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Vessna Perunovich

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STILLS: Moments of Extreme Consequence

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Online (Edition 1), 2012
Digital print, Editions of 7
28" x 20"

ANGELL GALLERY is pleased to present STILLS: Moments of Extreme Consequence, a multi-disciplinary body of work featuring painting, drawing, photography, video and sculpture by VESSNA PERUNOVICH. The exhibition will take place throughout the gallery from January 19, 2013 to February 23, 2013. An opening reception will be held on January 26, 1:00 to 4:00 PM, with an Artist Talk beginning at 3:00 PM. Vessna Perunovich is one of Canada's most significant artists. Working across diverse platforms, she explores the physical and psychological implications of borders, displacement, exile and transience. While working from the perspective of a female artist exiled by conflict from her Balkan homeland, Perunovich aims to express the broader context of the human condition. Like fellow Serbian, performance artist Marina Abramović, Perunovich often works with her own body, examining the push and pull of social, political and personal constrains through her own performances. She shares with sculptor Louise Bourgeois, another exile, a tendency for "soft" materials, whose malleability echoes the body's limits as a resilient yet vulnerable container. Through video, Perunovich investigates the opposing notions and patterns in human experience, presenting them as symbolic cycles of creation and destruction, movement and stillness. STILLS: Moments of Extreme Consequence includes recent pieces created during the artist's residency as part of the renowned International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) in New York. Continuing her investigation into the nature of existence, Perunovich focuses on the concept of life-defining moments, which she invites us to experience as "stills" — moments in between movement and immobility. Significant events are emblematically represented on canvas, paper and film as splashes, spills, enclosures and entrapments. Figurative, abstract and text imagery is linked through Perunovich's reduced, yet dramatic and sensual palette of black, white and, her signature color, blood red. With a visceral edge that pokes at the body while provoking the mind, Perunovich infuses her thoughtful meditations on the human condition with irony, humor and beauty. Vessna Perunovich is a Toronto-based internationally acclaimed interdisciplinary artist whose work embraces performance, video, sculpture, painting and drawing. Perunovich has exhibited at International biennials in Cuba, Albania, England, Portugal, Yugoslavia, and Greece and attended residencies in Berlin, Banff, Bursa (Turkey), Mileseva (Serbia) and New York. Her survey exhibitions Borderless and Emblems of Enigma toured prestigious galleries and museums across Canada and Europe. Her work has been reviewed in numerous magazines and periodicals, including Canadian Art, Espace Sculpture, World Sculpture Magazine, Umelec, and Border Crossings among others. Perunovich is a recipient of numerous awards, including the Toronto Friends of Visual Arts (2005), Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council Grants and Chalmers Development Grant. Her work is included in many public and private collections, and is the subject of two monographs: (W)hole, 2004 and Emblems of the Enigma, 2008. Vessna Perunovich is represented by Angell Gallery.

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The Window of Opportunity , 2012
Acrylic and graphite pencil on board
60" x 84"
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Ripple , 2013
Graphite and china marker on board
36" x 48"
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Finding love , 2012
video installation: 2:50 minute loop with sound
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Big Blow , 2012
Acrylic and ink on board
60" x 60"
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Never Saw It Coming
Acrylic and ink on board
48" x 60" (sold)
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Online (Edition 2) , 2013
Digital print, Editions of 7
28" x 20"
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Cause and Effect, 2013
Diameter sphere, acrylic, graphite and china marker on canvas
48" x 48"
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All is Well, 2013
Acrylic, oil stick and graphite on board
20" x 16"
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Love & Loss (Diptych), 2013
Acrylic and ink on canvas
20" x 20"
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A Sudden Appearance of Many Marys , 2008
Video installation: 18 minute loop with sound
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Hanging in , 2008
Latex fabric, rolling pin and sand
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Flood Gate , 2012
Latex fabric, sand, metal hooks and reflective Mylar