Tongue and Groove Collective
May 9- June 12, 2012
Opening (bring some stuff): Friday, May 13th, 6-9pmClosing Reception (take some stuff): Sunday June 12th, 12-3pmMarket hours: Wednesday-Sunday, 1-7pm
It’s broken, we’ll fix it. If it’s not broken, we still might fix it. If it’s unclaimed, you can take it. No money will be accepted.
Artist collective Tongue and Groove call on the irony of a free market by creating a literal space for the sharing of objects and skills at no cost to the audience. Anchored in Whippersnapper gallery, the Fix-em Up Free Market spills out onto the sidewalk of Dundas St West on the physical boundary lines of three downtown Toronto neighborhoods (Kensington Market, Chinatown and Alexandria Park). There is nothing for sale at this market. Instead it is an active workshop where new lives can be given to discarded materials. Community members and passers-by are invited to participate. Each person may find his or her own way of interacting with the market. Some will bring by broken treasures to revive, others will take items offered up for the taking; some may become actively involved in the fixing process, while others may simply inquire or observe. While people may walk away with a new skill or a new lamp, the main offering at the Fix-em-up Free Market is the opportunity to re-imagine how we relate to the objects in our lives.
Tongue and Groove is an eight-person Toronto-based artist collective that creates participatory installation works utilizing mostly recycled materials. A further commitment to social engagement plugs T&G into a rich lineage of artist collectives whose work resonates outside the confines of closed off gallery spaces. In the early 80s, socially interested art collectives such as Group Material and Colab staged exhibitions in commercial storefronts that facilitated new forms of participation from audiences. They critiqued consumer society and proposed alternative methods of art production and distribution. More recently, collectives such as Border Arts Workshop and Toronto’s Mammalian Diving Reflex push the limits of participation and renegotiate the margins between artists and “non-artists” outside an isolated studio or “white cube” space.
This market operates outside any economic framework, perched above the prevailing system of production and consumption, challenging planned and perceived obsolescence. While conventional repairs will be an option, the market is moderated by artists who approach repair as the reinvention of an object’s value.
The audience’s capacity to create and share comes to the forefront, becoming the turning gear of the project as each member of the collective creates opportunities for the objects to take on a new life; a second chance. The cemetery of disposal is scrapped, and the audience alongside the shared reclaimed object, gains power. In Fix-em-up Free Market, the value of objects is not fixed or based on matter, but relative to meaning. Meaning will be added or subtracted from stuff; a clock may become a hat, a hat may become a belt.
Functionality will be only an option as each artist shares their set of skills and tools with the audience, sparking dialogue between passers-by and attendees.
People who want their stuff “fixed”, want to engage in trading, delivering or drop-off of objects will have the chance to reinvent or renovate the meaning of materials.
