Wishing on My Falsies: A Maior, Katayoon Yousefbigloo
Western Front, Vancouver, BC - To April 5
A highlight of Vancouver’s 2024 exhibition year was P.L.U.R.O.M.A (Peace, Love, Unity, Respect, Oxygen, Music, Autonomy) Resort ’24, a multimedia fashion show produced by the art collective Liquidation World under the creative direction of Katayoon Yousefbigloo and presented at the Polygon Gallery. Whether the overflow crowd was there for the spectacle of a runway fashion show or its critique is irrelevant to a world where success continues to be measured in bums in seats. For Wishing on My Falsies, Yousefbigloo and the A Maior collective have something new in store.
Taking their cue from a superstition (making a wish on fallen eyelashes), the artists have fashioned an exhibition that, according to press materials, “explores the mythmaking potential of playing dress-up.” Centring the exhibition is an installation by Yousefbigloo that features a video and a collection of bootlegged merchandise the artist has absorbed into her P.L.U.R.O.M.A. lifestyle brand. Flanking that are billboard-sized wallpapers enlarged from images taken from A Maior’s seasonal lookbook.
A Maior is a clothing and homeware store near Viseu, Portugal. Since 2016, an eponymous exhibition program has been hosted in its shop. A Maior is run by store staff, artist Bruno Zhu, and his family. Yousefbigloo is an Iranian-born interdisciplinary artist and musician based on the traditional and unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Skwxwú7meshww and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ Nations (Vancouver, Canada). Using video, music, writing, performance and visual art, she examines how media shapes our mythologies. Yousefbigloo is a founder of Liquidation World, which hosts exhibitions, performances, workshops, fashion shows and other events.
