Event: Jon Rafman: The attraction of virtual communities (June 20 - Sept 13, 2015, Montréal, Canada)

June 20–September 13, 2015
Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
185, rue Sainte-Catherine Ouest
Montréal, Québec H2X 3X5

The MAC is delighted to present the first major museum exhibition in Canada devoted to Montréal artist Jon Rafman, accompanied with an extensive catalogue. Rafman first made a name for himself with his series "The Nine Eyes of Google Street View," begun in 2009, and his international reputation has grown ever since.

Part anthropologist, part archivist, Rafman brilliantly and passionately explores the subcultures that people the Internet, seeking to question the distinction between virtual and real. Among the works on view at the MAC, the video series "Kool-Aid Man in Second Life," 2008−11, takes the form of tours of Second Life in which Rafman's avatar, the Kool-Aid Man, guides us through astonishing micro-communities. A narrative work tinged with nostalgia, Codes of Honor, 2011, is a docu-fiction that is an homage to video arcades. The use of images found on various sites and forums is a recurring strategy in Rafman's work, but it is especially potent in the video trilogy comprising Still Life (Betamale), 2013, Mainsqueeze, 2014 and ERYSICHTHON, 2015, a brand new work.

Born in 1981, Jon Rafman lives and works in Montréal. He has exhibited at the New Museum in New York, Palais de Tokyo in Paris, Saatchi Gallery in London and the Contemporary Art Museum Saint-Louis. This year, Rafman is a finalist for the prestigious Sobey Art Award.

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