Culture

The disappearance of the art installation on Queen's Park

by alfred ng | July 17, 2007 at 12:02 pm | 553 views | 6 comments | 40 recommendations

After my report on the art installation yesterday, this morning I went back to Queen’s Park hoping to talk to some of the public with their reactions on the Art.Installation and educate myself more with this Islamic inspired art

To my surprise, what had been billed as a two-day art installation had been packed up and disappear without a trace. I inquired of one of the guards at Queen’s Park. He told me someone had packed it up this morning without any protests from either Queen’s Park or the public. For my guess, seems like Mr. Josephson’s religious art installation was staged for the benefit of media only, (the Toronto Star’s two-page colour spread and TV stations such as Omni TV and City TV as far as I was aware).

Is this another case of the media felling victim to a self-promoting artist for his 15 minutes of fame?

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kate

at 13:38 on July 17th, 2007

Alfred, you're right - this is really odd. It says it opened on Monday and would run for two days. But you say that now it is already gone? I doubt very much that it has to do with an artist pulling the wool over the eyes of the media. Usually the artist is very happy to have their work up for the duration. My guess is that something has happened, since the work was controversial. I can't find anything about it in the mainstream reports...

kate

at 13:45 on July 17th, 2007

I've sent him an email and will let you know what he says about the missing installation.

kate

at 13:59 on July 17th, 2007

Maybe two days was Monday and (most of) Tuesday. Here is information that was published in local paper "livewithculture"

"Starts: Jul 16, 2007

Ends: Jul 17, 2007

At: Queen's Park, Queen's Park, Toronto

[view map]

Neighborhood: Downtown

Playing:
Monday, Tuesday

Times: From Dawn to Dusk

Cost: FREE"

mtippett

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 14:00 on July 17th, 2007

please keep us posted if you learn anything more.

Actual News Geezer

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 14:54 on July 17th, 2007

wow - an art whodunnit! thanks for keeping up with this story...

alfred ng

at 08:50 on July 18th, 2007

I entered Mr. Josephson’s name on Google this morning. There were many entries on him and his art installation. From CBC, CTV, CP to local papers such as eye weekly, Kelowna daily, most of the articles was pretty similar and all reported the art installation were for July 16 and 17. Seems to me Mr. Josephson has received more publicity than most artists will received in their lifetime.