Tag: MC Coble

PULSE by MC Coble

Cinesphere, Ontario Place, Toronto
September 15–25, 2016
Performances nightly from 8:00–8:30pm

In Mary Coble’s Pulse, the artist climbs the iconic Cinesphere at Ontario Place each day in order to repurpose it as a beacon of protest. A series of Morse Code messages are transmitted from the structure to receivers on the ground positioned throughout Ontario Place island who then relay the message on using their own light source. The transmitted messages are composed of statements and chants used in recent and current protests and fights for civil rights which will be selected from the artist’s archive as well as in collaboration with local community. This collaborative gesture of solidarity merges activist and nautical language to amplify a collective call for action.

Coble’s Pulse fits into the MONOMYTHS journey at Stage 7: Ordeals. During this stage of the journey the heroine has come face to face with their personal challenge. In this moment they either confront death or face their greatest fear. The hope of this stage of the journey is that by confronting their greatest fear and conquering it, they can embark on a new life. Coble’s response to illuminating this stage of the journey suggests the necessity of challenging seemingly inaccessible structures and systems (social, political personal), while insisting on the interdependency of a collective effort by employing the communication of multiple bodies, versus attempting to cross this personal bridge alone. Refraining from a heroic narrative of conquering an iconic structure, the piece lends itself to chance and even possibly, failure.

PULSE is presented in the context of in/future, a festival of art and music, presented by Art Spin in partnership with Small World Music. 100+ transformative experiences re-animating the West Island of Ontario Place during this once-in-a-lifetime festival. 60+ artists including large scale installations, films, and performances. 40+ musical performances on the Small World Music stage.

Thanks to Rui Pimenta and Layne Hinton (Art Spin), Mike Hazleton (Ontario Place), and special thanks to Matthew Languay and Basecamp Climbing for their expertise and support. Thanks to Matt Seto for facilitating the climbing team who are supporting this project. 

USA / Sweden

https://www.mccoble.com/

Embracing unpredictability, messiness and failure MC Coble has worked with performance art for over 20 years, through this time aiming to manifest problems of bodily, societal and symbolic navigation particularly focusing on issues of injustice and normative boundaries. Recurrent themes in Coble’s work revolve around queer politics evolve around the intersection of queer politics and activism.

Coble’s work, which has been included in exhibitions such as Queer Objectivity at The Stamp Gallery, University of Maryland (Baltimore, USA); The Great Refusal: Taking on New Queer Aesthetics at theSchool of the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, USA); Lost and Found: Queerying the Archive at the Nikolaj Center of Contemporary Art (Copenhagen, Denmark); and in the internationally traveling archive re.act.feminism #2–a performing archive.

Coble has performed live as part of 13 Festivalen, Festival of Performance Art (Gothenburg, Sweden), Rapid Pulse Performance Festival (Chicago, USA), MADE Festival (Umea, Sweden); in Commitment Issues presented by FADO Performance Art Centre (Toronto, Canada), Global Feminisms, Brooklyn Museum of Art (NY, USA) and in Performa 05 at Artists Space (NYC, USA).

Coble is a Senior Lecturer in the Fine Art Unit, MFA Programs at Valand Academy of Art, Gothenburg University, Sweden.