•  Janet Morton is knitting a model of her home in Guelph, Ontario, in time for the exhibition reception. Also in the show are Morton's absurdly large, 15-foot-long handmade mitten and a tree branch sculpture frosted with lace. Her prolific body of work, including cozies for buildings and sweaters for sub-Saharan animals in Canadian zoos, spurs consideration of human excess, perceived needs, imposed aesthetics, and the value of time and repetitive labor. “The intent has been to playfully transform objects, critically examining impulses of anthropomo rphization taken to extremes, misplaced sentimentality and control of nature,” Morton explains.

•  Rudy Shepherd , wearing a brown bear costume sewn by his mother, tromps in a New England winter scene. The casual, immediate air of a snapshot in these large photographs belies heavier implications. Selected from a series titled Ursa Major Contemplating the Meaning of the Universe , Shepherd's performance work questions the meaning of home, the idea of comfort, the structures of transcultural and collective identity, and assumptions based on facades.

•  Italian Futurist Bruno Munari 's children's book, Little White Riding Hood , shows there is substance in seemingly empty pages if one is inventive enough. The International Herald Tribune claims, “Munari is one of the most influential designers of the 20 th century. Not because he has imposed a particular style or look, but because he has encouraged people to go beyond formal conventions and stereotypes by showing them how to widen their perceptual awareness.”

•  New York State transplant Takeshi Murata pushes the boundaries of animation and psychedelia with sophisticated code-based image processing. In the hypnotic video installation Monster Movie, a B-movie yeti decomposes and reconstitutes 30 times per second, becoming a seething, digital morass of color and form. “Murata's particular genius is an almost alchemical ability to transform forgotten relics of pop culture into dazzling jewels,” comments Artforum .

•  Available in a listening station as well as on the gallery's website, strong>Collin Olan 's delicate audio piece encapsulates the melting process of contact microphones frozen inside a block of ice. A tiny picture of an awe-inspiring, voluptuously iced landscape from a family camping trip in the Midwest accompanies the recording.

•  “In these familiar spaces, transformed in winter not only by a blanket of snow but also by a state of inactivity, we are offered glimpses of the sublime,” says Lisa M. Robinson about her photographic series Snowbound . The selected images pristinely capture a moment in time w hile pointing to the cycle
of seasons.

•  Amidst these artists' works, The Warehouse Gallery has produced interactive and informative displays. Visitors can compare their heights against a full-scale graph charting the snowfall in Syracuse over the last half century. Free samples are provided of de-icing agents that are less damaging to the environment than the conventionally used salt. A presentation of locally purchased snow shovels was inspired by Marcel Duchamp's 1915 readymade In Advance of the Broken Arm . As a munificent reversal of this historic Dadaist work, the gallery renders the display useful again, allowing guests to borrow the commercially made tools from an art gallery setting.

Embracing Winter is the third exhibition in a series at The Warehouse Gallery referencing the natural world and encouraging environmental consciousness. The de-icing agents were generously donated by Cryotech. The curator would like to acknowledge the inspirational exhibition at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Sense of the City, which explored the theme of urban phenomena and perceptions that have traditionally been ignored, repressed or maligned.

Winter Light Film Screening / Thursday 8 March, 8 pm
@ The Redhouse, 201 S. West Street (at W. Fayette St., across from The Warehouse Gallery).
Cosponsored by Thursday Screeners.
6-7:45pm - Casual reception at The Warehouse Gallery beforehand.

A selection of seasonally inspired experimental films, videos and audio by Arnait Women’s Video Workshop, Michael Bell-Smith, Stan Brakhage, Thorsten Fleisch, Jake Kennedy, Kurt Kren, Peter Lipskis, Guy Maddin, Collin Olan, Paper Rad and Wolf Eyes, John Price and Joyce Wieland. Curated by Canadian filmmaker and writer Brett Kashmere and The Warehouse Gallery director Astria Suparak, with work from Austria, Nunavut, America, Germany and Canada. Program details.