Rogue Wave 2020

Image: Mitch Fenton via Instagram "Bring on the Next Wave!" — *Image:* Mitch Fenton via Instagram *"Bring on the Next Wave!"*

Rogue Wave is an outdoor exhibition of installation art that takes place on Toronto Island. Running this year from September 28 to October 25, 2020, there is still two weeks to catch this show!

As written on their website – Rogue Wave 2020: In the spirit of rogue waves – unpredictable, causing disruptions, affecting change, and with short notice – we asked artists to devise their own creative response to this theme. The exhibit involves 25-30 artists: professional, emerging and collectives. The works are site-specific, created or re-installed on the Island. Online on Facebook and Instagram there are daily posts featuring a different artist and their project each day.

To see the exhibition take the ferry from the Jack Layton Ferry Terminal to Ward’s Island and follow the map:

Some highlights from the exhibition include:

"Levity and Gravity" by Sarah Gaby-Trotz (1)

This work explores themes weight, balance as well as entanglement. It has been built outdoors on Ward’s Island over a series of days using many materials sourced from the island. Island rocks were cast using wet felting techniques, allowing for the exploration of the weight of rocks through the lightness of felt.

"Bring on the Next Wave!" by Mitch Fenton (2A)

This installation is a lighthearted rearrangement of park amenities reflecting on the year 2020. Park lawn chairs are Covid-19 spaced and high-water resistant with a ring of sandbags around them. Visitors are welcome to enjoy the view from the chairs and perhaps imagine they are flying in formation over Toronto like the Snowbirds often do.

"With the Flow." by Kathleen Doody (3)

For over ten years the artist has been creating pebble mosaics with many of the pebbles used being collected from local Lake Ontario beaches. After the floods of 2018, cisterns were dug into various locations on the Island. Doody created the first of four ‘rogue’ sewer grate mosaics for Rogue Wave 2018, culminating with her 2020 installation. She creates patterns and forms both reflective of the natural and man-made sites of the island.

"The Anatomy of Fear - Right Wing" by Bruce Smith

"The Anatomy of Fear" by Bruce Smith (5)

As a geologist, teacher, plumber, welder, gas fitter and artist, Smith has put these eclectic skills together to create many fantastical sculptures. These Dragons were created in 1994 for a show called The Gauntlet of Fire. They reappeared over the years and have found a new life in 2020 installed in land and water and can be set alight. Fear can give rise to frantic despair and also can lead to progression. This duality is represented in The Anatomy of Fear as the right and left wings. The terrifying right wing consists of the body of the dragon, filled with "Big Bucks" ($): a bat wing coloured red to indicate hysteria and disruption. A contemporary analogy of this wing is the denial of global warming and refusal to engage in carbon emission reduction programs. The benign left wing is filled with common sense "c", coloured environmentally-friendly green with shape derived from a dove.

"Brutish Museum" by Alastair Dickson (7)

As part of the Mini Galleries that have popped up all around Ward’s and Algonquin Islands the Brutish Museum provides a small, outdoor gallery space to showcase Dickson’s sculptural scenes and continues to change throughout Rogue Wave and beyond. Using primarily found objects, he breathes new life into them by creating magical and sometime macabre visions.

“Erratic Revisited” by Gaye Jackson (14)

Jackson has been creating photographic work about environment history for over 30 years. Erratic Revisited is from series of photographs of “erratics” – rocks moved by glaciers that once covered most of North America and that often appear out-of-place within their surroundings. The two images in Rogue Wave are exhibited in the front windows of the artist’s home. One image is of the first erratic that she photographed in 2011; the second image is a composite of colour correction test strips of rock images for an exhibition cancelled because of Covid-19.

“Mini Gallery” by Laura Shepherd (16)

Shepherd has lived on Toronto Island since 1993 and living on the shores of Lake Ontario, she is influenced by the effects of weather and light, the island, the city, the lake and the sky. She will presenta changing viewing of recent work in scratchboard, experiments with gouache, and works from her archives.

“Sun/Snake” by Merle Harley (17)

A snake muses on the changing season from its meadow habitat of swamp and snake grass. Harley uses this comic strip style to highlight one of the many island mascots who are sun lovers.

"Big Trouble" by Shadowland Theatre (23)

Founded in 1984 on Toronto Island, Shadowland creates original theatre that entertains, engages, and inspires people to interact positively with each other and their environments. The company’s distinctive theatrical performances include puppetry, mask, stilt-dance, spectacle arts, fire and live music. Shadowland animates streets, parks and outdoor spaces and collaborates with urban and rural communities to celebrate local stories and Canadian histories. Artistic directors are Anne Barber and Brad Harley. In these challenging times, Big Trouble embodies your fears and purges your anxieties. It is based on the Mexican papier mâché Judas figures that were traditionally filled with fireworks and set alight as cathartic relief. This figure was originally displayed at the AGO in 2012 as part of the Frida and Diego exhibition.

"Groyne" by April Hickox (23)

Groyne is an ongoing series of video and still images photographed over many years by Toronto photographer April Hickox. Groynes run perpendicular to shorelines, capturing sand and preventing erosion. The cement groyne documented here extends into Lake Ontario from Centre Island. The artist has been recording this landmark for over 20 years and has watched as it has eroded with high water and winter ice. The work reflects her interest in the constant change in the landscape, from the climate crisis, and the dance we have with the elements. The installation shows a grid of images of the groyne taken over the years recording high and low water as well as the changing seasons. It is mounted on a plaque in the location where the images were shot.

Sources: Rogue Wave 2020