EXHIBITION

In the pilot episode, we are introduced to a near future where a solar disaster has wiped out a large part of the human population. The protagonist Ben reminisces about his childhood spent roaming the back corridors of the Natural History Museum in London. By Episode 5, the latest in Dawood’s series, Ben has met Yasmine, and both are taken captive aboard a gigantic cargo ship whose megalomaniacal captain entertains biblical pretensions.

In the exhibition, you experienced the first part of the Leviathan Legacy VR Trilogy, which jumps 150 years into a future where rising sea levels and the calcification of the oceans have led to new hybrid species and social hierarchies. Shaped through information sourced from marine biologists, engineers, and oceanographers, each instalment imagines the speculative future of reef ecosystems and interspecies hybridity. Alongside the VR experience were the remains of billboards that incorporate Leviathan research imagery.

Taking its cues from globalisation, international trade, and the legal structures of maritime law set against the rights of the individual, for the Toronto Biennial, Episode 5 was presented at 259 Lake Shore Blvd East, within a customised Newfoundland cod trap from the 1970s (before the moratorium on cod was introduced). This sits alongside a series of new textile-based paintings created in collaboration with artisans from Fogo Island using traditional craft techniques.

To delve deeper into the Leviathan universe, the MOCA Resource Room hosted a curated reading list of books and articles that informed the artist’s research for the project.

PUBLIC PROGRAMME

This programme was organised in dialogue with Shezad Dawood’s exhibition “Leviathan”. Public programmes for Leviathan were supported by Brenda Simpson and Len Goodman.

Artist talk with Shezad Dawood, Qavavau Manumie, and Candice Hopkins
25 September 2019
This conversation was set amidst Episode 5 of Leviathan film cycle and Qavavau Manumie’s depictions of Arctic wildlife and contemporary Inuit life. The artists address the relationships between their work in discussion with curator Candice Hopkins.

Alan Emery in Conversation with Johnathon Gatehouse
30 November 2019
Marine biologist, Alan Emery, and journalist, Jonathon Gatehouse, discuss the immense changes occurring in the oceans and how these shifts are affecting Canada, a country with three ocean coasts. This conversation delves into what can be done with technology, resources, changes, and sacrifice to address the global climate crisis.

From the bay area to the arctic
23 September 2019
Artist Shezad Dawood is joined by researcher Alice Xia Zhu for a conversation that addresses the fate of microplastics in marine and freshwater contexts, from the San Francisco Bay to the Arctic. This programme is organised in dialogue with Shezad Dawood’s exhibition Leviathan, presented on MOCA’s Floor 4.