Patrick DeCoste @ Zsa Zsa

[Andrew harwood]

For Immediate Release:

Zsa Zsa
962 Queen Street West
Tel:416-537-3814

Patrick DeCoste
"It's just a piece of red fabric."

Nov 1-14
Closing Reception:  8-10 PM Thursday, November 14, 2002.

Curation: Herb Campbell
Translation: Emmerich Kremeth
Typography: Petra Chevrier

"It's just a piece of red fabric." is a deceptively simple 
installation featuring a piece of fabric draped over a plinth 
accompanied by German and French text on the gallery walls.  In this 
show, DeCoste discards his usual practice of figurative painting in 
favour of more minimal and conceptual techniques of art making, all 
the while continuing his investigation into the relationship between 
the self and the outside world.  Irreverent and witty, this work 
explores the nature of curation, as well as other institutional 
practices surrounding the display of art.

Patrick DeCoste is a Toronto based artist originally from Antigonish, 
Nova Scotia. Since his last solo shows "Exchange" at Zsa Zsa in 2000 
and "Hermetic Museum" at SPIN in 2001, he has exhibited extensively 
in group shows in England, Ireland, United States, and Canada.  Many 
of the works in these exhibitions were part of his "Antigonish Boy" 
Project, which is an ongoing search for a fictitious missing boy 
based on a childhood photograph of the artist.  Not limiting his 
search to galleries, DeCoste also "painted the town" with missing-boy 
posters in a variety of cities including Vienna, Munich, Paris, 
Ottawa, and Montréal.

Patrick DeCoste is represented in Toronto by SPIN Gallery. "A 
Portrait of the Artist as a Dead Man", an exhibition of figurative 
sculpture and paintings will be exhibited from Nov.2-24.  Opening 
reception 8-10 PM Friday Nov 8.