Buy tickets online: http://www.publicationstudio.biz/events/canadian-romantic

Looking for a surprise for that special someone? Why not pick up tickets for two to the Vancouver appearance of The Canadian Romantic on January 13 — dinner, two sets of music and performance, and the launch of a new book, at the Dunlevy Snackbar.

Space is limited, so get your tickets early! If you can’t make it, you will still be able to order copies of The Canadian Romantic book online, just a few short days from now.

Join us for an artist talk by Patrick Cruz and the launch of a publication accompanying his installation Yin Yang Temple, on Saturday December 17 at 2pm at UNIT/PITT Projects, 15 East Pender Street, Vancouver.

Patrick Cruz’s installation Yin Yang Temple was the first commission launched in UNIT/PITT’s series Ill Repute. Originally created in October 2011, it is an elaborate “listening station” consisting of a wild clash of paintings and other artifacts, and a soundtrack provided by constantly shuffling playlists, broadcast on low-power FM radio. These playlists were contributed by Cruz’s friends and colleagues, making this a collective work that underlines the social nature of his work, and the social production of artist-run culture.

Drop by 15 E Pender between noon and 5 pm on Saturday, December 17, and join us in ending the 2011 programming year.

Since April 2011, when we moved in to 15 East Pender Street, we have shown about a dozen exhibitions and other types of projects. That’s a busy schedule for any gallery, let alone one that was pretty much declared dead back in 2009. The latest of these is Ill Repute, a series of five commissions from emerging artists, meditating and riffing on how so much of what has touched the Pitt over the past 36 years has been somehow on the wrong side of history. If you haven’t seen the installations by Patrick Cruz, Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers), and Chun Hua Catherine Dong & Ek Rzepka, Saturday is the last chance; and if you would like to get a book and poster by Wil George, this will be your last chance this year.

Even after we close for the season, though, the web-based components of some of these projects will continue on; you’ll also be able to see videos by Wil George, Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers), and Christie Lee Charles in our front window from 8 to 11 pm every night, alternating with videos from the We Give A Shit Because We Can project. The video screenings will keep on going through the holidays, so if you’re in our neighbourhood at night you might want to stop for a minute or two (and if you’re waiting for an eastbound bus on Pender just past Carrall, it’s something to pass the time — you’re welcome).

And then there are the books: some titles related to projects we did this year are still to come, but we have an impressive back catalogue from this year alone. You can purchase these at the Pitt, and some of them are available for purchase online as well.

Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers): Vancouver Can’t Argue With The Dead opens Saturday December 10, 8pm
Ek Rzepka artist talk Sunday December 11, 2pm

This weekend, UNIT/PITT’s Ill Repute series of emerging artist commissions continues with two events: the launch of Vancouver Can’t Argue With the Dead by Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers) on Saturday, December 10 at 8pm; and a talk to go with Chun Hua Catherine Dong & Ek Rzepka’s crowdsourced work We Give A Shit Because We Care, on Sunday, December 11 at 2pm.

There are still more events to come in this series before we close for the holidays: a video launch, additional publications, evening video screenings, and web-only content. Subscribe to our mailing list for details, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.

Ill Repute is a series of commissions intended as critical riffs on the history that has intersected with the Helen Pitt Gallery (Unit/Pitt, Pitt International Galleries, Helen Pitt Gallery Artist Run Centre, P.I.G. Gallery, and all of the other things we have been called). The series so far has included Patrick Cruz, Wil George, Chun Hua Catherine Dong & Ek Rzepka, and Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers); installations, audio, online works, books and video are all part of the project. What is emerging is a picture of ideas and tendencies that have endured and resisted extinction despite ending up on the wrong side of history.

With support from the City of Vancouver’s 125th Anniversary Grants Program. Ill Repute is also supported by a project grant from the British Columbia Arts Council. UNIT/PITT Projects is grateful for ongoing support from the City of Vancouver, the British Columbia Arts Council, the Canada Council, and from artists, cultural workers, volunteers and individual donors, without whom we would be unable to continue.

Continuing the breakneck pace of programming this year, the Ill Repute series continues with Vancouver Can’t Argue With the Dead by Sxwchálten (Dustin Rivers). This project includes  video on the window monitor, a publication, and photo-based work in the gallery (which already houses Patrick Cruz’s Yin Yang Temple and Chun Hua Catherine Dong & Ek Rzepka’s We Give A Shit Because We Care). The publication is going to be the second book in the Ill Repute series; the first was Wil George’s Survival In Its Many Shapes, which we launched last month.

Ill Repute was envisioned as a series of riffs on the history of the Pitt, and by extension the history of Vancouver, especially the “wrong” side of that history: movements of resistance, scandals, subcultures, undergrounds, and life outside the law. Since the Pitt’s history includes First Nations curators, artists and cultural workers, we asked Cease Wyss to curate some commissions from emerging First Nations artists. What those artists bring to the concepts of “history” and “resistance” is distinct because of the scope of history and the personal nature of resistance in their lives. And that shouldn’t be surprising.

Back in 2010, when the Pitt had an office but no permanent gallery, we received a very nice postcard from the Ministry of Casual Living in Victoria, inviting us to bring a show there. What resulted was Exhibition To Be Destroyed, Again and the book of the same title (the first of many Pitt/Publication Studio co-publications).

Now the Ministry is in a similar position. After a decade or so of being a window gallery at an obscure retail crossroads in Victoria BC, redevelopment is forcing them to become nomadic. We wish them the best, and here’s hoping there’s another collaboration in our future somewhere.

http://mondaymag.com/articles/entry/closing-of-two-fernwood-galleries-opens-up-new-possibilities

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/tom-hawthorn/eviction-wont-shutter-ministry-of-casual-livings-artistic-ambitions/article2259656/

Here it is, tonight! The amazing We Give A Shit Because We Care (part of the series Ill Repute) launches tonight, Friday December 2, with a sure-to-amaze assortment of video, audio, sculptural and illustrated shit. And you can take it home, in the form of freshly-printed books. They’re full of shit, but you’ll love them because of it!

Come see us any time after 8, and don’t neglect other fine art events in the neighbourhood or across town.

The long-anticipated launch of Chun Hua Catherine Dong and Ek Rzepka’s community project We Give A Shit Because We Care is this coming Friday, December 2, at 8pm.

We call it a “community project” because the two artists contacted other artists in the Pitt’s community and asked them to submit documents, specifically documents of their shit — a request that has been broadly and diversely interpreted, resulting in the project itself (online, on Unit/Pitt Radio and in the gallery) and its accompanying publication.

So, thanks to everyone on this impressive list of respondents:

Adam Dodd
Adam Gandy
Bill Thomson
Brian Kokoska
Bruce Barber
Chia-Chen Jane Hsu
Chris Von Szombathy
Christina Nicolay and Ya-Chu Kang
Cindy Baker
David Khang
Deyan Denchev
Elisha Burrows
Ella Collier
Francisco-Fernando Granados
Glenn Lewis
Helen Tieger
James Lindsay
James Whitman and Courtney Burke
Jason Field
Jimmy Liang
John G Boehme
Jonathan Russell
Justin Frederick Worhaug
Justine Cheung
Kathleen Ritter
Lesley Anderson
Lucien Durey
Mark Lowe
Mel King
Chad Durnford
Patrick Cruz
Peter Baren
Sally Jorgensen
Shiloh Sukkau
Steven Hubert
Susan Kang
Vanessa Brown
Victoria Singh
YoungSook Park
Bill Vorn
Jasmine Reimer
Katharina D. Martin
Deniz Merdano
Mark Lowe
Rachel White
Davida Kidd
Golboo Amani
Erin Gee
Kate Sansom
Jeremy Green
Heidi Nagtegaal
Jessica Jang
Josh Hite
Michael Macbain
Dylan McHugh
Jennifer Chan
Holly Armishaw
Lara Fitzgerald
Kathleen Beckett
Jeremy Isao Speier
Evan Tyler
Syed Kazmi
Zarah Ackerman
Davida Kidd
Marie-Helene Tessier
Setareh Yasan

Thanks to Reid Shier and Michael Turner for mentions of the Pitt and Pitt director Keith Higgins in their discussion of the role and evolution of artist-run centres in Vancouver. You can read the article by picking up the current issue of Fillip, or read it online here.

Looking for a small gift for someone? You can support contemporary art in Vancouver and spread some culture by buying one or more of our Pitt publications, made one-at-a-time by Publication Studio Vancouver. How about:

• Exhibition To Be Destroyed, Again, a book of full-size reproductions of exhibition posters, gig posters and ephemera from 1979-1984, containing gems like the U-J3RK5 “eyechart” poster and one drawn by Attila Richard Lukacs for his first solo show
• Haptic, which has been described as “a jewel of a book”, showcasing the work of Tegan Moore and Elspeth Pratt, which a written contribution by Lorna Brown and design by Working Format. Contains color plates and some of the materials used in sculptures by these artists.
• Reoccurrence, which includes several colour reproductions of the work of Rebecca Brewer, Chrystal Fisher and Allison Tweedie.
• Free Concert, an artist’s book by writer and curator Michael Turner, illustrated with several photographs, and a found-poetry text which both recasts and retells the events of the Rolling Stones’ set at Altamont. (You can also purchase this book with the print edition The Rolling Stones Trilogy and also receive a copy of Allison Collins’s critical text Rock Lore.)
• Unstable Ground, a book combining the work and process of six artists (Robin Cameron, Sarah Ciurysek, Kate Davis, Emily Jones, Dan Siney and artist-curator Andrea Pinheiro) into a dense and diverse document of instability and transformation.
• Esophagus Now, an eccentric and captivating book by Chris von Szombathy in which he shares three illustrated meditations on fast food, music and meaning.
• Re-reading the Riot Act : Cycles One through Five by leannej, a book that began with her performance at the Rereading the Riot Act performance cabaret that we presented on the night of the Stanley Cup Riot. It’s an especially good choice for anyone who wants (or needs) to see Occupy Vancouver in its local and historical context.
• Survival In Its Many Shapes by Wil George, which we launched just a couple of weeks back, a book of poems that plainly and honestly tell stories from the First Nations experience in the unceded territory which is Metro Vancouver and its surroundings.

We’re coming out with even more titles before we close in December — books by Patrick Cruz, Christie Lee Charles, Chun Hua Catherine Dong & Ek Rzepka, and Sxwchálten X̱elsílem Tłaḵwasik̓a̱n (formerly Dustin Rivers). Drop by during open hours and pick up a few of them. We also stock some “books we like” by other people: books like Who Owns Canada? and A User’s Guide to Demanding the Impossible. While they last, we also have copies of the 2007 Helen’s Cookbook.

Some Of Our Books