I Thought There Were Limits

I thought there were limits, Newtonian

The apples, falling, never hit the ground.
– D.G. Jones

I Thought There Were Limits brings together five Toronto-based artists whose work engages with both the material and conceptual dimensions of space. Taking as its departure the tradition of site-specificity pioneered in the 1960s, the exhibition presents a category of site-specific gestures that derive unique material implications once they are affixed to a site. By displaying previously conceived artworks along with new works made for this occasion, the exhibition tests the limits of site-specific practice as both responsive to a particular place while also adaptable to any site. Like a perpetually falling apple and the expanding ground beneath it, the artworks form a responsive relationship to their site and in so doing reveal specific architectural, temporal and virtual properties of the Justina M. Barnicke Gallery. This selection of artworks is representative of the variations of site-specific practices within Toronto contemporary art. The project demonstrates a local history of spatial practices that challenge the terms and expected ways that a work might be responsive to a place.

This exhibition is produced as part of the requirements for the MVS degree in Curatorial Studies at the University of Toronto.