NEW CIRCADIA: AN EXHIBITION FOR A CITY THAT DOESN'T SLEEP

Beyond Tradition | Erika Serodio

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The first time I went to New Circadia (Adventures in Mental Spelunking), it was a Tuesday. A friend and I fit our visit into a pocket of time during a busy week. I took advantage of being with someone who wasn’t studying museums like myself, and I suggested we bypass the exhibition text on the main floor and head straight to the installation downstairs. A few weeks later, I nervously asked one of the curators, Professor Richard Sommer, about the ideas and intentions behind the text that I had not taken the time to read. To my relief, Sommer explained that they did not want this exhibition to be pedagogical. The didactic part of the show was designed by the team of curators which included Richard Sommer, Natalie Fizer and Emily Stevenson of Pillow Culture, and Laura Miller. A recent Daniels graduate, Zainab Al-Rawi, helped with the research. According to Sommer, the text was intentionally separate from the installation because they didn’t want people to have to work for the experience.

How do you organize your time? Photo courtesy of Erika Serodio

New Circadia taps into our current cultural moment by cross-examining our never-ending push for productivity. The curatorial team set out to design a space for idling and mental decompression. Sleeping in the space, says Sommer, was not outside of the goal. “We’ve had faculty fall asleep in there.” But Sommer adds that there was a broader sense of ambitions. The space was designed for anyone to fall into a state of semi-unconscious, to be lulled into a dream state. However, the positive reaction from students who are using the space to rest on campus has not gone unnoticed. The team at Daniels made the choice to extend their hours during the most intense time of the year for students; they stayed open all night at the end of last semester.

One of the puzzles in designing a space for people to disconnect is addressing the inconspicuous and insidious ways in which our cell phones are tied to our waking life. The curatorial team carefully considered how to make this space tech-free without being draconian about it; they did not want to make a no-phone rule. They chose instead to take a laissez-faire approach, hoping that the space itself would inspire phone-free behaviour. In my experience this has worked quite well.

Dream Parliament. Photo courtesy of Erika Serodio

A wide range of events are set to compliment the space in the coming months. Last Thursday, Matthew Spellberg and David Leo Rice led a comfortably horizontal audience through An Exercise in the Democracy of Sleep. Through his talk about the history of sharing dreams and the benefits of dissecting this common experience, Spellberg made a case for reclaiming sleep in a society that tends to devalue it. Recorded dreams had been printed in large fonts and affixed to the walls of the cave-like installation. Some of those dreams were collected through Oneiroi, a dream-sharing project that operates in tandem with New Circadia. An audience member asked Spellberg what we know about controlling our dreams. His response was that we do not, conclusively, know very much, but we do know that talking about our dreams will make it more likely that we remember them. Spellberg told us that after tonight’s talk it was very likely that we would all remember our dreams tomorrow morning. Sure enough, for the first time in what felt like weeks, I woke the next morning from a vivid dream to the sound of my landlady roaring the snow blower outside my window.

New Circadia (Adventures in Mental Spelunking) runs from November 7, 2019 to April 30, 2020, and is free to attend.

The upcoming programming associated with New Circadia is not to be missed:

February 13, 2020 – Performance: Christine Sun Kim
February 25, 2020 – Lecture: Mark Kingwell, “Wish I Were Here: Boredom and the Interface”
March 5, 2020 – Lecture: Franny Nudelman, "Activist Encampments and the Fight for Public Sleep"
March 13, 2020 – Performance: Beau Rhee
April 2, 2020 – Performance: Kay Turner, “Persephone’s Return/Persephone’s Revenge”

A GIFT GUIDE FOR MUSEUM PEOPLE

Beyond Tradition | Erika Serodio

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As our first semester comes to a close, many of the first year Museum Studies students have remarked on the joy of being surrounded by so many like-minded people in our program. There are obvious characteristics that draw people to this field. If you’re reading this blog, you probably have Museum People in your life. And if you need a gift for that special someone, you should keep in mind that we like cultural experiences, we have an affinity for the tactile, and we are drawn to aesthetics. Read on for a few gift ideas for your new (or old) museum friends.

EXPERIENCES

Museum people love to take part in cultural activities. We enjoy watching eclectic films (note the use of the word films, not movies) and we like to do so in old elegant theatres like the newly opened Paradise on Bloor. A gift card for a night out at the theatre would be a real treat this winter. Or better yet – just buy tickets and drag your museum friend to the show you want to see!

Paradise Theatre on Bloor | Source 

An annual pass to a museum like the AGO would be a great gift for the museum people in your life. But the museum people in your life might already have a pass… in which case you should get tickets for one of the many talks and events put on by some of the great institutions in your city. Who wouldn’t want to spend an evening at the ROM learning about The Human History of the Mosquito?

TACTILE

Museum people prefer flipping pages to scrolling. Encourage this tactile habit with a subscription to an arts and culture magazine like Canadian Art or Frieze!

Photograph courtesy of Erika Serodio.

Should we keep our agendas on our phones and laptops like the rest of our technologically advanced society? Maybe. But museum people tend be old school and impractical. We write down our plans on paper. And the crowd favourite in museum studies classrooms seems to be the Moleskine.

After we manually check off every item on this week's to-do list, museum people return to flipping pages for pleasure. An artsy coffee table book would be much appreciated! I recently gifted one from this gift guide in a Museum Studies gift exchange. Each book on this list is recommended by an artist, collector, gallerist, or curator.

ART 

And last, but not least, museum people do not have blank walls. Add to their personal collection with something aesthetically pleasing.

The Champs by Stephanie Cheng | Source 

Stephanie Cheng is a Toronto-based designer with designs that are infused with local landmarks and people. You can buy from her online store or from one of several shops who stock her work.

Mass by Annie Axtell | Source

Annie Axtell is a printmaker and artist who works out of Vancouver. She makes some seriously sublime art. You can buy her prints online or pick up one of her infamous lunar calendars at this shop in Toronto.

One last thing to remember about museum people is that they value the intangible just as much as the tangible. The gift of your time is never wasted on them. You could take your museum people to free events like this gallery party at the Power Plant or go an adventure in mental spelunking at the new Architecture and Design Gallery. Whether you're shopping or not this season, be sure to spend some time with your museum people.