I am interested in exploring our relationships with undersea life. Like many, I watched the film, My Octopus Teacher, and my Instagram feed is filled with people interacting with sharks, seals, and, of course, octopuses. What is going on? How closely does our experience of consciousness align with that of the other beings around us? Somewhere along the way, we—by which I mean the Eurocentric, scientific, capitalist, settler “we”—turned nature into “Nature,” something separate from ourselves. I would like to rethink this habit, exploring ways to adopt a less confrontational approach. (Perhaps this is more aligned with Indigenous perspectives)

Finding ways to allow our relationship to animals be more visible is part of what this work is about.  At first I thought I might perform an absurd action to put our anthropomorphizing tendencies into better relief. I would create “Drawing Lessons for Fish” with the assumption that of course they wouldn’t be interested in what I thought or did. The idea of displaying the chasm of differences in perception would be interesting or at least humorous. But now that I have been down there with them, even for a snippet of time, I don’t think that it was the best approach. They merit more respect. The assumption that they may not be interested makes it more difficult to accept the possibility that animals may have opinions, and that is exactly what I’m looking for.

For example, there’s a bass in the Kahnawake quarry that follows divers around, staying just behind their heads and watching where they look. If you point a flashlight at a crayfish in the weeds, it will go over to investigate. This behaviour doesn’t seem random—it’s taking advantage of the diver’s presence to achieve its own goals. Perhaps it’s purely utilitarian: the diver’s air bubbles help oxygenate the water, making the fish feel more energized, and the divers also stir up the bottom, potentially exposing hidden prey illuminated by the flashlight. In this way, the bass is actively benefiting from the interaction, using the diver’s presence to its advantage. However, what if the fish just liked a particular divers company, thought the bubbles were fun, or the flashlight was cool? Maybe it prefers divers who are using the BigBlue VTL13500P-MAX, a 13,000 lumen light to the Kraken NR-1000, a much more modest underwater light.

In Michael Pollan’s book The Botany of Desire, he suggests that apple trees have trained us to hybridize them, eat their fruit and plant more of them. This suggests we are not in as much control as we think we are. If I accept this, then it’s not a big stretch to imagine that all kinds of animals might also try to influence us to achieve their own goals. As the project stands now, I make drawings of the underwater life I encounter and look for the animals’ reactions. So far, the results are inconclusive. For example, when I showed an octopus a drawing of itself, it built a wall of rocks, making it clear it didn’t want to be disturbed. However, it may not have been responding to the drawing, but rather to my presence. This relationship did not have enough time to build any trust.

Paul Litherland

November 2024

The backs of the works reveal a plethora of information not found on the front, with all the practical matters of artwork manufacture and presentation leaving their traces. There are marks from the stretcher makers, the restorers/conservationists, auctioneers, collection managers, collectors, the transporters and accidents. This project is a tribute to the collective effort of many hands that guide a work into our consciousness.

The photographs are printed to the same scale as the original works and mounted on to the stretchers as one would mount a canvas. Through this act, the artist is imbuing  the photographs with a desire to become “real” art objects. That they may already be real art objects is not really the point. The photographs don’t feel like they quite belong in that world. You can almost hear them whispering Pinocchio’s mantra:

Fake it till you make it

The experiences we render into story are integral parts of who we become. Yet some stories remembered are more significant than others. These stories are often comprised of “vital memories” (Brown and Leavy) that recall a moment of drama or trauma in a life. Vital stories are not always coherent, or consistent. We may tell them slightly differently, only recall fragments, or embellish. Although we may share them with others, we may also repress or forget details over time.

47 Storeys is one such vital story. In 1996 Paul Litherland went to a bar at the top of a very tall building, drank a beer, waited until the other patrons and staff left, then parachuted into the night-time sky, landing safely on the street to the astonishment of two late-night revelers. Three months after the jump, afraid of forgetting significant details, Paul commemorated his adventure to video. 20 years later Paul revisits the event with Monique Moumblow. They re-edit the original 43 minutes tape down to 11 minutes. Paul then attempts to re-enact his original mediated performance. On one screen we see Paul who sits, listens to himself through headphones, and speaks over his original narrative. On a second screen Paul attempts to duplicate his original performance word-for-word and gesture-by-gesture. On the third screen is the edited original. These three different renditions of the tale, from 3 different moments in time, are almost the same, but they never perfectly align. No matter how much we practice, the story is never exactly as it was.

47 Storeys is a brilliant and slightly comedic rendition of the “performative act of memory -making” (Kuhn). Narrating the past re-activates and catapults memories into the present, often with the help of souvenirs such as the video-tape and parachute equipment that Paul still keeps in his care. Paul’s fumbling narrative recollections lay bare this performative process of memory-making as past and present collide in a single temporal moment superbly visualized in this 3 channel video.

In the re-telling of this vital story grey-haired, bespectacled Paul moves in imperfect harmony with his former self. This temporal collision invites reflection upon both memory re-enactments, story-telling and the vagaries of ageing: “the permanently fluctuating relationships between younger and older selves” (Segal). We see, hear and feel these fluctuations, experiencing a vertigo of narrative mediation: Paul’s post-hoc memory is rendered into story and captured on video tape, which is then digitally remastered in the present for the future. It is the absence of documentation of the original event –no pictures, photos or go-pro video– that makes the re-telling of the story so necessary and so compelling. Thankfully, Paul lived to tell the tale, again and again.

Monique Moumblow is a video artist and a fan of spectacular storeys.

Paul Litherland is a gentleman adventurer, a closet scuba diver in a room full of wingsuiters.

Author: Kim Sawchuk (professor et director of Ageing-Communication-Technologies, Université Concordia)

lire la version française du texte

“Gravité brings together photographs and videos by Rachel Echenberg and Paul Litherland. Astonishing, puzzling, secretive – what do these works signify? What narratives propel these enigmatic images? Both artists immerse themselves in compelling situations, positioning their bodies as barometers of the spirit and of the mind. Each of their invented actions demands a response. Inner and outer self engage in a fascinating interchange; gravity meets resistance. The title of this exhibition has a double meaning that applies equally to these works. While gravity exerts itself, pulling us towards the earth, the term also alludes to the tone of thoughtfulness that pervades these works. Combining serious play and humourous invention these images propose a deeper significance that arouses imaginative speculation.” – Lorraine Simms, Curator

I want to document secrets. I will ask friends and strangers to tell me something that they don’t want known. I will document some part of the story in photos. The photos will be sent via the internet to a web-enabled photo-frame in the gallery. At the end of each day I upload the photos. So the next day when the gallery opens, the new photos will be there.

I leave without a clear idea, hoping that something will emerge. Perhaps it will just be a series of awkward encounters, or the challenges of the weather, or the motorcycle, that will define this itinerary.

The Artwork information sheet is modeled on the accession database that is used by the gallery to store information on the artworks.

The email conversation with John Hunting is here
The artwork information document is here

This series was created for the 2014 group show Speculations: Risquer l’interprétation, but the idea goes back eight years, when the artist was photographing a 17^th century Rembrandt painting, which he was documenting for the Agnes Etherington Art Centre. The markings he found there from distant conservators and framers told the story of the provenance of the work, but also there was something intriguing about the privilege of seeing the side of the painting that is normally hidden from the public.

Litherland’s B-Side uses a lesser-known but recurring subject in historical and contemporary art. He shares in an overarching interest in the gesture of elevating the mundane material support of an artwork to the status of art, and thus flipping the normal status of the front and the back. He also engages with the trompe-l’oeil tradition, which confronts viewers with the pleasures and questions that come from mixing up the “real” and the “representation” of the real. However, what it brings to both of these axes is also very personal.

The choice of the subject not only comes out of his work as an art photographer, it also is a visual metaphor for the artist’s ongoing reluctance to embrace his identity as an artist (the front of the painting) at the expense of an ideal of being a “productive” member of society (the support).

As for the trompe-l’oeil, the artist does want to fool us, but only at first. He leaves enough clues to reveal the artifice. The underlying question for the artist is “How can I find a balance between being an authentic person while maintaining the act that allows me to get along with others?” In having us realize our mistake in perception, the artist gives us an experience in which we can delight in the pleasures of the representation, but also feel what is missing in it—reality is something more—thus reminding us that there are ways to navigate this distinction.

During the production of the work, the artist had the privilege of an email conversation with media theorist John Hunting. You can view the conversation here.

Also presented with the exhibition is an artwork information document that is modeled on the accession database that the gallery uses to manage the information about the collection. You can consult it here.