Image: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
The Art Gallery of Ontario is presenting ‘Picture Space’, an exhibition that considers how the making of a photograph changes what viewers see—and how they experience it. The exhibition is currently on view in Toronto and will remain at the AGO through November 1, 2026.
Installed across the Edmond G. Odette Family Gallery and the Robert & Cheryl McEwen Gallery on Level 1, the presentation brings together work by 13 artists: Barbara Astman, Sandra Brewster, Anne Collier, Chris Curreri, Luther Konadu, Suzy Lake, Scott McFarland, Abelardo Morell, Michael Snow, Alec Soth, Cheryl Sourkes, Ian Wallace and James Welling.
Rather than treating photography as a transparent record of the world, the exhibition focuses on the physical and technical conditions through which photographs are produced and viewed. The artists engage with surface textures and photographic materials, drawing attention to the ways images are framed by cameras, scanners, computer screens and gallery walls.
According to the AGO’s exhibition overview, the works extend the traditionally two-dimensional picture space into three dimensions. This emphasis on materiality places the photograph’s construction at the centre of the viewing experience, asking audiences to consider not only the image itself but also the systems and surfaces that give it form.
The exhibition’s artist list brings together distinct approaches within contemporary and modern photographic practice, including artists represented in the AGO’s wider programme and collection. The presentation does not assign a single medium or method to the group; instead, it sets their explorations of texture, framing and photographic space alongside one another.
One work highlighted by the AGO is Abelardo Morell’s ‘Light Bulb’ (1991), a gelatin silver print measuring 51 by 60.5 centimetres. The work belongs to the Art Gallery of Ontario collection as a gift from Morton and Carol Rapp in 2007. Its inclusion provides a concrete example of the exhibition’s attention to the photographic object and to the relationship between image, material and display.
‘Picture Space’ is part of the AGO’s exhibition programme at 317 Dundas Street West in Toronto. The gallery notes that its contemporary programming is supported by the Canada Council. The exhibition is scheduled to remain on view until November 1, 2026.
