Paix Au Vietnam

John Abrams

A Space Windows

February 13 – March 13, 2009

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Incorporating Andy Warhol’s penchant to repeat, Paix Au Vietnam, represents industry and production by presenting four assemblages. The oil paintings picture the opening shot from Orson Welles’ film, Citizen Kane, (1941) which shows a chain link fence fastened with a no-trespassing sign. This sign is a signifier for private ownership, separation of classes, and the commodication of everything from essential needs to drinking water but also serves as the back drop-times four-for the artist’s A Space Window Project. Seen together these assemblages repeat an image and a scene from Jean-Luc Goddard’s film, Masculine Feminine, (1966) in which a young man is filmed on his knees before an American Embassy car painting the words: Peace in Vietnam.

Biographies

John Abrams holds an MFA from York University. He began to exhibit in 1983 after attending OCAD. An active A Space member, Abrams has previously served on the Board of Directors. He is represnted by Paul Petro Contemporary Art in Toronto and the Boltax Gallery on Shelter Island, New York. The artist’s work has been exhibited at and is in the collections of the O’Hare Airport, National Gallery of Canada and Canada Council Art Bank, Robert McLaughlin Art Gallery, Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Queens University, the Art Gallery of Windsor, McMaster Museum of Art and Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art and University of Toronto Art Centre and more. Upcoming 2009 exhibitions include a solo show at Paul Petro Contemporary Art in September and a Window Project www.windowproject.org, curated by Ho Tam in Victoria B.C.