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Sobey art exhibit runs until Sept. 3Art on the wallsContinued from page 24Salinger novels sit on a shelf, the Cohenes Like, Like, a two-His works have an intentional text sanded from their covers, channel video work that playsambiguity; he applies leading leaving only a distinctive angular with your heart before your head.titles swamp thing Everglades, rainbow in the corner. Certain A distillation of 80s movie heart-for a field of short green lines editions of the authors books had break, Cohene intercuts scenes of evocative of some wall works by this graphic signifier, and if you lovelorn ladies in various states of Minimalist giant Sol LeWitt were in a high school English emotional dishevelment athat suggest a deep cultural soup class in the 90s, youd recognize it puffy-haired Meryl Streep (fromfrom which meaning, or specific instantly. Like Sullivan, Long fid-Kramer vs. Kramer, I think); ameaning, is near-impossible to dles with the visual as a carrier of weepy Kristy McNicol; a womandistill.meaning as potent as language in a bathtub tearfully warblingA frequent collaborator is fel- almost, but not quite; a suite of the Beatles If I Fell en route tolow shortlister Gareth Long, rep-nearby panels, fitted with multiple an emotional breakdown. All theresented here by a work called rainbow forms shift and change as while, a concoction of essentialThe Illustrated Dictionary of you pass, underpinning his point. oils subtly scents the room with aReceived Ideas, an illustrated In Josh Thorpes work, on the sweet odor of flowers and herbs.translation of Gustave Flauberts other hand, language appears to The effect is immersive, likesatirical dictionary of the same be all; on a window near the lake, visiting the inner mechanisms of name. Flaubert was a funny guy, and above the door downtown, a popular clichwhich the piecein that pre-modern way; le mot Thorpe inscribes aphoristic phras-happily plies. Like, Like is a self-juste, a term he coined, expressed es, in what seems to be a direct conscious nostalgia trip thats nothis love of precision in language. reference to the towering, early afraid to declare its and ourHis dictionary was a send- up of conceptual work of Lawrence willing submission to the emo-the dissolution of linguistic mean-Weiner. Unlike Weiners, though, tional manipulations of pureing he so loathed. Long and Thorpes works are site specific, Hollywood-style cheese, indulg-Sullivan push it one step further: and his wry, subtly minimal ges-ing the urge to feel more thanOut of language entirely, into the tures quietly subvert the space think. Speaking for myself, nowrealm of visual speculation. they inhabit, if you give them a and then at least: guilty asSpeaking of which, Longs solo moment to work their way from charged.work at Oakvilles downtown eye to brain and back again.The Sobey Art Award 2011ERIC RIEHL / OAKVILLE BEAVERspace is a clever play on language After all of this, Aleesa Cohene Ontario exhibition continues atAT JULIA'S:Oakville artist Halina Grzyb is currently showcasing her Horizonand the visual, and how the two took me by surprise, and happily Oakville Galleries until Sept. 3.Series of paintings at Julia's Ristorante, which runs until Sept. 8. The restaurant isintersect and depart to inscribe so. If all this heady Modern cri-The Sobey Prize will be awardedlocated at 312 Lakeshore Rd. For more information, visit www.halinasart.com.their own meanings. A set of J.D. tique gets you down, slip into in Halifax on October 13.www.insideHALTON.com OAKVILLE BEAVER Friday, July 22, 2011 26