Thinking Animals: A conversation with John McEwen at the AGO

the Department of Visual Art and Art History, School of Arts, Media, Performance and Design, York University presents
Thinking Animals, A conversation with John McEwen

“…the human species can not be fully itself without the otherness of all kinds but especially animals.” – Paul Shepard
As a sculptor of more than fifty years McEwen’s interest in animals as subject matter is not anchored in the faithfulness of representation, but rather in the parallel muteness of both animals and material. From the beginning of his career he has used this quality of muteness to explore both the politics of possession and how animals make us human. If the first is peculiar to McEwen’ s psyche, it is the latter quality that lead him to curate an exhibition entitled Thinking Animals held from August 4th, 2018 to August 25th, 2018 at the Olga Korper Gallery (Toronto, ON). In his presentation McEwen will outline the trajectory of his work with animals, followed by a conversation with Dr David Dorenbaum on how it led him to curate the exhibition Thinking Animals.
David Dorenbaum is a Toronto psychoanalyst in private practice and a Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. His interest in the relationship between psychoanalysis and art has led him to collaborate with various artists. His most recent essays have appeared in Incarnations, with Janieta Eyre, Couch House Press (2017), and Synchrony and Diachrony, with Robert Polidori, Steidl and the J.P. Getty Museum (2018).