Gallery Exhibition: Artist Carole Itter

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About

This gallery exhibition of Carole Itter's works entitled "Carole Itter: Only when I’m hauling water do I wonder if I’m getting any stronger" brings together a selection of the artist’s multi-disciplinary works and archival materials from the 1960s to the present. Revealing her attention to locality, language and choreography, the title references Itter’s writing and points to her self-reflexive labour as an artist, as a woman and as an inhabitant of shacks, old houses and cooperatives on the West Coast.

Itter’s artistic ethos is evident in her consideration of the places and communities that have framed her life, in her written, drawn and material expression, and in her practice of designing conditions for performance. The artist’s focus on the local was part of a shared sensibility in Vancouver and beyond in the 1960s and has found renewed urgency and wisdom in the context of the climate crisis. Itter’s hand-hewn work reasserts the presence of the body through ecological, feminist and anti-capitalist lenses, and offers insight into how humans see themselves in relation to each other and other beings in the world.

Included in the exhibition are a selection of installations, photographs, sketches, costumes, films and writing that reveal the artist’s multi-valent practice, blurring the lines between art’s traditional containers.

Posing questions around social and ecological choreography, Itter’s work asks, What are our collective and individual gestures of understanding and being with a place? For the artist, these gestures occur over time, with responsibility, with others (people, birds, water) and in threshold spaces.

She inhabits sites, forms and figures with a unique vision and material force that highlights the illusion of permanency. In the film Tarpaulin Pull (2009) she rows a small boat, pulling a field of blue made from disintegrated plastic tarps that rests on the surface of the ocean. She methodically lands the tarp, folds it up and deposits it in a dumpster. Whether performing in or out of costume, she inhabits a singular perspective of understanding that repudiates her refusal of expertise. Itter admits that she’s “an expert at looking at water” and the strength of her work is in how she has carried the load.

Gallery Hours:

Tue 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Wed 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Thu 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Fri 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Sat 12:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Sun 12:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Links

• Gallery Website and Exhibition Details belkin.ubc.ca
• UBC ARTIVISM: Madness in the Masses arts.ubc.ca

Organizer

UBC Arts & Culture District

The UBC Arts & Culture District invites you to immerse yourself in live music, theatre, opera, film, contemporary and fine art, a world-renowned Museum of Anthropology, and more.

We are the producer of the annual ARTIVISM festival. Welcome to ARTIVISM 2023, presented by UBC Arts & Culture. This year's theme is "Madness of the Masses" where radical creativity merges with collective liberation. Brace yourself for immersive experiences where art and culture becomes a catalyst for challenging the confines of a capitalist system. This Artivism invites you to the spaces of storytelling, where we seek to challenge class systems, highlight mental and emotional effects of oppression, and ultimately invite imagination to envision a culture of community and collective care through creativity.

The UBC Arts and Culture District educates and showcases student creatives and scholars, presents world-renowned performers, and is home to innovative public programs and international exhibitions. We also offer annual Artivism Festival and International Women’s Day events.

We hold the creative and performing arts as core to deep disciplinary knowledge and applied research, and as the key to a fulfilled and connected life.

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