April Hickox
April Hickox is an established Canadian artist, educator, and independent curator. Producing for over 35 years; her practice includes photography, film, video, and installation. Hickox’s work is based in narratives and explores how the passage from one life experience to another encompasses history and memory.
An active community leader, she is the Founding Director of Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography, and a founding member of Tenth Muse Studio and Artscape Toronto. Currently Hickox is an Associate Professor of Photography at OCADU. Most recently her video Observance is currently screening on site at Queen and Bay street till October 3rd. A survey solo exhibition of her photographs, curated by Crystal Mowry, was mounted at Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery. Her art was included in the Art Gallery of Hamilton’s exhibition In Her Own Words curated by Tobi Bruce. Hickox’s work can be found in numerous public and private Canadian Collections.
Observance
This piece developed in response, and in memoriam, to the lives lost during the AIDS epidemic, expanding to consider how to honour people who have left marks on our lives and the fragmentation of memory. Informed by the history of both floral photography and painting, Observance pulls from this genre, moving beyond traditional still life with the interjection of performance and repetition. The simplicity of the frame – a black background with a floral arrangement centred in front of the genderless figure – directs the audience’s gaze to the purposeful movements unfolding. The vases and flowers echo past lives and historical uses, vessels for personal reflection to be layered on with countless possible narratives. The hands move and pause as they modify the arrangement for the best possible vantage, embracing the loss of control while simultaneously exploring aesthetics of composition. The hands creating a language that is an unspoken dance depending on the viewer's life experiences.
Please see Observance a 45 channel video on Site at Queen and Bay till October 3rd. Link to video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIP0yL8v2YU
The work for Rogue Wave on Toronto Island:
Vantage Point - Passing. Reflects my interest in the climate crisis, environmental issues, land stewardship, and our relationship to natural elements. I have lived and worked on the Toronto Islands all my life exploring and documenting this urban park. My work begins to question what is ‘wild’ and how we are re-negotiating our relationship over time with our environment. Vantage Point - Passing is an ongoing body of work of video and still images that have been made for over seventeen years. These images are a record of a groyne that extends into Lake Ontario from Centre Island on the Toronto Islands. These images record changes in this landmark, while acknowledging the hand of the artist in observing what passes before the lens on a seasonal basis.
https://hyperallergic.com/633729/a-view-from-the-easel-during-times-of-quarantine-43/
https://www.lensculture.com/search/projects?q=april+hickox
Podcast - https://defendthedarkroom.libsyn.com/talking-to-april-hickox
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Hickox
The Toronto Islands have a rich cultural history beginning with the indigenous peoples, to whom the Island continues to have spiritual and cultural importance. I would like to acknowledge that this work was created on the traditional territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabe, the Chippewa, and the Haudenosaunee. I would like to thank the Huron-Wendat for sharing these Islands, known as Mnisiing, where I live and work.
