Patrick Mahon is an artist, and a writer/curator who lives in London, Canada. He is a Distinguished University Professor in Visual Arts at Western University (Emeritus), retired as of 2024. Mahon’s artwork has been exhibited widely in Canada: at Museum London, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto; the Southern Alberta Art Gallery; the Winnipeg Art Gallery and The Art Gallery of Hamilton; and internationally in exhibitions in China, France, Norway, Switzerland and elsewhere. Recent solo and group exhibitions include Patrick Mahon: Messagers’ Forum, Thames Art Gallery Chatham, ON (solo, 2020-21); Written on the Earth, McIntosh Gallery, London, ON, curated by Helen Gregory, (group, 2021). Patrick’s collaborative SSHRC-funded initiative, GardenShip and State, generated an exhibition co-curated with Jeff Thomas involving twenty artists and scholars, which premiered at Museum London (October 2021 – January 2022) and was reprised at Thames Art Gallery (August – October 2024). It was one of two finalists for a GOG Exhibition of the Year in 2022. The project was accompanied by a comprehensive catalogue, a symposium (Confluences, Museum London, Mar. 2023), and a series of related community projects in 2022-23. Patrick’s other significant collaborative exhibitions include Immersion Emergencies and Possible Worlds, which resulted in a ten-artist group exhibition, The Source: Rethinking Water through Contemporary Art, presented at Rodman Hall, Brock University, Canada, in 2014, with a second iteration, The Living River Project, at the Art Gallery of Windsor, in 2019. Patrick Mahon’s work is held in numerous private, corporate, and museum collections.

CONTACT

Patrick Mahon
Artist; Distinguished University Professor (Emeritus), Western
E-mail: pmahon@uwo.ca
Instagram: pmahonstudio

PROJECT WEBSITES

GardenShip and State
Speculative Energy Futures

PODCASTS

As a member of the Speculative Energy Futures Project (2018 to the present), which is an ambitious collaboration dealing with Energy Transition, Patrick Mahon hosted a series of 8 podcast episodes with project leader, Sheena Wilson, involving 20 artists and other research collaborators.

All episodes are available here.

Episode 1: Introduction to SEF and the FluxKit featuring Sheena, Patrick and Natalie Loveless
Episode 2: Bundle (Bundle)
Episode 3: Indigenous Knowledge Bundles (Bundle cont'd with Kurtis McAdam)
Episode 4: Storytelling (We Were In It, Planet for Sale)
Episode 5: Satire and Systems (E.E.R.K, Prototypes for Possible Worlds, Paromancy)
Episode 6: Play and Transformation (Scores for Energy Transition, The Lost Garden, Perfect Storm)
Episode 7: Plants Matter (Seed Time, Carbon Catching Library)
Episode 8: What's Up Ahead? (This Can't Wait, Earth Fortunes)

VIDEOS

Shipwreckiana(2024) – A Multi-Media Collaboration

Video Document of a Collaborative Project by Patrick Mahon, Dickson Bou, Jamie Dronyk, Sharmistha Kar, Peter Lebel, Thomas Mahon, Valerie Mills Milde, and Quinn Smallboy. This presentation was part of “YouandIareWaterAirEarthFireofLifeandDeath,” Dec. 12, 2024, ArtLab Gallery Western University (Canada) and livestreamed.

Shiprwreckiana is a document of a multi-medium project spanning a 38 minute section of a 12 hour event on Dec. 12, 2024. Comprised of a combination recorded video and sound, it also involved real time interventions deploying sculptural materials, lighting, spoken word, and foley sound. Patrick Mahon and collaborators, Bou, Dronyk, Kar, Lebel, Mahon, Mills Milde and Smallboy, some of whom have worked with him on projects before (i.e., GardenShip and State, 2021-24), presented an allusive event where references to water and shipwrecks forged abstracted spaces marked by trouble, beauty and difference.

The support of The Thames Art Gallery, Chatham; The Ontario Arts Council; ArtLab (Visual Arts, Western University); and Presenter/Curator, Christof Migone, is gratefully acknowledged.