Through sustained watching and writing, this research residency at Vtape will explore ways of engaging with performance for the camera within the specific context of a video archive. Across her time at Vtape, Sanader will develop practices of descriptive, associative, and speculative note-taking for watching artists’ bodies in motion on video. While her approach is intentionally unstructured and ambulatory, she is guided by the following questions: what kind of movement—or stillness—exists within an archive of video? What can be learned or felt by watching gestures by artists in this context? Does watching performance for the camera within a video archive constitute a duet between artist and researcher? What are the potentials—and failures—of writing as a mode of documenting these relationships

Daniella Sanader is a writer and reader living in Toronto. She has written reviews, essays, and experimental texts for a variety of publications, galleries, and artist-run spaces across Canada. She has curated projects for Vtape and Oakville Galleries, and her upcoming exhibition The Shape of the Middle at Open Studio is listed as a Featured Exhibition for the 2018 Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival. Daniella was recently awarded the 2018 Emerging Cultural Leader Award from the Artist-Run Centres and Collectives of Ontario (ARCCO). She works as the Installation and Communications Coordinator at Gallery TPW. desanader.com

Image credit: Martha Wilson, “Psychology of Camera Presence,” 1974, 08:50, B&W, English.