Figures of Sleep Jan 17–Mar 3, 2018 Works by

Francis Alÿs, Rebecca Belmore, Louise Bourgeois, , , Chris Curreri, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Rodney Graham, , On Kawara, Hassan Khan, Liz Magor, Ron Mueck, , Gabriel Orozco, Jasmeen Patheja, Jon Sasaki, Mladen Stilinović

Curated by Sarah Robayo Sheridan Figures of Sleep

Cover: Tehching Hsieh, One Year Performance, 1980-1981. Performance. Courtesy of the artist and Sean Kelly Gallery.

Right: Louise Bourgeois, Insomnia, 1995-1996. Lithograph on paper, 63.5 x 49.5 cm. Collection of The Easton Foundation. Figures of Sleep is a major international technological transformation. Is sleep in crisis? Is sleep in crisis? exhibition that considers the cultural Exceedingly, artists have adopted the motif anxieties manifest in the popular and critical of sleep as a cipher for material, aesthetic, imagination around the collapsing biological existential and political considerations of these function of sleep under economic, social and urgent cultural concerns.

Liz Magor, Burrow, 1999. Polymerized gypsum, fabric, 23 x 78 x 54 Ron Mueck, Old Woman cm. Collection of the In Bed (detail), 2002. Vancouver Art Gallery. Mixed media, 25.4 x 94 Courtesy of Catriona x 53.9 cm. Collection Jeffries. of the National Gallery Rodney Graham, Halcion of Canada. Copyright Sleep (detail), 1994. Ron Mueck, courtesy of Textile and single- Anthony d’Offay, London. channel video. Collection of Vancouver Art Gallery. Courtesy of the artist. Figures of Sleep

Jon Sasaki, A Rest, 2016. Choreographed solo performed by James Phillips, 9-10 minutes duration. Courtesy of the artist and Clint Roenisch Gallery. Originally commissioned by the Toronto Dance Theatre.

It is the difficult crossing that is invoked hindrance to capitalism, is now increasingly slumped over their dance partners for support. by Louise Bourgeois’s Insomnia Drawings colonized by the imperatives of global markets In the solo performance, removing the (1994-1995) and by writers like E.M. Cioran and military aims. To the list of contemporary secondary body as a buttress, the performer who professed “I have never been able to preoccupations, the territory of sleep seems succumbs under the strain of the contrived write except in the melancholy of insomniac to be another natural resource in jeopardy. poses. nights.” More recently, anxiety over sleep Speaking to the fraught comingling of humans has transferred from the quandary of the in the landscape, Liz Magor’s sculpture Burrow Collective sleep actions have served the aims lonely philosopher into the rhetoric of fast (1999) features a sleeping bag asphyxiated by a of protest, most famously with John Lennon capitalism, with a sleep “recession” widely tree stump, a provisional shelter of last resort and ’s Bed-Ins for Peace, and by being reported by popular media. Is sleep in which is both compelling and disturbing. contemporary social movements like the Meet crisis? A differential politics of access between to Sleep campaigns in India organized by Blank subjects emerges, supported by attendant Artists have inhabited the paradigm of sleep Noise that call for women to nap in parks as a architecture—contrast the luxury of the as rest, as protest, as withdrawal and a radical means to shift the fear-based relationship with Gabriel Orozco airline first-class sleep pod to the aggressive expression of a will to live. On Kawara’s I Got public space into a dialogue about trust. Sophie Sleeping Leaves (Hojas landscape design of serrated benches expressly Up (1968-1979) postcards are time-stamped to Calle crosses a divide between private chamber durmiendo), 1990. Silver built to reject the weary. At the margins of the demarcate the artist’s entry into consciousness and collective site in her photographic series dye bleach print, 40.6 x 50.8 cm. Collection protected 9-5 workday, we find the disjointed as he travelled the globe, place-marking his Les Dormeurs by inviting acquaintances of the National Gallery relationships of night shift labourers, sleep- position by mailing tourist cards to the art to sleep in her bed, transforming it into of Canada. Courtesy of deprived parents of young children, jet-setters, world. Lawrence Weiner described that the a convivial site of intensified intimacy. the artist and Marian Goodman Gallery. elective night owls, and eager partygoers. postcards “step out of the line of history as we A different disruption in propriety was know it.” performed by Chris Burden’s Bed Piece (1972) Few states are as ambiguous as sleep, a where he lay in a single bed in a gallery for 22 “And I entered into sleep, which like a scientific enigma that has produced widely Some of the most poignant artworks in the days straight. second apartment that we have, into which, different theories—a hangover of an obsolete exhibition explore the visibility of bodies in abandoning our own, we go in order to sleep.” evolutionary impulse, the foundation the street. Rebecca Belmore’s Dream Catcher Endurance, boredom, counter-resistance, — Marcel Proust of complex brain function, or the seat of (2014) pivots on the agency and visibility of Sisyphean futility—all these themes emerge dreaming in psychoanalysis. By turns, sleep a subject occupying sidewalk space while in the works presented here. If we understand The classical separation of sleep and has been decried as useless, purposeless and Tehching Hsieh’s Outdoor Piece (1981-1982) sleep as a type of technology, we might wonder wakefulness would have these two spaces surplus, while on the other hand defended as charts the artist’s self-imposed directive to if increasing angst over its demise signals a bounded by separate conventions, ethics, a precious inalienable human right. Lately, spend a year living and sleeping on the streets cultural shift. If McLuhan argued that a new perceptions, and gravitational rules. Given the it is subject to detailed quantification, with of Manhattan, a place he had entered without medium “never ceases to oppress the older particular sleeper, the passageway between various self-monitoring health apps adding resident status in 1974. A feat of endurance media until it finds new shapes and positions these rooms might look like an effortless entry to the inventory of big data mapping human is also the basis of Jon Sasaki’s A Rest (2016), for them,” then we might ask what new forms by automatic door, the plunge through an consciousness. Cultural theorist Jonathan a collaboration with dancer James Phillips will sleep find in the future? unexpected hatch, or the continuous pacing Crary argues that sleep, once a former safe that catalyzes the photographic records of through an endless hallway. haven from commerce and last substantial depression-era dance marathon hopefuls Sarah Robayo Sheridan Opening Events Staff

Reception Barbara Fischer, Executive Director/ Thursday, January 25, 5-7pm Chief Curator University of Toronto Art Centre Sarah Robayo Sheridan, Curator John G. Hampton, Adjunct Curator Night of Ideas Rebecca Gimmi, Program Coordinator To sleep or not to sleep Maureen Smith, Business & Programs Thursday, January 25, 7pm-7am Coordinator Hart House Heather Darling Pigat, Collections Manager An evening of lectures, workshops, Esther Simmonds-MacAdam, Exhibition performances, screenings and readings Coordinator presented in partnership with the Cultural Chiara Cavaliere, Gallery Attendant Service of the French Embassy in Canada and Brittany Brooks, Communications Assistant Hart House as part of global initiative across Ana Djapa, Curatorial Assistant 50 cities. Night of Ideas will bring together William Brereton, Outreach Assistant international artists, writers, philosophers, historians, neuroscientists and other restless Exhibition Technicians: Jaclyn Bruneau, minds to tackle such wide-ranging subjects Danielle Greer, Marina Gugliemi, Dax Morrison, Aamna Muzaffar as the neuroscience of sleep, the meaning of Yonge St downtime, the health impact of sleeplessness, Brand Design: Underline Studio the cultural importance of dreaming, and the Bloor St W architecture and politics of sleep. Printing: Flash Reproductions Charles St W Museum Subway Station Public Programs St George Subway Station Art Bus Tour Bay St St Joseph St Sunday, January 21, 11:30am Queen’s Park Cres W

Meet at the Justina M. Barnicke Gallery Hoskin Ave Tower Rd Justina then bus tour continues to the Art Gallery of M. Barnicke Gallery Wellesley St W Hamilton and Oakville Galleries St George St

Huron St Hart Drop-In Tours University House of Toronto Circle Every Friday, 2pm Art Centre University of Toronto Art Centre Grosvenor St King’s Spadina Ave College Curator’s Tours Circle Saturday, February 3, 2pm Saturday, March 3, 11pm

University of Toronto Art Centre Galbraith Rd Queen’s Park College St Russell St Subway Station Extended Hours On March 3, 2018, Art Museum will be Spadina extending public hours from 12pm-12am Crescent

For program details visit artmuseum.utoronto.ca

an Ontario government agency un organisme du gouvernement de l’Ontario Art Museum University of Toronto — Justina M. Barnicke Gallery University of Toronto Art Centre

7 Hart House Circle Toronto, Ontario M5S 3H3 artmuseum.utoronto.ca