2019 Images Festival is Almost Here!

11 – 18 April 2019

Opening Night: Software Garden by Rory Pilgrim

Thursday April 11, 7:00PM
The Royal Cinema, 608 College St.

Nurtured over two years of collaboration, workshops, and live concerts, artist and musician Rory Pilgrim premieres his debut music video album Software Garden in Canada. In contrast to a recent fascination with technology’s dystopian impact on public and private life, Software Garden asks how we meet from both behind and beyond our screens. Over the course of 11 tracks and performances, we encounter proposals for tenderness with digital and robotic entities in tow. Without cynicism, irony, or repudiation, the enmeshing of lyrical, cinematic, and choreographed sequences pour between stage, studio, and screen.

Opening night will be followed by Opening Night Party featuring Korea Town Acid at The Baby G.

HEAT (a work-in-progress) by Aisha Sasha John

Saturday April 13, 10:00PM
The Costume House, 165 Geary Ave.

Aisha Sasha John’s medium is energy. Her solo dance show the aisha of is premiered at the Whitney museum in 2017; in 2018 it was presented by the mai and Toronto’s 2018 summerworks festival. I have to live. (McClelland & Stewart) was a finalist for the 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize.

Keynote Lecture: Visions of Black Secret Technology by Charles Mudede

Saturday April 13, 3:00PM
Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Ave.

This talk will begin by closely examining the movie Black Panther to determine not only how black technology is visualized, but, more importantly, what this visualization tells us about our understanding, manner of coding, and modes of experiencing technology as a whole.

401 Richmond Gallery Tour with Geneviève Wallen

Saturday April 13, 12:00PM
The Commons, 401 Richmond St. W.

Join curator and writer Geneviève Wallen on tour of the exhibitions at 401 Richmond.

Meet at the lobby of 401 Richmond for a walking tour of Outliers on Tour at Tangled Art + Disability, Sharona Franklin’s installation in the Gallery 44 Vitrines, New Psychedelia of Industrial Healing, Sarah Pupo’s solo exhibition burning through the body, Emilija Škarnulytė’s video work Sirenomelia at VTape.

The tour will conclude at Pamila Matharu’s solo exhibition One of These Things is Not Like The Other, at A Space. Followed by an artist talk by Matharu at 1:00pm.

Artist Talk: KC Wei

Sunday April 14, 3:00PM
Small World Museum, 101-180 Shaw St.

Canadian Spotlight artist KC Wei will deliver a talk about her music, publishing and community driven projects, as well as her latest film, art rock? The Popular Esoteric (2018) — a recent document of overlaps in Vancouver’s underground music and art scenes. Her talk with be followed by a conversation with journalist and critic Merray Gerges.

Wei’s first feature film, Murky Colours (2016) will screen on April 13.

Membership – Festival Pass

Images Festival was founded by a passionate arts community who championed alternatives to mainstream media and fought to open up critical dialogue. The festival is 90% run by volunteers and owes much of its success to our generous members. Please consider joining our membership today to receive benefits, and help us continue to build a platform for artists in Canada.

Supporters of the Images Festival – $250

TWO Festival Passes
FOUR Vouchers (general admission)*
A Charitable Donation Tax Receipt for $100
TWO limited edition Images Tote Bags
Preferred box office privileges (reserved tickets for members until 15mins before curtain)
Recognition on the Images Festival list of supporters online

Individual Membership – $60
Student, Senior, Underemployed – $40

ONE Festival Pass
ONE limited edition Images Tote Bag
Preferred box office privileges (reserved tickets for members until 15mins before curtain)

*Some restrictions apply. Festival Passes do not guarantee admission to every presentation. Please see individual programs for more details regarding festival pass restrictions. Tax receipts may be issued for a portion of memberships. Please ask for details. Our charitable registration number is #12741 8762 RR0001. Images Festival Membership Program is non-voting.

PURCHASE MEMBERSHIPS HERE

ABOUT IMAGES FESTIVAL

The Images Festival is one of the most enduring and respected platforms in the world for the exhibition and dissemination of independent film and media art. The festival takes place annually in Toronto, Ontario, and has been attended by more than 25,000 people each year. The 2019 edition will take place from April 11 – 18th and will include approximately 16 in-cinema programs, 14 gallery exhibitions, 10 public program events, and five live performances. Images has spent the last 31 years presenting media works that range from the formally and aesthetically challenging, to the personal and lyrical and is committed to cultivating a passionate arts community who see moving image culture as a means or understanding our contemporary context.

The land on which we gather and organize is the territory of the Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee, Huron-Wendat and the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation. Today, the meeting place of Toronto is the home to many Indigenous people.

A territorial acknowledgement can demonstrate a coming to awareness, and provoke thought and reflection, all of which are essential in beginning to establish reciprocal relations. This acknowledgement should not function as closure, resignation, or acceptance of the structural conditions of settler colonialism that remain in effect today. The Images Festival will continue to ask what it means for us to keep open a spirit of sustained inquiry into the complexities of our situation.

Images Festival acknowledges the generous support from our public funders. The Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council an Ontario Government Agency, Toronto Arts Council, the Department of Canadian Heritage, Telefilm Canada, the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport.

+ images:
Album artwork, 2018 (courtesy of andriesse-eyck galerie)
Aisha Sasha John (Photo by Yuula Benivolski)
KC Wei

For media specific inquiries regarding Images Festival, please contact Emily Fitzpatrick: outreach@imagesfestival.com

Website: www.imagesfestival.com
Twitter: @imagesfestival
Instagram: @imagesfestival
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