"
My first encounter with Vid I ngelevics was at an "All Candidates"
meeting in the JunctionTriangle during the 1984 Ontario Provincial Election.
At this meeting, a man named Vid stood up and delivered a passionate statement
about the need to support the work of contemporary artists through continued
funding to the arts. Although we had not met, I recognized Vid Ingelevics
as my advocate. One year later, I had the pleasure of meeting Vid at an exhibition
of my work at the Toronto Photographers Workshop. It is apropos that this
introduction occurred in the exhibition hallway at Queens Quay. I asked Vid
to participate in this exhibition because I consider him to be one of the
most engaging photographic artists working in Canada today. Vid Ingelevics'work
approaches photography and memory from a personal and public perspective.
His work endeavors to reinvent the relevance of documentary practice within
a context that values and identifies experience. Vid Ingelevics' photography
reminds us that history is made from the stories of our friends and families,
the anecdotes and accounts of everyday life, and is not a relic to be embalmed
in a museum. This history is situated, political and belongs to everyone.
It does not sanction an immutable or monumental past. Rather, it is a history
that anticipates the future. The composer Pierre Boulez once stated that a
civilization that conserves is a civilization in decline. This observation
challenges the premise of contemporary Western culture. We are obsessed with
surplus accumulation, excess consumption and a nostalgic fetishism for the
past. The work of Vid Ingelevics reminds us of the importance to celebrate
the relevance of experience and creativity in the face of this passive nihilism.."
