My creative work has two sides. One is in the world of media arts, where I create experimental visual projects for digital exhibitions and galleries. The other is in filmmaking, where I bring my background as an artist to the craft of screenwriting and directing.
After creating a number of short and medium-length art films that have found their audiences in galleries and festivals alike, I am now developing my first feature-length project, Mama D'Lo, a magical realist Caribbean folklore film set in and around the Maracas River in Trinidad & Tobago. This research for this film was funded by the Canada Council for the Arts and was awarded a spot in the 2020 From Our Dark Side genre incubator program at Women in Film and Television Vancouver.
My media arts work studies the nature of performance and explores the ways a performative act can be documented and re-circulated, often in relation to contentious and complex sites and landscapes. I experiment with directorial and script-writing techniques that interweave performance and site, allowing one to inform the other within the production of videos, gifs, and photographs. At the core of my practice is a fascination with collaboration and improvisation across disciplines. I have worked with many creative professionals, including actors, dancers, voice artists, costume makers, a court illustrator, a police sketch artist, and an auctioneer.
I have exhibited my work at galleries and film festivals in Canada, the US, Italy, Mexico, and Trinidad & Tobago. I teach media arts, performance, and critical writing at Simon Fraser University and Emily Carr University.
Contact: mars.lauren@gmail.com
EDUCATION
2010
Master of Fine Arts, Social Practice, California College of the Arts
2005
Bachelor of Fine Arts, Visual Arts, University of Victoria
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2017
Birds of Paradise, Deluge Contemporary Art, Victoria, Canada
2016
The Seasonal Bachelor The Frisky Entrepreneur The Sociopathic Gentleman The Affectionate Drug Dealer The Son of a Dead Rock Star, CSA Space, Vancouver, Canada
2015
Ecstatic Time, Alice Yard, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago
2014
5 Types in 3 Parts, Et al. Gallery, San Francisco, USA
2011
Set for an Altered State, Sight School, Oakland, USA
GROUP EXHIBITIONS & FESTIVALS
2020
A Matter of Taste, Koffler Centre for the Arts, Toronto, Canada
2019
Shooting Gallery Performance Series, Left of Main, Vancouver, Canada
2018
Preservation and Permanence, InterAccess Gallery, Toronto, Canada
Feathers Ether Sand Speech, Access Gallery, Vancouver, Canada
Out of Place, Pacific Cinematheque, Vancouver, Canada
2015
The Scary, New Media Gallery, New Westminster, Canada
Trinidad & Tobago Film Festival, New Media Program, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago
2014
Adjacencies, 221A Artist Run Centre, Vancouver, Canada
Behind the Wall xx In Front of the Wall, UNIT/PITT, Vancouver, Canada
Victoria Film Festival, Victoria, Canada
Collective Walks and Spaces of Contestation, UNIT/PITT, Vancouver, Canada
The Broken Altar Touring Film Programme, Antimatter Film Festival, Mexico City, Mexico
2013
This is the Sound of Someone Losing the Plot, Catharine Clark Gallery, San Francisco, USA
Antimatter Film Festival, Deluge Contemporary Art, Victoria, Canada
LIVE Biennale, VIVO, Vancouver, Canada
Your Kontinent Film Festival, Richmond, Canada
I THINK WE’RE READY TO GO TO THE NEXT SEQUENCE, Gallery 400, Chicago, USA
Intersections, Cineworks, Vancouver, Canada
2012
The Museum Problem, Frutta Gallery, Rome, Italy
2011
F for Fetish, Shudder Gallery, Vancouver, Canada
The George Spelvin Show, Adobe Books, San Francisco, USA
The Doubtful Bureaucrat Comes Home, Skydive Art Space, Houston, USA
2010
OPENwater, St. George Distillery, & SFMOMA, Alameda, USA
SC13, SF Antique and Design Mall, San Francisco, USA
2009
Exercises in Seeing, Queen’s Nails Projects, San Francisco, USA
Visi-Cue Cue, Canteen Gallery, Ottawa, Canada
Home is Something I Carry With Me, Southern Exposure, San Francisco, USA
2007
Hogan’s Alley Welcomes You, 200 Block Union St. Vancouver, Canada
2006
Shopdropping: Experiments in the Aisle, Western Front, Vancouver, Canada
ART RESIDENCIES & MENTORSHIPS
2020
Women in Focus Mentorship program, Whistler Film Festival
Quest University Artist in Residence Program, Squamish, Canada
2019
What Lab Artist Residency, Vancouver, Canada
2019 Sointula Art Shed, Malcolm Island, Canada
2015
Quest University Artist in Residence Program, Squamish, Canada
Alice Yard, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago
RECENT GRANTS & AWARDS
2020
Women in Film + Television Vancouver, From Our Dark Side Incubator Program
Canada Council for the Arts: Digital Originals
2019
Canada Council for the Arts: Research and Creation Grant
Canada Council for the Arts: Arts Abroad Travel Grant
PUBLICATIONS
2019
Familiar Millennial, exhibition essay for Ever Gold Projects, San Francisco, USA
2018
The Channelers exhibition catalogue, EMMEDIA and LUMA Quarterly, Calgary, Canada
2016
The Book of Types, self-published, Vancouver, Canada
2013
Site Non-Specific, Et al. Projects, Oakland, USA
2012
The Museum Problem, Frutta Gallery, published by Motto Distribution, Zurich, Switzerland
2010
After Words: Texts on Voice, published by Practice & Practice, San Francisco, USA
Recollecting the Archives of Ethel Parker, MFA Thesis, self-published, San Francisco, USA
ARTIST TALKS
2018
Access Artist-Run Centre, Vancouver, Canada
2016
Artspeak, Vancouver, Canada
2015
Quest University, Squamish, Canada
New Media Gallery, New Westminster, Canada
Sunday Supper, Iris Film Collective, Vancouver, Canada
Alice Yard, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago
2014
Capilano College, Studio Art Program, North Vancouver, Canada
Et al. Gallery, San Francisco, USA UNIT/PITT, Vancouver, Canada
2013
InterUrban Gallery, Vancouver, Canada
2012
School for the Contemporary Arts, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada
2011
Sight School Lecture Series, Oakland, USA
REVIEWS & INTERVIEWS
Interview with Sydney Southam, Shooting Gallery Performance Series (2019)
Interview with Florence Hwang, La Source (2015)
Interview with Linda Sjostrom, CFUV Radio (2014)
Interview with Celesse McCarthy, VANDOCUMENT (2013)
Set for an Altered State, Christina Linden, Art Practical (2011)
Set for an Altered State, Aaron Harbour, ArtCards Review (2011)
SC13: With Love, From Mabel, Noah Krell, Art Practical (2010)