SIDE STREETS: Amanda McCavour & Micah Adams
March 20, 2016
The Theatre Centre is excited to unveil the latest installation in our Café: Crystal Dream Homes by Amanda McCavour and Micah Adams, as part of SIDE STREETS, a year-round series of hanging installations in The Theatre Centre Café/Bar, created by the talented and local artists of City of Craft.
“This is a combination of two artist’s practices, a collage. We created a constructed reality. Suspended in space this is a low tech interpretation of a high tech digital model.” – Amanda McCavour and Micah Adams
Read our Q & A with Amanda and Micah below and check out their stunning Crystal Dream Homes in The Theatre Centre Café/Bar until May 2016.
Q: You each have your own well developed art practice, so how often do you get to collaborate?
Amanda: We don’t collaborate too often but this seemed like the perfect way to work together- a way to combine both of our interests into one project.
Micah: she’s right and we don’t really get the opportunity, but it’s certainly refreshing to do something new once in a while.
Q: Where did the idea for the Crystal Dream Homes originate?
Amanda: We went to a dollhouse store and found these dollhouses for dollhouses which were so intriguing. Both of our practices have an interest in scale- Micah working quite small and I work on a 1 to 1 scale. These objects made in miniature for a dollhouse seemed intriguing and both of us wanted to incorporate these into something- we just didn’t know what.
Micah: yeah that’s what happened.
Q: Favourite tool or material to work with?
Amanda: A sewing machine and thread.
Micah: As a metal I like copper, I like how it ages, it develops a old soft leathery look, It’s great for making mystery faux antiques. I work with lots of different materials; coins, glass and ceramic things. That’s the fun part for me; finding new materials or even old used ones and seeing what they can do.
Q: What is your favourite colour? (nope…this isn’t a trick question. We really want to know).
Amanda: Green! No- Peach. I’m not sure. I love lots of colours.
Micah: I think all colours are so beautiful…don’t make me choose! … However context is everything, there’s a perfect colour for any application it just depends on the variables involved. For this particular project we wanted to use string that seemed high-tech or science illustration so neon colors seemed a good fit.
Q: What’s your favourite thing about living in Toronto? Your neighbourhood?
Micah: Our neighbourhood actually feels like a neighbourhood, I’ve lived in 3 different areas of the city and where we are now has a little bit of everything and most of all, neighbours, neighbours we’ve gotten to know and would do favours for.
Q: What do you listen to while working in the studio?
Amanda: I like listening to podcasts. My favourite are the story based ones.
Micah: If I’m doing metal work or other noisy things, the music or background noise is less important because I don’t really hear it and I’m focused in a way that I don’t seem to notice the surroundings as much, the CBC might stay on all day. But if I’m doing a long, sit down task like drawing, I like long format things like books on tape, or the Boards of Canada.
Q: If you could collaborate with any artist (living or dead) who would it be and what would you make?
Micah: In the past, I’ve done involuntary collaborations with Norman Rockwell merchandise and Kim Adams… does that count? When no one was looking I photographed my tiny monuments amongst a Kim Adams installation.
Q: What’s up next for both of you? A project you’re particularly excited about? Places we can see your work?
Amanda: I have a few exhibitions up right now and I’m really excited about colour right now in my studio. Two of my large installations use brightly coloured thread to create “clouds” made out of thousands of sewn units. These installations are up at the Olin Art Gallery in PA and at the Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke, VA. These installations utilize the same fluorescent threads that are in “Crystal Dream Homes”. The closest exhibition is in Toronto at the Textile Museum which opens in May.
Micah: I have some private commissions to catch up on that will keep me busy till the end of the summer. You can always see my work at MKG127, I run an Etsy shop: MicahAdamsCo and I also keep a visual diary of works in progress on Instagram: @micahadams.ca
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As an artist Micah is a collector of objects as much as he is a maker of objects. As a trained jeweler, Micah is a constant tinkerer on a fine scale. Adams received a BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax. Upon Graduation in 2008, he pursued a three year residency in Toronto at Harbourfront Centre’s Metal/Jewellery studio. In 2013, he applied this jewellery experience at a printmaking residency at Toronto’s Open Studio. Where printmaking and jewellery merged, finely engraved coins resulted with cut coins being used as tiny printing plates. Also in 2013, during a residency at the Museum of Glass in Tacoma, Washington, he translated drawings into sculptures. This combination of work won the 2016 top award for Best in Festival during the Toronto Design Offsite Festival. Since 2004 his drawings have been held in the Pierogi Flat Files (New York) and he is represented by MKG127 (Toronto). He has received numerous grants from government agencies and has works in private as well as corporate collections. He currently lives and works in Toronto. @micahadams.ca
Amanda McCavour is a Toronto-based artist who works with stitch to create large-scale embroidered installations. She is interested in drawing. Thread is used in her work to explore connections to home and thread’s accumulative presence. McCavour holds a BFA from York University where she studied drawing and installation and has recently completed her MFA in Fibers and Material Studies at Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, PA. McCavour shows her work in galleries nationally and internationally with recent solo exhibitions in Gatineau (QB), Williamsport (PA) and Vancouver (BC). She has received awards and scholarships from the Ontario Crafts Council, The Handweavers and Spinners Guild of America, The Ontario Crafts Council, The Ontario Society of Artists, The Surface Design Association and The Embroiderers Guild of America for her work. amandamccavour.com
Past Side Streets artists include:
Ian Philips – Chipmunks on Ice
Valerie Marchand – colourful glass feathers and succulent filled terrariums
Kalpna Patel – Well-loved book sculptures