Vector Festival 2022: Glitch

Vector Festival 2022: Glitch centres around the enticing, joyous, infinite possibilities offered by glitch. Drawing inspiration from Legacy Russell’s Glitch Feminism the festival considers glitch as a necessary, protective force for interrupting the machinic workings of patriarchy, capitalism, and racism. Counterintuitively, through its multitudinal ruptures and refusals, glitch becomes a generative site for envisioning new ways of existing beyond current sociopolitical operating systems. 

Through a hybrid online and in-person program of exhibitions, performances, screenings, workshops, talks, and community events, this 10-day festival invites artists and audiences to come together in celebration of failure and all its potentials.

Exhibitions
Vector Festival 2022 kicks off on Thursday, July 14 with the opening of the festival’s flagship exhibition, Machine Bodies (Is Cyborg Good or Evil?) (July 14–August 13), curated by Karina Iskandarsjah and featuring works by Xuan Ye, Madeleine Lychek, and artist collective L.A. Birdwatchers (Suzanne Kite, Aljumaine Gayle, Nicholas Shapiro, and Ladan Mohamed Siad). 

The air we share (July 14–24) is a multisite exhibition of GIF artworks considering the spatial and social resonance of air. In this open-air, outdoor exhibition curated by Megan MacLaurin, works by Christina Battle, Driftnote, Dalia Hassan, Jason Isolini, Kaya Joan, Sally McKay, Geoffrey Pugen, and Laura Margaret Ramsey are presented in storefront windows along Toronto’s Bloor Street in partnership with BIG on Bloor Festival.

Participants of InterAccess’s and STYLY’s augmented reality workshop will also be given the unique opportunity to display their interactive digital creations to the public as part of BIG on Bloor (July 14–August 6). 

Screenings
We are excited to present The Glitch as a Remix (July 15), a screening program exploring the use of glitch aesthetics and narratives in music videos. This screening is curated by Roya DelSol and features videos by BlackPowerBarbie / Shad, Sylvain Chausse / BADBADNOTGOOD, Jessamine Fok, The Kitsch Generation, Casey MQ, Scott Pilgrim / Cadence Weapon, and Sammy Rawal.

A body as a fault in the system, in a system of faults (July 17) is a large-scale outdoor public screening event curated by Amanda Low showcasing works by Steven Cottingham, Stephanie Deumer, Chun Hua Catherine Dong, Gladys Lou, and Seyi Olomodosi. This event is presented at Brampton’s Garden Square in partnership with Performing Arts Brampton and The Arts, Culture & Creative Industry Development Agency (ACCIDA).

Performances
Another Life (July 22) is an evening showcase of experimental musical performances by Erin Corbett, Myriam Bleau, and Hex-A-Decimal centred around gaming, identity, and future feminisms. This event is curated by Sofie (Sonja) Mikhaylova and is co-presented by Biblioteka Records.

Workshops
In the introductory workshop Psychedelia VJ: Experiments in TouchDesigner (July 16), artist and performer Joy will walk participants through the process of using the creative code software TouchDesigner to create generative and reactive visuals for musical performances.

Discover how to design small, zine-like games that can be shared with others, develop an appreciation for the indie “art tool” scene, and learn to embrace happy accidents in the game-making process with the workshop Keeping It Strange: Experimental Game Design Tools (July 18) led by Sagan Yee.

Join instructor Sydney Hart for Mapping for Open-source Investigation (July 21) to produce a flow map and a collection of related satellite images, while learning how to start an open-source investigation.

Game and Hardware Jam
Join us for a hybrid online and in-person video game and hardware jam presented in partnership with Hand Eye Society. In this 48-hour collaborative event, teams develop video games virtually and are provided access to InterAccess’s studio to create alt controllers. On the festival’s closing day, jammers will have the opportunity to share their games and controllers with Vector Festival’s wider community through a public Game & Hardware Jam Showcase (July 24).

Tickets
All Vector Festival events will be offered for free or pay-what-you-can. Registration for all festival events will be released on July 4, 2022.

To learn more about our upcoming programs & to register for tickets visit vectorfestival.org.