Les Ramsay Flip Flop Flux 

August 6th - August 28th, 2009
Opening Reception: 
August 6th @ 6pm

Flip Flop Flux

Les Ramsay

Daily life has long been a subject of art, but has traditionally occupied the lowest rank in a hierarchy of representation, the realm of the mundane. Perhaps it is the constancy of the experience that dulls and eventually reverses the traditional alchemical process: exciting sculptural forms become ordinary objects to be cleaned up or covered over, instead of considered and celebrated.

Vancouver artist Les Ramsay practices the more traditional alchemy of positive transformation; for Flip Flop Flux, his new paintings, sculptures, photographs, and drawings, represent formal and material experiments towards a realization of the full potential of the quotidian experience.

Ramsay's engagements may seem questioning and questionable improvements to his surroundings. The raising of a houseplant towards the sun could be enacted by its simple placement on a table or a chair. While the solution he proposes is absurdly roundabout, the odd appropriation of the trophy is a sentimental and formal investment in the success of the amalgamation of objects.

Perhaps the feeling of uncertainty can be traced to the process underlying the still-life, the traditional representational form of the day to day, and a formal structure that is to be found in most of Ramsay's new works. Often temporary arrangements of things at hand, these are supposedly immortalized through the application of paint on canvas, or sometimes the fastening of the objects together. However, the conceptually or formally finished product could be viewed as only semi-permanent, always subject to later whims: new brushstrokes and new environments, disassembly and re-assembly, devaluation and re-evaluation.

One such piece, a wood assemblage Ramsay initially constructed in 2008, has been transfigured for this exhibition. In a gesture towards a blank canvas, the piece was covered with white paint, before being playfully crossed out with a multi-coloured stripe. It is simultaneously old and new: like the other works in the exhibition, it is the precious product of a transformation that carries within its solid weight the traces of a particular physical and intellectual history, made special within the ordinariness of the every day.

Les Ramsay is an artist based in Vancouver, Canada. His diverse studio practice incorporates painting, drawing, sculpture, collage, photography, and printmaking. He received a BFA in visual arts from the Emily Carr University, and also studied at the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, Spain. His work has been exhibited in Canada, Spain, and the United States. As a member of the Lifetime Artists Collective, he is excited to be holding a solo exhibition with their support.

Lifetime Collective

68 West 5th Avenue

Vancouver, BC V5Y 1H6

1 877 629 2488