Kelly Jazvac: Hi Limit Slots; Nov. 20 – Dec. 19, 2009

November 19 – Dec 11th 2009

The Khyber Arts Society presents Hi Limit Slots, an exhibition by Kelly Jazvac. Currently residing in London, Ontario, Jazvac’s work deals with notions of uncertainty, social contribution and material value through the use of textiles, video and adhesive vinyl.

The group of works Throws, is composed of textile pieces, produced during a recent residency Jazvac attended in London, England. During her residency Jazvac linked advertising’s relationship to desire and, by extension, its relationship to physical and material exhaustion. Jazvac enlarges garment-related images culled from news sources and then prints them life-sized onto silk or wool. For the Khyber exhibition Jazvac chose to incorporate unused and neglected plinths found in storage for draping the pieces upon. As an arrangement they bring to mind a surreal landscape: perhaps expressing the exhaustion one might feel under the ever-pounding beat of the media’s drum. Throw (Asbo Youth Banned Hoodie) comes from a headline about an English youth who was legally banned from wearing his hoodie under new restrictive anti-social laws. Throw (Vera Wang hopeful for Michelle Obama collage) is a collage of portions of potential dresses that fashion writers speculated Michelle Obama might wear on the presidential inauguration day.

The untitled short video is a loop composed of a sparrow in the process of nesting in the facade of a city building. As a result of a popular contemporary construction technique involving spraying a thin veneer of concrete over Styrofoam, buildings can be infiltrated by the beaks of birds. In the video a House Sparrow has found his way into the exterior facade of the building and made a nest, excavating the Styrofoam to accommodate his anticipated family. After several minutes of the sparrow peeking its head out, chirping, it flies out and is followed by an identical sparrow ad infinitum.

In Stubs, Jazvac re-purposes adhesive vinyl used for advertising into sculpture. The vinyl has been collected from the excess, mistakes and roll-ends of various vinyl sign shops. The vinyl sculptures are dilapidated forms, melting, deflating and appear to almost be sliding off the wall and onto the floor, where they would sit in wait like a wrinkled dirty sock tossed to the corner of a bedroom. However, the forms are not dirty, they retain a hopeful futuristic appeal, shiny, new, reflective, and bright. The title, Stubs, draws its name from the unused portion of a deck of cards after a gambling card game has been played. Jazvac incised small coin slots into each of her sculptures, these ‘coin-slots’ touch on funding issues that many artist-run centers must address on an ongoing basis. Viewers are invited to contribute donations to the Khyber into the slots of whatever may be floating in their pockets, playing on ambiguities and insecurities about touching and interacting with “fine” art.

In many ways, Jazvac’s interests and works mirror the Khyber’s current and seemingly endless situation; exhaustion. Like the vinyl sculptures, the Khyber has been re-worked and re-modeled over and over again, at times wilting and bending under the pressure of unseen forces but also springing to new life and adapting to new forms.

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