SUM gallery and Flavourcel Present Centipede in Chinatown

Add a Comment by Rebecca Bollwitt Wednesday, March 30th, 2022 — 8:56am PDT

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SUM gallery and the Flavourcel Animation Collective invite you to crawl down into the dark depths of the Sun Wah Centre basement for Centipede: a three-day pop-up exhibition of queerly macabre experimental animation.

SUM gallery and Flavourcel Present Centipede in Chinatown

When: Thursday, April 7 to Saturday, 9, 2022 from 12:00pm to 6:00pm daily
Where: Sun Wah Centre (268 Keefer St, Vancouver)
Admission: Drop-in. Advanced registration only required for closing reception, Saturday, April 9 from 3:00pm to 5:00pm

Flavourcel’s Centipede exhibition will enchant and spook audiences as it blends multimedia installation, 3D projection and sound experimentation to present a sensory crawl through a haunting landscape of ghouls, guts, creepies and crawlies.

This exhibit is curated by Queer Arts Festival’s Assistant Curator Benjamin Siegl.

About the exhibition: Animation as an industry is not without its binaries: join the prosperous but strenuous industry grind, or resign yourself to outsider status making animations “alone in your basement.” The Flavourcel Collective subverts this binary by choosing the latter, with one significant exception—they’re not alone in the basement. Combining the talents of 10 artists, Flavourcel embraces an alternative approach to animation through collectivist collaboration and resource sharing.

In Centipede, movement is recognized as a principal component of fear. From the sudden movement of jump scares in thrillers and haunted houses inspiring our fight-or-flight instincts, to the agonizing dread of movement’s absence all together. The Centipede, a multi-sectioned organism, moves in unison towards an undiscovered future, encapsulating both the animated image and the bold, collective journey Queer folks undertake when creating space in this world—foot over foot, frame by frame.

For decades, queer movement was restricted to the darkness—in the corners of dark bars and margins of our minds. As queerness moves further and further into the light, there is a ripple both backwards and forwards; towards the future, but not without the intrinsic hauntings of all that’s been shouldered.