29 June–18 August 2013, RBC New Works Gallery, Art Gallery of Alberta.
Adam Waldron-Blain’s practice exists in a space between overwhelming sentimentality and the clinical dissection of the role of the contemporary artist, the art object and—ultimately—heartbreak. Using durational performances, video and text, Waldron-Blain takes his broken heart and sends it up as the object of his art practice. While some may sing a sad song à la Adele, Waldron-Blain stretches it to an absurd end; his is an exhaustingly long operation that points to the packaging of feelings and the hyperbolic emptiness and simultaneous sincerity of sad pop songs. As he places the personal into the public realm, Waldron-Blain draws our attention to the inadequacy of the language of love. (Ruth Burns)
