Defacement, expunging, obliteration, removal: these terms can apply both to DeFreitas’ initial reworking of the announcements from The Toronto Star and to the effects of death or loss.

Deaths/Memorials/Births began as an installation of pages taken from that section of the Toronto Star. DeFreitas cut out all but the page headings and the black borders that outlined the original images and texts. She then chose and reattached sections of the announcements she found resonant. The result was a “metaphoric narrative”1 that moved vertically through the spaces left by DeFreitas’ expunging of all specific biographical information. DeFreitas began this project on November 7, 2006 and continued it until September 7, 2007. The outcome of her labours was an installation in which the fragility of newsprint echoed the fact of human mortality, and in which the need for people to give public notice of loss or new life, to present a final portrait of a loved one or to assure the dead that they are still missed was both undercut and honoured. – excerpts from  the essay Deaths/Memorials/Births, Heidi Eigenkind

 

Reception: Friday October 31, 7 to 10 pm

Artist Talk: Saturday, November 1, 3 pm