Name/Title
Microbes Swabbed from a Pallet Used by Tom ThomsonEntry/Object ID
2013.01.01Description
Jon Sasaki (b. 1973) is a Toronto-based multidisciplinary artist whose artistic practice is concerned with generating creative and convoluted approaches to art that provoke question and inquiry. Sasaki began his artistic career as a landscape painter and now works primarily in photography, performance, and installation art. His subject matter and interests are diverse. However, Sasaki frequently uses his artworks to question the notion of being an artist.
In his series Microbe Swabs (2013-), Sasaki worked with the McMichael Art Gallery in Vaughn, Ontario to grow bacterial cultures swabbed from the paint pallets and tools of artists from the Group of Seven and Tom Thomson. The resultant Petri dishes appear like colourful, abstract landscapes that recall the original paintings of these landscape artists. Sasaki aims to give playful homage to these prolific Canadian artists using the growth of bacteria as a metaphor for their creative legacies, which continue to live and grow in unexpected ways. Using their tools as the source of his work, Sasaki, originally a landscape painter, connects himself as part of a new generation of artists that are inspired by, and cultivate from, the creative practices of historic artists.
Sasaki received his BFA from Mount Allison University. His work has been exhibited internationally in solo exhibitions at The Esker Foundation, (Calgary, AB); The Richmond Art Gallery; The Rooms (St. John’s Nfld); and the Art Gallery of Ontario. Sasaki has participated in recent group exhibitions at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, (Seoul, South Korea); The Bentway, (Toronto); The Canadian Embassy in Japan (Tokyo); The Nihonbashi Institute of Contemporary Arts, (Tokyo) and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art (Toronto, ON).
https://www.jonsasaki.com/Made/Created
Date made
2013Edition
ed. 2/3 + 1 artist proof