PLACEBO

Present - July 16, 2004
ARTSPEAK (an artist-run centre)
233 Carrall Street, Vancouver

Placebo features two artists, Helen Cho and Colleen Wolstenholme, who
use everyday objects and substances to investigate consumption and
states of embodiment.

Colleen Wolstenholme's work uses images of pills and corporate logos
found on the internet as sources for projects in sculpture,
photography, painting and embroidery. Psychotropic and analgesic
medications are charged with a range of social, sexual and cultural
content, and Wolstenholme has wed these associations to a range of
cultural practices. The history of handicraft informs her labour-
intensive petit point reproductions of pharmaceutical logos.

Helen Cho uses the sensual presence of soap and sugar in
installations that reflect the permeable and transitional nature of
these substances. Luxurious and exuding an overbearing scent, these
concentrated and heavily processed materials are manipulated and
placed in ephemeral arrangements in relation to the architecture of
the gallery. The usual intimacy between soap and body is undercut
through paring and grating, and through embedding remnants of
everyday life, such as beads and pins. These fossils, when placed in
piles of glittering refined sugar, become part of an idealized
landscape.

Telephone: (604) 688-0051
Fax: (604) 685-1912
E-mail: artspeak@artspeak.ca
Web site: http://www.artspeak.ca
Gallery hours: Tuesday to Saturday, 12 - 5 pm