Ian Wojtowicz: The Betweeners

Exhibition

April 16 – May 22, 2010
Opening on Saturday April 17, 3pm-5pm
Conversation with artists Ian Wojtowicz and Ann Hirsch, curated by Felicity Tayler, at 2pm

Project Description

This large-format photo-portrait work is informed by the relatively new field of network theory. While the 20th century could be characterized by the use of the bell curve and the notion of the middle-class, the early 21st century seems to be characterized by “power laws” – the tendency for connected systems to exhibit the “rich get-richer” phenomenon and the “long tail,” which gets longer and longer. By analysing Montreal’s MySpace network, the artist intends to identify a group of people who constitute, in the artist’s words, “a small group of highly-connected but obscure Montrealers […] the independent friends of popular people […] an elite who, taken cumulatively, have a close communication link with the entire city.” Instead of highlighting the most visible people, the artist is seeking out catalytic individuals with the strong viral potential. This exhibition is presented in a text by Felicity Tayler.

Keys

1. Speculating in the network: Ian Wojtowicz’s The Betweeners (artengine.ca)