Rick Leong
Hybrid Vigour
Dean Baldwin
Lime Eyes
September 13–October 6, 2012
Opening: September 12, 6–9pm
PARISIAN LAUNDRY
3550 St-Antoine West
Montreal, QC, Canada
H4C 1A9
Hours: Tue–Sat, 12–5pm
T 514 989 1056
PARISIAN LAUNDRY is thrilled to announce the opening of its Fall season 2012 with Hybrid Vigour, a new series of paintings by Rick Leong, and an on site installation in the gallery’s Bunker space by Dean Baldwin.
Rick Leong’s Hybrid Vigour is inspired by the artist’s investigations in hybridity and the phenomenology of dusk and dawn, researched and developed during a series of canoe trips throughout Southern Ontario as well as during a recent artist’s residency in Barcelona, Spain. Intrigued by the blurry moments between day and night, alert and at rest, Leong focused on the notion of hybridity as a combination of life forms to create something new. The artist translates this into his constructed landscapes where new meanings and reflections upon mythology come to the surface of his masterfully executed works on canvas, introducing the viewer into the artist’s oneiric world.
A third generation Chinese-Canadian, Rick Leong obtained his MFA from Concordia University in 2007. His thesis work was immediately acquired by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts affirming his emerging practice. In 2008, he was a finalist in the Royal Bank of Canada’s Painting Competition that toured at important venues such as The National Gallery of Canada, the Power Plant, Toronto and the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver. He will be the artist in residence at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design this coming fall. Leong’s work is collected widely across Canada, including in the corporate collections of Senvest, the ALDO Group, the Canada Council Art Bank, The Department of Foreign Affairs, Caisse de dépôt et placements du Québec, Mouvement Desjardins, the collection prêt d’oeuvres d’art du Musée national des beaux arts du Québec and private collections throughout Canada and the United States.
Dean Baldwin’s installation Lime Eyes in PARISIAN LAUNDRY’s coveted Bunker space blurs the lines between subject and object and art and life. Baldwin’s work typically combines food, drink, lounge and entertainment to provide participants with an experience that is thoughtful, unique and active. Baldwin’s work is currently installed at Mass MoCA, in North Adams, MA as part of the Oh, Canada exhibition where viewers / participants are invited to visit a “Canadian style” chalet with a fully equipped bar frequently serviced by the artist himself. Baldwin’s remarkable contribution to the Montreal Museum of Contemporary Art’s Triennial in the Fall 2011 transformed the Rotunda entrance of the museum through the installation of a massive 1952 wooden sailboat bar.
Dean Baldwin obtained a BA in Fine Arts from York University in Toronto and an MA in Fine Arts from Concordia University in Montreal. He has exhibited at Centre Clark in Montreal, the Art Gallery of Ontario, No. 9: Contemporary Art & Environment and Scotiabank Nuit Blanche in Toronto, Space Studios in London, Volta 5 in Basel and WhiteBox in New York. He was part of the Montreal Museum of Contemporary Art’s Triennial exhibition and the Oh, Canada exhibition at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA. He will be artist in residency at Darling Foundry’s residency program in Mumbai, India. The artist would like to thank the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the Canada Council for the arts.
