A giant arcade claw machine will sit in the heart of Toronto’s financial district next month. Filled with “pre-loved” stuff – teddy bears, hammers, mannequins, fishbowls – the machine will be part of Canada’s annual visual arts festival Luminato. Nine Canadian artists collaborated on the carnivalesque installation “Stockpile.” And all nine will perform as the claw. That’s right – passersby can manipulate artists into getting what they really want. At least during the week of June 14, 2013.
Selected by Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art curator Denise Markonish (who also curated the recent MASS MoCA exhibition “Oh, Canada,”) the “Stockpile” artists are: Dean Baldwin, Brendan Fernandes, Diane Landry, Divya Mehra, Luanne Martineau, Graeme Patterson, Ed Pien, Charles Stankievech and Mitchell Wiebe. If you’re into art and manipulation–or just prizes–this is your kind of installation.
