Colour of the Year

The Project

Colour of the Year is a site-specific, participatory artwork that invites us to consider the impact and materiality of colour. The possibilities of colour in the contemporary world are dizzying and seemingly limitless with new trends being established each year. However, what we see is not always what we get. Colour is not just a refraction of light rays that hold the power to transform, but is also a material substance that quite literally stains lives, livelihoods, and the environment. The multi-hued, toxic, dye run-off from industrial textile factories often located in the Global South can be found from beach to shore in lakes and rivers that sustain life. Colour when seen from this perspective is a major social and environmental concern that requires our collective attention. In Colour of the Year, you are invited to witness the movement of wind and water while meditating on the colour of cloth and participating in its clean-up.

The Artist

• Meera Sethi, Toronto, Canada

Meera Sethi is a contemporary Canadian visual artist with an interdisciplinary, intuitive, and research-based practice. Her work lies at the intersection of the subjugated body and histories of cloth with a particular focus on South Asia and its diasporas. Using painting, drawing, fibre, photography, illustration, performance, and social practice, she delves deep into the ways we understand and appreciate cloth, clothing, and the body, including its histories, its resonances, and its possibilities.

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Acknowledgements

Photographer: Stan WIlliams