Whose Life Are We Talking About Anyway?: Michael Fernandes' One potato, two potato...it's your life...
Fuse, Jan. Winter 2008, v. 31, no. 1, pp. 44-46
Michael Fernandes is a Halifax-based artist, born in Trinidad in 1944. One potato, two potato...it's your life... is an exhibition resulting from a residency at the Montreal Arts Interculturel, where Fernandes was reacting to conversations he had with individuals in the Montreal communities. Fernandes' interactions culminated with a text-based installation on the street Jeanne-Mance, facing the MAI, which continued toward Hotel-Dieu, as well as blank video projections accompanied by soundtracks in the MAI gallery. These soundtracks, which are recordings from Fernandes' collaborators, pertain to four different types of conversations: talking on cell phones, to their dogs, giving directions and telling stories. The exhibition is concerned with ideas of how chance encounters, within a seemingly isolated and chaotic city, function in bringing singularities together and create a community.
ITEM 2008.002 – available for viewing in the Research Centre
Videos, Artworks and Artists Cited
One potato, two potato... it's your life... – Michael Fernandes
Cellphone – Michael Fernandes
Dogs – Michael Fernandes
Maps – Michael Fernandes
Story – Michael Fernandes