial era: motive power via steam and electricity, mass production, and aspects of local industry such as footwear and rubber production.

The KW|AG exhibition includes a commissioned video which documents the locations of sculptural machinery, black and white photographs of the Kaufman Rubber Factory with a focus on shoe production and related artefacts, selected photographs of the demolition of regional industrial buildings, and related monoprints by Rees. A significant aspect of the project is an online publication which includes images from the exhibition with contextual writings by Rees.

Remnants marks the beginning of the Vernacular Series of projects which expresses the informal and the local.