The Power Plant
Encyclopedia
The Power Plant is one of Canada’s leading public galleries devoted to contemporary art
, located in Toronto, Ontario at Harbourfront Centre
. As a non-collecting art gallery
, The Power Plant has presented new and recent work by numerous Canadian artists along with their international peers.
Over its history, the program has included ambitious thematic exhibitions and major solo exhibitions by Canadians Colin Campbell
, Janet Cardiff
, Peter Doig
, Stan Douglas
, Geoffrey Farmer
, Rodney Graham
, Annie Pootoogook
, Steven Shearer
, and Michael Snow
. Solo exhibitions by international artists include those by Fiona Banner
, Liam Gillick
, Douglas Gordon
, Thomas Hirschhorn
, Mike Kelley, Glenn Ligon
, Adrian Piper
, Ryan Trecartin
, Francesco Vezzoli, and Carey Young
.
Since its foundation in 1987, The Power Plant has produced more than forty influential and award-winning publications, as well as a wide array of public programming such as symposia, performances, screenings, and the acclaimed International Lecture Series that further the dialogue around contemporary practices. Throughout its history, The Power Plant has been committed to creating an environment in which diverse audiences can access contemporary art through educational programs and special events such as the Power Ball.
The Power Plant is a registered Canadian charitable organization supported by its members, sponsors, donors, and funding bodies at all levels of government.
The Power Plant is Canada’s leading public gallery devoted exclusively to contemporary visual art. It is a vital forum for the advanced artistic culture of our time that offers an exceptional facility and professional support to diverse living artists while engaging equally diverse audiences in their work. The Power Plant pursues its activities though exhibitions, publications and public programming. It fulfills its mandate by generating:
, renowned for its global vision and special commitment to groundbreaking contemporary Canadian art
and widely supported as essential to the cultural infrastructure in Toronto, Ontario, and Canada
.
). Part of the Federal Government's acquisition of a 92-acre lakefront site, The Power Plant was in operation as an actual power plant until 1980.
In 1980, Harbourfront
Corporation provided the Art Gallery at Harbourfront with the opportunity to renovate the 1920's powerhouse as its new home. Peter Smith of Lett/Smith Architects was chosen to undertake the renovations, the design of which has taken into consideration both the history of the building and the demands of contemporary art. The powerhouse was then converted to an art gallery and opened to the public on 1 May, 1987. The Power Plant is recognizable by its smokestack and exterior façade which have been restored to maintain reference to its history.
projects by Canadian and international artists. Since The Power Plant is a non-collecting contemporary art gallery
, the commissioning of major new projects is a distinctive and important role for The Power Plant.
Past commissions include:
. While the gallery is led by its own Board of Directors, Harbourfront Centre
supports the gallery with maintenance and improvements to the physical site, as well as services and financial support. The waterfront site offers many visitors a first-time experience with internationally-acclaimed, contemporary art
.
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
, located in Toronto, Ontario at Harbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre is a key cultural organization on Toronto, Ontario's waterfront, situated at 235 Queen's Quay West. Established as a crown corporation in 1972 by the federal government to create a waterfront park, it became a non-profit organization in 1991. Funding comes from corporate...
. As a non-collecting art gallery
Art gallery
An art gallery or art museum is a building or space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museums can be public or private, but what distinguishes a museum is the ownership of a collection...
, The Power Plant has presented new and recent work by numerous Canadian artists along with their international peers.
Over its history, the program has included ambitious thematic exhibitions and major solo exhibitions by Canadians Colin Campbell
Colin Campbell (artist)
Colin Campbell was a pioneer Canadian video artist.-Life:Colin Campbell was born in Reston, Manitoba, 1942. Based in Toronto since 1973, Campbell produced over 45 tapes. He received his BFA from the University of Manitoba and his MFA from Claremont Graduate School, California...
, Janet Cardiff
Janet Cardiff
Janet Cardiff is a Canadian installation artist. Born in Brussels, Ontario in 1957 Cardiff studied at Queen's University where she graduated in 1980. She also studied at the University of Alberta and graduated in 1983. She works in collaboration with her partner George Bures Miller. Cardiff and...
, Peter Doig
Peter Doig
Peter Doig is a contemporary artist born in Scotland. In 2007, a painting of Doig's, entitled White Canoe, sold at Sotheby's for $11.3 million, then an auction record for a living European artist.-Early life:...
, Stan Douglas
Stan Douglas
Stan Douglas is an artist based in Vancouver, British Columbia. He has exhibited internationally, including Documenta IX, 1992, Documenta X, 1997, Documenta XI, 2002 and the Venice Biennale in 1990, 2001 and 2005...
, Geoffrey Farmer
Geoffrey Farmer
Geoffrey Farmer is a Canadian artist based in Vancouver. Farmer studied at the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver and the San Francisco Art Institute...
, Rodney Graham
Rodney Graham
Rodney Graham is an artist and musician born in Abbotsford, British Columbia. He is most often associated with the Vancouver School...
, Annie Pootoogook
Annie Pootoogook
Annie Pootoogook is a Canadian contemporary Inuit artist. Her influences include her mother, Napatchie Pootoogook , and her grandmother, Pitseolak Ashoona , both of whom were accomplished artists.-Artwork:Pootoogook began drawing in 1997, working with the disarmingly simple media...
, Steven Shearer
Steven Shearer
Steven Shearer is a contemporary artist based in Vancouver, British Columbia. He has exhibited internationally, including the Tate Modern in London, The New Museum, the Barbara Gladstone Gallery in New York, the Galerie Eva Presenhuber in Zurich, and the Renaissance Society in Chicago...
, and Michael Snow
Michael Snow
Michael Snow, CC is a Canadian artist working in painting, sculpture, video, films, photography, holography, drawing, books and music.-Life:...
. Solo exhibitions by international artists include those by Fiona Banner
Fiona Banner
Fiona Banner is an English artist, who was short-listed for the Turner Prize in 2002. In 2010, she produced new work for a Duveen Hall commission at Tate Britain. She is one of the Young British Artists.-Life and work:...
, Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick is a British conceptual artist who lives in New York City. He is often associated with the artists included the 1996 exhibit Traffic, which first introduced the term Relational Art.-Life and career:...
, Douglas Gordon
Douglas Gordon
Douglas Gordon is a Scottish artist; he won the Turner Prize in 1996 and the following year he represented Britain at the Venice Biennale...
, Thomas Hirschhorn
Thomas Hirschhorn
-Life and works:In the 1980s, Hirschhorn worked in Paris as a graphic artist. He was part of the group of Communist graphic designers called Grapus. These artists were concerned with politics and culture, displaying impromptu creations and posters on the street mostly using the language of...
, Mike Kelley, Glenn Ligon
Glenn Ligon
Glenn Ligon is an American conceptual artist whose work explores race, language, desire, sexuality, and identity. He engages in intertextuality with other works from the visual arts, literature, and history, as well as his own life.-Early life and career:...
, Adrian Piper
Adrian Piper
Adrian Margaret Smith Piper is a first-generation conceptual artist and analytic philosopher who was born in New York City and lived for many years on Cape Cod, Massachusetts before emigrating from the United States...
, Ryan Trecartin
Ryan Trecartin
Ryan Trecartin is an artist and filmmaker currently based in Los Angeles. He studied at the Rhode Island School of Design, graduating with a BFA in 2004...
, Francesco Vezzoli, and Carey Young
Carey Young
Carey Young is a visual artist who incorporates a variety of media such as video, photography, performative events and installation into her works, which investigate the increasing incorporation of the personal and public domains into the realm of the commercial...
.
Since its foundation in 1987, The Power Plant has produced more than forty influential and award-winning publications, as well as a wide array of public programming such as symposia, performances, screenings, and the acclaimed International Lecture Series that further the dialogue around contemporary practices. Throughout its history, The Power Plant has been committed to creating an environment in which diverse audiences can access contemporary art through educational programs and special events such as the Power Ball.
The Power Plant is a registered Canadian charitable organization supported by its members, sponsors, donors, and funding bodies at all levels of government.
Mandate
The Power Plant’s mandate continues to be a touchstone guiding our vision, goals and objectives.The Power Plant is Canada’s leading public gallery devoted exclusively to contemporary visual art. It is a vital forum for the advanced artistic culture of our time that offers an exceptional facility and professional support to diverse living artists while engaging equally diverse audiences in their work. The Power Plant pursues its activities though exhibitions, publications and public programming. It fulfills its mandate by generating:
- exhibitions that represent the range of advanced practice in visual artsVisual artsThe visual arts are art forms that create works which are primarily visual in nature, such as ceramics, drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking, design, crafts, and often modern visual arts and architecture...
; - publications that increase knowledge of contemporary artContemporary artContemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
; - lectures and symposia that encourage debate and further understanding;
- interpretative tools that invite visitors to question, explore and reflect upon their experiences;
- programming that incorporates other areas of culture when they intersect with visual art.
Vision
The Power Plant will be a leading international centre for contemporary artContemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
, renowned for its global vision and special commitment to groundbreaking contemporary Canadian art
Canadian Contemporary Art
Canadian Contemporary Art can refer simply to any visual art made in Canada currently or by living Canadian artists. However, it is a term that more accurately refers to Canadian visual, media, performance, video, and other artistic and/or conceptual practices that are critically and...
and widely supported as essential to the cultural infrastructure in Toronto, Ontario, and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
.
History
The Power Plant was initially established in 1976 as the Art Gallery at Harbourfront. The original Power Plant with its companion building The Ice House (today the Enwave Theatre), was constructed in 1926 to house the heating and refrigeration equipment for the massive Toronto Terminal Warehouse (now Queen's Quay TerminalQueen's Quay Terminal
Queen's Quay Terminal was a cold storage warehouse facility, the Toronto Terminal Warehouse, built in 1926 by Moores & Dunford and converted to a condo/mall complex in 1983...
). Part of the Federal Government's acquisition of a 92-acre lakefront site, The Power Plant was in operation as an actual power plant until 1980.
In 1980, Harbourfront
Harbourfront
Harbourfront is a neighbourhood on the northern shore of Lake Ontario within the downtown core of the city of Toronto, Canada. Part of the Toronto Waterfront, Harbourfront extends west from Yonge Street to Bathurst Street along Queen's Quay. East of Yonge to Parliament St...
Corporation provided the Art Gallery at Harbourfront with the opportunity to renovate the 1920's powerhouse as its new home. Peter Smith of Lett/Smith Architects was chosen to undertake the renovations, the design of which has taken into consideration both the history of the building and the demands of contemporary art. The powerhouse was then converted to an art gallery and opened to the public on 1 May, 1987. The Power Plant is recognizable by its smokestack and exterior façade which have been restored to maintain reference to its history.
Commissioning Program
In 2006 The Power Plant launched an annual Commissioning Program, which is an ambitious ongoing program to develop and premier major new works by the most exciting Canadian and international artists at work today. The Commissioning Program is linked to The Power Plant’s Strategic Plan to produce at least one major new art work of international significance per annum, establishing The Power Plant as a lead agent in Canada for commissioning landmark contemporary artContemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
projects by Canadian and international artists. Since The Power Plant is a non-collecting contemporary art gallery
Contemporary art gallery
A contemporary art gallery is a place where contemporary art is shown for exhibition and/or for sale. The term "art gallery" is commonly used to mean art museum , the rooms displaying art in any museum, or in the original sense, of any large or long room.-Identity, function and locality:A...
, the commissioning of major new projects is a distinctive and important role for The Power Plant.
Past commissions include:
- Ian WallaceIan Wallace (artist)Ian Wallace in Shoreham, England, is a Canadian artist based in Vancouver. He won the 2004 Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts...
: Abstract Paintings I–XII (The Financial District) (2010) - Pae White: Sea Beast (2010)
- Candice BreitzCandice BreitzCandice Breitz South African artist Born in Johannesburg, 1972Professor of Fine Art at the Braunschweig University of Art since 2007. Breitz has shown her work on the international art scene for many years and is best known for her video works and installations.Candice Breitz is represented by...
: Factum (2009) - Lawrence WeinerLawrence WeinerLawrence Weiner was a central figure in the formation of conceptual art in the 1960s His work often takes the form of typographic texts.- Life and career :...
: CUL-DE-SAC (2009) - Scott Lyall: The Power/Color Ball (2008)
- Simon StarlingSimon StarlingSimon Starling is an English conceptual artist and was the winner of the 2005 Turner Prize. He lives and works in Copenhagen and Berlin, and is a professor of art at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main.-Biography:...
: Infestation Piece (Musselled Moore) (2008) - Rafael Lozano-HemmerRafael Lozano-HemmerRafael Lozano-Hemmer is a Mexican-Canadian electronic artist who works with ideas from architecture, technological theater and performance. He holds a Bachelors of Science in Physical Chemistry from Concordia University in Montreal...
: Pulse Front (2007)
Harbourfront Centre
The Power Plant is a key attraction of Harbourfront CentreHarbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre is a key cultural organization on Toronto, Ontario's waterfront, situated at 235 Queen's Quay West. Established as a crown corporation in 1972 by the federal government to create a waterfront park, it became a non-profit organization in 1991. Funding comes from corporate...
. While the gallery is led by its own Board of Directors, Harbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre is a key cultural organization on Toronto, Ontario's waterfront, situated at 235 Queen's Quay West. Established as a crown corporation in 1972 by the federal government to create a waterfront park, it became a non-profit organization in 1991. Funding comes from corporate...
supports the gallery with maintenance and improvements to the physical site, as well as services and financial support. The waterfront site offers many visitors a first-time experience with internationally-acclaimed, contemporary art
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
.