LEÓN, Glenda

Time Zones Reception
Wednesday October 20 5 pm
Ontario College of Art and Design (OCAD)

Every Step is a Shape of Time
Friday October 29 7pm
performance installation
OCAD yellow stairwell

Time Zones Artist Residency presented by Fado Performance Inc. and OCAD
Curated by Tagny Duff

Organized by artist/curator Tagny Duff, Time Zones is a residency project with internationally acclaimed Cuban artists Glenda León and Tania Bruguera. The goal of the residency is to create new works that further the artists’ reflections and engagement with time, the commute in-between citizenship and nationhood, and the flight between corporeal and virtual spaces. Bruguera and León begin the residency in Montreal as part of Mois de la Performance, hosted by La Centrale, followed by two weeks in Toronto under the auspices of Fado Performance Inc. and sponsored by the Ontario College of Art and Design. Glenda León will present Every Step is a Shape of Time. This performative installation invites the public to create individual and collective aural experiences generated in the lag time between walking and listening.

“Every step we make is a small yet important instant in our lives. The direction, the speed, the decision to make one step or a sequence of them can take us to certain events or move us away from them. (The sound amplification of this daily act is a way to make us reflect upon and notice infinite possibilities sculpted through time. Listening to our own footsteps is metaphorically linked to the act of listening to ourselves. Where are we going? How are we walking on this path we have chosen? In fact, have we chosen this path we are walking? I believe these are questions worth asking, however, they are ones not easily answered.”

Glenda León is an artist and writer. Her acclaimed book La Condicion Performatica (2001), the first overview of performance art in Cuba, received a national award. Her performance interventions, photographic work and video works have been featured in numerous exhibitions such as the Havana Biennial, Museo Carillo Gill (Mexico), Galeria Marta Trava (Sao Paolo, Brasil), the Javits Centre (NYC), and the ArtParis Fair (France). She is the director of the Batiscafo Project (an artist residency program affiliated with Triangle Arts Fund) in Cuba.

FADO’s project page for Time Zones
FADO’s artist page for Glenda León