Art Nest: Public Art at TOAF
Home for Public Art Installations
Art Nest is TOAF’s annual public art incubator, providing access to artists who are at the early stage of taking their studio practice to public space. Art Nest offers a space for artists to experiment and push the boundaries of their practice, guided by established and emerging curators. The program equips artists with experience, training, and exposure to build confidence for future public art commission and opportunities.
Since 2022, Art Nest has annually collaborated with artists, supporting them in bringing their artistic vision to life. An extension of TOAF’s mandate, Art Nest provides the tools for artists to launch a successful career in public art.
TOAF Brings Public Art to the Public
Through Art Nest, TOAF provides an exciting opportunity for the public to engage with contemporary art outside the commercial setting, fostering an atmosphere that encourages exploration, interaction, and appreciation. We invite everyone to immerse themselves in the creativity and challenges of contemporary art.
Art Nest 2025
Curatorial Statement from Myta Sayo
I’m thrilled to be curating this year’s Art Nest exhibition, which brings large-scale and thought-provoking installations to the public. Art Nest offers a rare opportunity: a space where emerging curators and artists engage directly with public art. These works aren’t made for quiet contemplation in white cubes – they’re placed into the bustle and noise of urban life. That shift changes the stakes. It asks artists to think not only about form and concept, but about visibility, execution, accessibility, and risk.
This year’s artists were selected for the ambition of their practices and the clarity of their proposals. Each one pushes material limits while opening up space for dialogue. As their artworks take shape, I’m excited to share a few thoughts on the nature of their work.
Sharl G. Smith is building a freestanding sculpture from oversized stainless steel beads and aircraft cable. She and her team undertake the arduous task of weaving under tension, creating a structural tapestry that feels both solid and ephemeral. Drawing on physical forces, she composes a visual language that reminds us how our world is built – one knot, one strain at a time.
Tracey-Mae Chambers will create a large-scale woven yarn installation that spans across two trees in the Art Nest square. Her red yarn works speak to belonging, identity, and decolonization. They offer a “soft” intervention in an urban setting, inviting viewers to step in, pause, and reflect.
Svava Juliusson’s practice begins with the ordinary: rope, cable ties, and for Art Nest, plant pots – everyday objects drawn from her immediate environment. Her process is one of attaching one thing to another until a familiar shape emerges, a method that collides with ideas of landscape and domestic space. Her gestures repeat, iterate, and insist – not toward uniformity, but toward a quiet transformation, revealing how the monumental might arise from the most familiar things.
Smith, Chambers, and Juliusson alike reframe weaving as a site of strength and transformation. They ask us to reconsider what kinds of work we value – and the kinds of bodies we imagine performing it.
Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster explore the politics of play. For Art Nest, they will rearrange off-the-shelf ping pong tables into a deliberate traffic jam – tables without nets, with no clear sides or direction. The expected flow of the game breaks down; there’s no obvious way to win, and that uncertainty is part of the invitation. The work encourages improvisation and insists on collaboration. Strangers are drawn into a new site of play, where rules are broken and active participation becomes the means through which the game (and art) is continually reinvented.
Jes Young turns to pigeons. They’re creating a porcelain flock in lifelike poses – eating, resting, preening. For Young, pigeons are a metaphor for resilience. Like artists, they persist, even when pushed out or dismissed. Their work is dedicated to those who’ve been “shooed” from spaces and honors those who adapt, endure, and stay.
Young, and Jamrozik and Kempster offer playful interventions that interrupt the seriousness we’re conditioned to bring to art. Their works invite us to play, linger, and look again.
This is my first time working on a curatorial project of this scale, and I’m deeply grateful for the support of Technical Director Calder Ross, the guidance of Mentor Rui Pimenta, and the leadership of Executive & Creative Director anahita azrahimi.
Right now, these works exist as sketches, models, and conversations. The artists are creating them as you read this, and soon, they’ll take shape. I look forward to watching these works emerge, and to sharing more with you as they do.
—Myta Sayo, Art Nest 2025
Curator
Myta Sayo,
Independent Curator
Myta Sayo is an art dealer with extensive experience placing works with collectors across North America, Europe, and Asia. As studio manager at Kal Mansur Studio, she has overseen the production of large-scale works for global corporate and hospitality clients. She founded and ran reference: contemporary (2015-2021), an online gallery that exhibited at major New York and Miami fairs, and later operated Myta Sayo Gallery in Toronto’s Dundas West (2021-2024), showcasing mid-career and emerging artists. Her gallery continues to participate in Art Toronto and the Affordable Art Fair New York. Through her advisory, Myta Sayo Research Projects (MSRP), she bridges contemporary art with research-driven practice, collaborating with consultants, architects, and designers to place works, secure commissions, and curate exhibitions. Outside of her professional work, she is an amateur CNC machinist and a keen novice golfer.
Artists
Tracey-Mae Chambers,
Artist
Tracey-Mae grew up as a stranger to her own story; adopted and re-named, grafted into a new family tree.
As an adopted person the discovery in adulthood of her Métis heritage was a revelation that set
her on a path of discovery. Her developing story is as an indigenous heritage woman and her
quest for harmony with the natural world. She is a proud citizen of the Métis Nation of Ontario.
Since July 2021 Tracey-Mae has created over 150 fibre art installations at residential school historical sites, museums, art galleries and other public spaces.
The goal of this project #hopeandhealingcanada is to bridge the gap between settlers and First Nations, Métis, and Inuit people by creating art that is approachable and non-confrontational and starting a conversation about decolonization and reconciliation.
Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster,
Artists
Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster create spaces and objects that interrupt everyday situations in critically engaging and playful ways. They operate at a variety of scales, from temporary installations to permanent public artworks. Their practice focuses on ‘social infrastructures’ which seek to build community by fostering playful interactions in physical space and alternative methods of documentation as forms of historic preservation. Their work is in the collections of the Buffalo AKG Art Museum (Albright-Knox) and the Center for Exploratory and Perceptual Arts (CEPA Gallery). They have exhibited internationally, including solo shows at Vtape in Toronto, the Weissenhofwerkstatt in Stuttgart and Gallery Kolektiv 318 in Marseille.
Svava Thordis Juliusson,
Artist
Svava Thordis Juliusson is a visual artist born in Siglufjörður, Iceland in 1966, and is currently based in Haldimand County, Ontario. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts at NSCAD University in 1997. Juliusson completed her MFA in studio at York University in 2007.
Juliusson has exhibited her work widely and participated in residencies in Canada and abroad. Her work can be found in the collections of The Art Gallery of Hamilton, Hamilton ON; McMaster Museum of Art, Hamilton ON; Akureyri Art Museum, Iceland; Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery, Halifax NS; the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, as well as, in several private collections.
Sharl Smith,
Artist
Sharl G. Smith is a Jamaican-born Canadian sculptor based in Kitchener/Waterloo. She earned her Bachelor of Architecture in 2003 and spent over a decade working as a designer and architectural professional in the United States. Smith moved to Canada in 2015 and became the sole proprietor of Sun Drops Studio the following year. Smith’s artistic journey combines her architectural background with large-scale public art. Her work resonates deeply with themes of connectivity, community and feminist care-based value systems.
Jes Young,
Artist
Jes is a non-binary educator and sculpture artist based in Toronto, Canada. Their practice investigates alternative uses of space after experiencing housing insecurity through creating ceramic multiples inspired by urban infestations. Young received their MFA, BFA, and BEd from York University. They were a guest artist at York University and exhibited in Toronto at Nuit Blanche (2022), The Artist Project Toronto (2023 & 2025), The Clay and Glass Gallery (2025) and The Gladstone House(2023). They have exhibited internationally at PADA Residency in Barreiro, Portugal (2023), and Gracía in Antigua, Guatemala (2023).
Collaborators
Rui Pimenta,
Independent Curator, Art Nest Advisor
Rui Pimenta practiced as a visual artist from 2000-2014, exhibiting his work extensively in Canada and internationally. Since then his creative focus has shifted towards programming and curatoriation. In 2009 he founded Art Spin, an arts organization now entering its 13th year of presenting site-specific, multidisciplinary programming in unique/alternative spaces and best known for its bicycle art tours. He was the Co-Director for Median Contemporary (2008-10) and has curated projects for the Toronto Artists Project, the Toronto Outdoor Exhibition, Eastern Front Gallery and the Government of Portugal. He has served on various arts council juries, was a member of the City of Toronto’s Public Art Strategy Advisory Committee and currently sits on The Bentway Advisory Committee. His curatorial aspirations are largely motivated by the enthusiastic pursuit of creating engaging and accessible ways to present art in public space.
His curatorial aspirations are largely motivated by the enthusiastic pursuit of creating engaging and accessible ways to present art in public space.
Calder Ross,
Art Nest Technical Director
With 15 years of experience in the execution and production of events and art exhibitions, Calder has found a niche as an expert at executing polished final products based on ambitious artistic visions.
Calder has worked as head stage manager and production designer for Fashion Art Toronto for 12 years. He works with 50 designers and performers a season, weaving their individual visions into a cohesive show.
Calder has designed stages and lighting plots for many events in Toronto. Most notably—Promise Indoor Events/Cherry Beach Sundays (since 2018), Fashion Art Toronto (Since 2012), DOCD (Summer 2023), and Summer Camp (2022). He is excited to bring his production expertise to TOAF, Canada’s largest and longest-running annual contemporary art fair.
Art Nest 2024
Curatorial Statement from Rafi Ghanaghounian
I have the honour of being the Art Nest Curator for 2024 and the great pleasure to select and work with the five incredible artists that are participating this year. These artists were selected for their keen observations as artists living, working and socialising in the city.
Navigating through concrete metal towers blanketed in glass, swerving around orange cones under the blue sky, we attempt to communicate and interact with each other through visual stimulation. These five culturally diverse artists’ works will bring to attention the challenges and rewards of living in such a cosmopolitan city through thought provoking sculptures and performances.
Safoura Zahedi’s spiritual geometric sculptures in smooth metal surfaces capture our movements in a blink. The furniture sculptures built with advertisement boards by Stephanie Avery bring the issue of over development through her unique humour. Martin Reis fills in the cracks. And I don’t mean structurally. Reis heals us with his wit. Whether he’s using Lego blocks or refereeing a congested intersection, Reis heals all wounds. Chris Harms exposes the ongoing relationship we have with a growing city. Using large stones with shovel handles embedded in them, Harms invites us to experience the physical act of building. Sculptor Javid Jah provides us with a spiritual vessel that will bring us together. As complicated and stressful our lives may be, Jah reminds us of the importance of our connection with each other.
Collectively the works will bring us together physically, mentally and spiritually.
—Rafi Ghanaghounian, Art Nest Curator 2024
Rafi Ghanaghounian,
Independent Curator
Rafi Ghanaghounian has been a staple in the Toronto visual arts and design community as an artist, independent curator and consultant for the last twenty years. He has exhibited and organized exhibitions and events that have represented national and international artists, many of whom have moved on to become representatives in international exhibitions and fairs through respected galleries and museums.
Chris Harms, Artist
Exceeding Expectations, 2024, Stone, wood and metal.
Chris Harms is a self taught, multi-media artist, based in Toronto. Creating sculpture and installations since 2015, Harms constantly strives to imbue wonder, humour and curiosity throughout his artistic practice.
His work has gone to collectors in Canada and the U.S. and he was awarded first place in the 2020 Overzealous Fine Art Exhibition.
Stephanie Avery, Artist
A Place At The Table, 2024, Salvaged condo advertisements.
Stephanie Avery is a Toronto-based multi-disciplinary artist with a degree in visual art from York University. With an emphasis on interactivity and empowerment, Stephanie’s practice intervenes with familiar spaces, objects and imagery to imbue her subjects with new meanings and narratives. Being especially interested in our collective relationships to the spaces we inhabit, Stephanie explores the world with an equal balance of joy, curiosity and skepticism: a balance she strives to represent in her practice.
Javid Jah, Artist
Talisman, 2024, Aluminum and steel base.
Javid Jah is an artist and architect exploring the sacred dimension of geometry. Operating as a design-build studio with maker Alex Akbari, he designs temporary and permanent sculptures that marry traditional knowledge with contemporary approaches to fabrication. Their public art practice is interested in making permanent, large-scale experiences that express a sense of Unity and infinity simultaneously. The principle of the practice is intersectionality – finding a balance between light and form that speaks to the correspondence between human and cosmos.
Martin Reis, Artist
Le Petit Bureau de Poste, 2024, Mixed media—wood, paint, paper, ink, fabric and plastics.
Born in Kassel (Germany), Martin Helmut Reis is a multimedia artist with a focus on performance art, public interventions and photography. His works have been featured on the BBC, CBC, CTV News, Global News, Toronto Life, West End Phoenix and during Nuit Blanche. He currently performs and exhibits at the Lyceum Gallery and in streets of Toronto.
Current projects include Tour Lego, Avery Goodcall: Crosswalk Referee and Martin de la Rue, the French Postman.
Safoura Zahedi, Artist
Journey Through Geometry, 2024, Mirrored steel and 3D-printed PETG.
Safoura Zahedi, born in Japan and raised in Iran and Canada, is an artist, architect, educator, and geometry expert currently residing and working in Toronto. She brings a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary approach to the study of geometry, exploring its potential as a spiritual design tool to craft spaces and artworks that foster curiosity, meditation, and connection.
Advisor
Rui Pimenta
Rui Pimenta practiced as a visual artist from 2000-2014, exhibiting his work extensively in Canada and internationally. Since then his creative focus has shifted towards programming and curation.
In 2009 he founded Art Spin, an arts organization now in its 15th year of presenting site-specific, multidisciplinary programming in unique/alternative spaces and best known for its bicycle art tours. He was the Co-Director for Median Contemporary (2008-10) and has curated projects for the Toronto Artists Project, the Toronto Outdoor Exhibition, Eastern Front Gallery and the Government of Portugal. He has served on various arts council juries, was a member of the City of Toronto’s Public Art Strategy Advisory Committee and The Bentway Advisory Committee.
His curatorial aspirations are largely motivated by the enthusiastic pursuit of creating engaging and accessible ways to present art in public space.
Art Nest 2023
2023 Art Nest featured commissioned artwork by five artists responding to the structure, architecture and meaning of Nathan Phillips Square.
Curated by Fatma Hendawy Yehia
Participating artists: Kristi Chen, Michelle Cieloszczyk, Rana Nazzal Hamadeh, Studio Rat, Stephanie Singh
From the Curator
Toronto holds inextricable layers of cultural diversity that make up the unique narratives and histories, including those of several marginalized and precarious communities. Public spaces in Toronto tend to reflect the city’s temporality, particularly as the pace of development has intensified over the past years. As a result of this dynamic, artists are often occupied with finding ways to activate and revitalize public spaces.
This year, Art Nest focuses on these narratives of precarity and diversity and how they overlap in Toronto. The artists in this exhibition share their personal and collective histories and use sustainable materials to immerse and engage us within this particular public space. They create an opportunity to contemplate Toronto as a place where differences are celebrated as a concept, while not yet fully activated and experienced within the public realm.
– Fatma Hendawy Yehia
2023 Artists
Kristi Chen
Jasmine Scented Garden, 2023, jasmine scented incense sticks, douglas fir plywood, baltic birch plywood and greenhouse, 73″ W x 99″ L x 82″ H.
Kristi Chen is a multidisciplinary artist utilising sculpture and installation to explore the nature of identity, diaspora and the recultivation of lost familial archives. A recent graduate from OCAD University with a bachelor of Fine Arts in Sculpture/Installation, she has showcased across Toronto and Ontario in various sites from a farm to a greenhouse. She has shown at the Downtown Haliburton Sculpture Exhibition, ON (2023), Between Pheasants Contemporary, ON (2023), Art Gallery Mississauga ON (2022), Artscape Gibraltar Point ON (2022), Elora Sculpture Project, ON (2022), Xpace Cultural Centre ON (2021), Good Family Farms, ON (2021), Abbozzo Gallery, ON (2021) and the J-spot x the plumb (2021). In July 2023, this will be Kristi’s first exhibit in the Toronto Outdoor Art Fair with Art Nest.
Michelle Cieloszczyk
Carapace, 2023, silicone and steel, 17.5″ W x 17.5″ L x 72.75″ H.
Michelle Cieloszczyk is a Toronto-based visual artist. She graduated with a BFA in Sculpture/Installation from OCAD University in 2019. She has been awarded the Haydn Davies Memorial Award, Best of 3D Works Award and the Most Innovative Use of Material Award at TOAF. She won the 2017 First Capital Realty Sculpture Competition; her public sculpture, CAN, was commissioned for 85 Hanna Avenue in Toronto. Michelle received grants from TAC, OAC, and CCA in 2021. Michelle has exhibited at Myta Sayo Gallery, Xpace Cultural Centre, the plumb, Propeller Gallery, Downtown Haliburton Sculpture Exhibition, Elora Sculpture Project, Nuit Blanche TO, London Culture Days, Good Sport Gallery, Long Winter, Yorkville Village Arts Festival, Red Head Gallery, and Main Street Gallery.
Rana Nazzal Hamadeh
105 Threads, 2023, textile on concrete.
Rana Nazzal Hamadeh is a Palestinian artist and organizer living between Ramallah and Ottawa on unceded Anishinaabe territory. Her photography, film, and installation works look at issues related to time, space, land, and movement, offering interventions rooted in a decolonial framework. Rana’s practice is informed by the knowledge emerging from grassroots movements for justice, both in Palestine and across Turtle Island, using memory and story to engage intimately with broad concepts Rana received her Master of Fine Arts in Documentary Media from Toronto Metropolitan University and is currently conducting research on Palestinian food practices during the Intifadas.
Studio Rat
Soft Monument, 2023, reclaimed L.D.P.E plastic sheeting, wood, air, axial fan, misc., hardware, 2′ W x 13′ L x 10′ H.
Studio Rat is an emerging creative practice pursuing research and experimental design work between the cities of Toronto and Montréal. Studio Rat was founded in 2018 as a site for investigations on plastics, inflatables, and community building between work-partners Dominique Di Libero (b. Montréal, 1997) and Emily Allan (b. Toronto, 1997). The duo’s educational backgrounds in interior design provide an understanding of the aesthetic & technical language of interiors which they reflect in their installation work with Studio Rat through a practice that is committed to DIY fabrication techniques & resource-sharing rooted in circular design principles. Presently, Studio Rat is interested in exploring what new relations can emerge between plastic, craft and art and is focusing their research around experimental models of creative reuse.
Stephanie Singh
a seat at my table, 2023, Table base: ash wood, India ink stain, OSMO black oil, OSMO polyx matte oil, Top Slab: resin slab immersed with Organics from Jamaica: botanicals, plants and spices, 72”L x 34”W x 29”H.
Stephanie Singh is a Toronto-based interdisciplinary textile designer. Currently in her final year of graduate studies at OCAD University in the Master’s of Interdisciplinary Arts, Media, and Design, her work focuses on sustainable one-use plant materials and transforming them into timeless forms.
Drawing inspiration from the beauty and diversity of Caribbean culture and the natural world, her current work pays homage to Jamaican culture and material experience through her childhood, reminding her of the place she calls home. The connections with preserved botanicals, spices, and fruit connect to her relationship with the natural world, exploring memory, love, care, healing and plant consciousness. Through her intricate and visually striking pieces, Stephanie invites viewers on a journey of discovery and delight, where storytelling experiences are captured. Singh’s works have been exhibited at the Royal Ontario Museum in the “Canada Modern Exhibit” and received admiration from art enthusiasts and collectors worldwide.
Curator
Fatma Hendawy Yehia
Fatma Hendawy Yehia is an Egyptian-Canadian curator, based in Toronto since 2017.
Yehia graduated in 2020 from the Master of Visual Studies Curatorial program at University of Toronto. Since 2008, Yehia held different positions at the New Library of Alexandria, including Head of Permanent Exhibitions (2010-12). She was the Assistant curator at the AGYU, Toronto (2021-22). She was Guest Curator at Images Festival 2022; currently, she works as Assistant Archivist at the Art Museum, University of Toronto. Yehia participated in curatorial workshops (including Tate Intensive 2017), residencies (ProHelvetia and ZKU/Berlin) and curated several projects in Egypt, UK, Switzerland, France, Germany, and Canada. Her curatorial practice focuses on investigating censored archives, questioning inaccessible histories, and navigating militarised spaces. Yehia is winner of the Apexart international open call 2023-24.
Advisor
Rui Pimenta
Rui Pimenta practiced as a visual artist from 2000 – 2014, exhibiting his work extensively in Canada and internationally. Since then his creative focus has shifted towards programming and curation. In 2009, he founded Art Spin, an arts organization now entering its 13th year of presenting site-specific, multidisciplinary programming in unique/alternative spaces and best known for its bicycle art tours. He was the Co-Director for Median Contemporary (2008-10) and has curated projects for the Toronto Artists Project, the Toronto Outdoor Exhibition, Eastern Front Gallery and the Government of Portugal. He has served on various arts council juries, was a member of the City of Toronto’s Public Art Strategy Advisory Committee and currently sits on The Bentway Advisory Committee. His curatorial aspirations are largely motivated by the enthusiastic pursuit of creating engaging and accessible ways to present art in public space.
Technical Director
Calder Ross
Calder Ross is a Stage Manager and Designer with over 10 years of experience executing events and arts exhibitions. With a background in building and construction, Calder has developed an ability to see the project vision and work collaboratively to deliver a polished and well constructed final product. For Art Nest, Calder evaluated and analyzed the technical requirements, safety, and liability requirements of each work, and liaised with the building permit engineer and artists to ensure the artists’ ideas were attainable.
Thank You
Art Nest 2022
Art Nest was a new TOAF programming initiative that provides six artists – having either current or past experience participating in TOAF – with an opportunity to push the boundaries of their individual art practices beyond the physical and conceptual limits of the fair’s iconic 10 x 10 square foot tent.
Curated by Rui Pimenta
Participating artists: Julia Campisi, Sofia Escobar, Kal Mansur, Rod Mireau, Aline Setton, Erin Vincent.
Photography by Shane Fester.
From the Curator
We find ourselves in a time when so many ideas around monumentality and permanence in public art are being questioned and dismantled. Equally important is the question of who the intended and excluded audiences are, not to mention the obstacles so many artists face when it comes to gaining access to opportunities for creating art for the public realm. Art Nest looks to contribute to these conversations through this diverse collection of newly commissioned artworks that explore the meaning and future possibilities of public art, as well as the general public’s role in that relationship.
2022 Artists
Julia Campisi
Building futures & other things, 2022, Hand-dyed acrylic, epoxy and resin.
“Art Nest allowed me to create my largest sculpture to date with funding and grants from the Toronto Arts Council & Ontario Arts Council (exhibition assistance). I have been focusing on creating more work that responds to the scaffolding and how our bodies move around temporary structures in urban spaces.”
Julia Campisi is a visual artist based in Toronto who re-makes overlooked items from our industrialized world. She uses the term ‘cultural debris’ to describe the mundane objects, which she makes in prefabricated acrylics and liquid plastics. Her use of material and subject matter speak to ideas surrounding consumption and development, finding metaphor for human existence in the utilities that mediates it. Her re-makings are not merely an act of reproduction but a subversive gesture that is meant to disrupt the complex archaeology and relationship we have with objects, material and ultimately ourselves. Julia Campisi has exhibited works in Toronto and abroad, including New York, Paris, Amsterdam and Ottawa, amongst others. Her artwork has been published by New York Magazine, Junior High Magazine in Los Angeles, and her written articles have been published by CBC Arts, The Artist and Viewer in Toronto. Her work can be found in private and public collections including the Ottawa Art Gallery and Bisha Hotel.
Sofia Escobar
Intervals of thread and the optics of space, 2022, Paracord rope and steel
Macro Weave, 2020, Thread and acrylic.
“I had a very wonderful experience at art nest. As an artist working in Installation, it was really great to be able to express my work on a larger scale, where the confinement of a tent was not a limitation. I was really drawn by the rich history and architecture of Nathan Phillips square, which was the basis of my research. Rui Pimenta, who carefully curated the project, was a great help throughout the process from start to finish. During the duration of the project, we got to share our work with the public and experience being part of a wonderful community of artists that TOAF has forged over the years.”
Sofia Escobar is a Toronto based artist born and raised in Peru and Ecuador. She completed her studies at OCAD University in Toronto in 2014, majoring in Material Art & Design, and specializing in Fibre. Driven by an ongoing interest in material and space, Sofia uses textile construction techniques and processes, to build intricate interwoven thread sculptures that explore themes of architecture and optical illusion. Her recent work explores new ways in which textiles could behave with their surroundings through material language, technology and participatory exchanges with the viewer. By using non-traditional materials and technologies such as acrylic and laser cutting, Sofia harnesses the broad versatility of textiles, and takes the medium beyond the utilitarian perception that is commonly tied to it. By adding projected light to her objects, Sofia further expands these intricate sculptures beyond their physical forms into the non-physical realm of light and shadow. Signaling an extension into the realm of abstraction, these sculptures become dynamic entities, opening a liminal space for the viewer to explore the works, but also themselves.
Kal Mansur
Admiral Ackbar, 2022, Mixed media sculpture.
Land Escapes, 2022, Acrylic and resin on panel.
“It was productive to be part of a curated exhibition of outdoor artworks. Art Nest pushed my boundaries as an artist, as I had to create robust large-scale outdoor public artwork.”
Kal Mansur is best known for his luminous wall works that combine painting and sculpture. Materials such as acrylic, cast acrylic, and epoxy resin are combined to create cohesive, elemental pieces of art. He uses transparency like a brushstroke, varying its application to refract available light. Mansur completed his BFA from the University of Texas at Austin in 1990. His work has been commissioned by Tiffany & Co., Bonjour Capital, George Brown College, Related Companies, among others. His work is in the permanent collection of Global Affairs Canada and was part of the Canada Pavilion at Expo 2020. He lives and works in Toronto.
Rod Mireau
Dig, 2022, Aluminium and ash wood.
“It was interesting to take part in the artist talk on the final day. I enjoyed hearing about the process and the project development from the other artists.”
Constructed of wood and metal, Mireau’s sculptures form a balance between the organic and the geometric while playing with gravity and scale. Mireau was born in Saskatchewan and is currently based in Peterborough, Ontario. His work is held in collections across Canada and the USA, Germany, and United Arab Emirates. He also creates commissioned work for public and commercial spaces.
Aline Setton
Plan View: a look into the eye of a building, 2022, Wood and concrete.
“Art Nest at TOAF61 gave me the opportunity to expand my creative practice and merge many fields of interest into one work. The sculpture created for the show is in direct dialogue with architecture, urban infrastructure and everyday objects.
Following Art Nest, I was invited to exhibit the work at other events, such as the Geary Art Crawl, where I was able to experiment with different configurations of the original sculpture to allow for public interaction. It has been a great experience to test the possibilities of this project.”
Aline Setton is a Brazilian artist who lives in Toronto. Her studies in architecture appear as a base that ends up unfolding in her works. In her paintings, collages and sculptures, she deconstructs and rearranges elements of the landscape with an emphasis on the connections established between overlapping layers. Most recent works explore dialogues between the body, architecture and objects, investigating how spaces inform body movements and vice versa. Her work has been exhibited in Brazil, Canada, Portugal, USA, and she has received the “Best of Painting Award” at the 58th Toronto Outdoor Art Fair.
Erin Vincent
BRISTlL FORM no.1, 2022, Natural fibre, dye, foam, acrylic on board.
Protect The Strong: 2, 2022, Bronze, fibreglass, acrylic, faux rocks.
Rubber Form, 2022, Recycled rubber.
“Participating in the Art Nest was a fantastic experience and opportunity. I had been wanting to shift my practice by incorporating more public art projects and this was the perfect platform. By bringing art to the public in a non-traditional setting it allowed me to witness a more diverse audience interacting with my piece.”
Erin Vincent (b. 1977, Canada) is a Toronto-based artist whose work draws on a variety of repetitive and labour intensive processes and materials. Things have always fascinated Vincent; attracted to the abject and discarded she de-categorizes them and removes established hierarchies. The sculptures she makes possess their own liveliness through heightened tactile qualities. Erin completed her MFA at York University, focusing on sculpture and installation. Vincent has exhibited her work in Canada, the United States and England, with representation by Christie Contemporary (Toronto ON), Muriel Gupien Gallery (NYC) and Karen Imperial Gallery (San Fransisco). Her work is held in Canadian and International collections and she is the recipient of the following grants – 2021 Canadian Council – Research and Creation, 2019 Visual Arts Mid Career – Toronto Arts Council, 2019 Visual Arts – Ontario Arts Council and a 2016 SSHRC.
Curator
Rui Pimenta
Rui Pimenta practiced as a visual artist from 2000 – 2014, exhibiting his work extensively in Canada and internationally. Since then his creative focus has shifted towards programming and curation. In 2009 he founded Art Spin, an arts organization now entering its 13th year of presenting site-specific, multidisciplinary programming in unique/alternative spaces and best known for its bicycle art tours. He was the Co-Director for Median Contemporary (2008-10) and has curated projects for the Toronto Artists Project, the Toronto Outdoor Exhibition, Eastern Front Gallery and the Government of Portugal. He has served on various arts council juries, was a member of the City of Toronto’s Public Art Strategy Advisory Committee and currently sits on The Bentway Advisory Committee. His curatorial aspirations are largely motivated by the enthusiastic pursuit of creating engaging and accessible ways to present art in public space.
Thank You
