Coming up in 2014

A few days ago, we gave you a recap of UNIT/PITT’s year in 2013. We thought you might be interested in what we have planned for the coming months. We can’t tell you everything yet, but here’s a lot of what you’re going to see in 2014. And remember, we rely on your support!

We’re closed for the first couple of weeks of January, but we’ll be opening on January 17th with Vancouver, Crawling, Weeping, Betting. UNIT/PITT and battery opera performance will present six weeks of performances, screenings, and city tours involving dozens of artists, writers, and performers. Watch our site for a full schedule.

The Spaces of Contestation project, curated by Mariane Bourcheix-Laporte, started in October 2013 with a lecture series co-presented by the SFU Institute for the Humanities and the SFU Woodwards Office for Community Engagement. The talks continue in February, followed by the core of the project: four collaborations between artists and community groups and institutions, culminating in public actions, an exhibition, and publications in the winter and early spring.

In May, we’ll open About Time, a survey of the work of Vancouver’s Robert Chaplin. His career has included artists’ books, painting, animation, cast metal, stone carving, and many other things. In spite of ambitious projects, and a prolific output, this exhibition will be one of the first places where Chaplin’s work will be placed in a critical context.

In July and August, the Pitt will host a curatorial project by Sylvana D’Angelo and Czech artist Anezka Minarikova. Behind the Wall x In Front of the Wall. Two decades after the fall of the East Bloc and the declaration of the “end of history”, the effects of communism still reverberate. The curators will ask artists to respond to artifacts and experiences, culminating in a closing party in August.

Also on the schedule: in September, we will transform our gallery into a showroom, The Monochrome Store, staffed by co-curators Andrew Smith, Mark Cunningham, and Willem Jan Smit; in November and December we will present an exhibition of First Nations erotic art, Indian Affairs, curated by Chris Bose and Cease Wyss; and watch for announcements of a publication by Mathew Sawyer and new vinyl with David Wisdom and The Music Appreciation Society. During all of this, we’ll continue screenings, and UNIT/PITT Radio. Also watch for our festival of art rock in fall 2014. Wrong Wave 2014: Poetry, Language, and Rock will be curated by Sydney Hermant, who curated and organized 2013’s Wrong Wave.

As always, your help is welcome, and needed! With your help since 2009, we have brought the Pitt back from the brink of oblivion and built it into something new and strong. With enduring support from our community, we will continue to support artistic freedom, supply creative space to artists and their organizations, provide experience and exposure to early-career artists and cultural workers, and give the public an opportunity to see under-exposed artists and practices.

Thanks for being there in 2013. You can help us in 2014 with a donation, by purchasing one of our publications, or by becoming a member.