TRUCK Contemporary Art and Latitude 53 Contemporary Visual Culture are pleased to present the Calgary launch for Orphan Well Adoption Agency, a publication produced in concert with Alana Bartol’s recent Latitude 53 exhibition, featuring texts by Lindsey V. Sharman and Lou Sheppard.

The evening will include a conversation between Alana Bartol and Lindsey V. Sharman at 7PM as well as light refreshments. Catalogues will be available at the event for $20.

Alana Bartol creates relationships between the personal sphere and the landscape, particular to our moment of environmental precarity. Orphan Well Adoption Agency re-imagines industrial remediation as a non-profit that finds caretakers for orphaned oil and gas wells in Alberta. Orphan Well Adoption Agency explores dowsing as technology for remediation and for discovering alternative relationships to natural resources, with a touch of humour.

Lindsey V. Sharman is a curator at the Art Gallery of Alberta and adjunct professor with the Department of Art at the University of Calgary. Sharman has studied Art History and Curating in Canada, England, Switzerland, and Austria, earning degrees from the University of Saskatchewan and the University of the Arts, Zurich. From 2012-2018 she was the first curator of the Founders’ Gallery at the Military Museums in Calgary, an academic appointment through the University of Calgary. Her primary area of research is politically and socially engaged art practice. Curatorial projects of note include Seeing Soldiering: in theatre with those who serve by Althea Thauberger; TRENCH, a durational performance by Adrian Stimson; Felled Trees an exhibition deconstructing national identity at Canada House, London; Gassed Redux by Adad Hannah; and the nationally touring retrospective and corresponding publication The Writing on the Wall: Works of Dr. Joane Cardinal Schubert.

Lou Sheppard is an interdisciplinary artist from K’jiputuk/Halifax. Sheppard graduated from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 2006 and then studied English and Education at Mount Saint Vincent University. In their recent practice Sheppard uses processes of translation and metaphor to interrogate structures of power in data and language. Their work is evidenced through installation, performance and score and often leads them to collaborate with other artists, including musicians, visual artists and performing artists. Sheppard has exhibited work both in Canada and internationally, and was included in the first Antarctic Biennale and the Antarctic Pavilion in Venice. In 2017 they received the Emerging Atlantic Artist Award and in 2018 they were long listed for the Sobey Art Award. Sheppard is currently Artist in Residence in the Faculty of Education at McGill University.

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This event takes place on the traditional territories of the Blackfoot and the people of the Treaty 7 region in Southern Alberta, which includes the Siksika, the Piikuni, the Kainai, the Tsuut’ina and the Stoney Nakoda First Nations. The City of Calgary is also home to the Métis Nation of Alberta, Region III.

TRUCK Contemporary Art in Calgary is dedicated to creating safe and inclusive spaces for participating in contemporary art.

The TRUCK Main Space is located on the main floor of the building (2009 10 Avenue SW). Our washroom is gender neutral and barrier free.