Opening Reception – Saturday, May 11, 2PM – 4PM
Home Made Home: Patch Work is a new project by Vancouver-based artist Germaine Koh, which explores complex housing issues relevant the Durham Region, and opens a conversation about civic responsibility, housing standards and the potential of alternative building models. For the exhibition, Koh has designed two provisional structures which provide practical solutions for emergency shelter. The first, a modular structure made from recycled materials, and the second, a small-scale building system in the form of a set of reusable panels that can be quickly assembled. Working together with members of the community, each of the panels will be created by various groups offsite and then brought together within the gallery. This framework, much like a patchwork quilt or old-fashioned barn-raising, draws on the skills within the community and provides a structure for individuals to contribute to communal needs. Starting from a DIY ethos, the works in the exhibition seeks to re-imagine housing conditions through models that address specific needs. Other projects by Koh in the Home Made Home series offer more speculative or utopian propositions that envision other possibilities for dwelling and sharing space.
Germaine Koh is a Canadian artist based in Vancouver, in the unceded ancestral territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Her work is concerned with the significance of everyday actions and common spaces, often adapting familiar objects to encourage connections between people and with the human and natural systems around us. Her current projects include Home Made Home, a project to build and advocate for alternative forms of housing, and League, a community project using play as a form of creative practice. Her exhibition history includes the BALTIC Centre, De Appel, Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, Para/Site Art Space, Frankfurter Kunstverein, The Power Plant, The British Museum, the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, Plug In ICA, Art Gallery of Ontario, and the Liverpool, Sydney and Montreal biennials. In 2018-20 she is the City of Vancouver’s first Engineering Artist in Residence.
Download the Patch Work Manual for building the small-scale home as seen in the exhibition space here.
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