The Centre for Experimental Art and Communication (CEAC) was a Canadian artist-run centre that developed out of the Kensington Arts Association (KAA) [1973-1978] in 1976 as a multimedia space that provided an important venue for experimental and avant-garde art in Toronto, Ontario and beyond. CEAC was the first ever multi-media centre owned and operated by an artist-run centre in Toronto and the largest non-institutional art space during its time. The centre engaged with artists, musicians, and activists from across North America through organized exhibitions, in addition to hosting video production facilities, workshops, screening, and performance series'. CEAC encouraged artist-to-artist communication and provided a platform for Canadian artists to expand their knowledge through international tours. The centre was also home to the radical art magazine Art Communication Edition, later renamed STRIKE. Despite its success as an artist-run centre from 1976 through to 1978, CEAC was disbanded in the summer of 1978 following scandal and the withdrawal of government funding from the Ontario Arts Council
During its years of operation, CEAC was invested in the radical juxtaposition of materialist practices and communication through art. A recurring theme throughout its programming included the synthesis of language and/as art, and technology. CEAC's multimedia approach to art bridged across many platforms, and included art exhibitions, international tours, workshops, conferences, film and video screenings, art performances, and music events. The centre housed a library and archives, a video production studio, a performance space, a film theatre, and a punk-music venue.
A chief concern of CEAC was the critique of social norms and formalism and the commodification of art, a characteristic of similar art groups formed during the apex of conceptual art throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Amerigo Marras, CEAC's co-founder (alongside Suber Donald Corley) and chief theoretician, promoted "contextual art" as a process that deconstructs meanings that no longer correspond to reality and allows the audience to introduce new meanings. The group celebrated the exhibition of avant-garde and non-material art practices (performance art, happening, body art, experimental film, et cetera), and was dedicated to “a continuous collective experiment in living and in sociological infiltrations with practical demonstrations.”
Locations
Before the formation of CEAC, their members and their peers co-worked in shared spaces. CEAC's founders Amerigo Marras and Suber Donald Corley purchased a house at 4 Kensington Avenue in the Market area, allowing early incarnations of The Body Politic and Glad Day Bookshop to use a shed behind the house as an alternative space. In the early 1970s, Jearld Moldenhauer moved into Marras and Corley's apartment at 65 Kendal Avenue - this address served as the official home for Glad Day Books and The Body Politic.
Previous to the formation of CEAC, Marras and Corley were affiliated with the Kensington Art Association (KAA). Following a $55,000 Wintario grant, KAA became the first artist-run organization in Toronto to buy a building and effectively establish a large multimedia centre. After acquiring 15 Duncan Street in September 1976, KAA launched CEAC. The centre's large, four-storey building in the light-manufacturing in the area south west of Queen Street and University Avenue, now known as the Entertainment District, where it became an instrumental hub for Toronto's creative cultural scene.
Funnel Experimental Film Theatre
The Funnel Experimental Film Theatre (1977-1989) was an experimental cinema collective that gathered in the basement of CEAC's 15 Duncan Street location. The collective was born out a concept of "hybrid telemedia", whereby independent video production would intersect with television's mass communication systems; emphasizing broadcast quality and colour technology.
Founding the Canadian Super 8 Distribution Centre in 1976, CEAC organized regular screenings and Super 8 Open Screenings which provided a focus for local filmmakers. These screenings led to the creation of a video production studio in the basement of CEAC and the formation of The Funnel Experimental Film Theatre in September 1977, co-founded, amongst others, by filmmaker Ross McLaren, who was then teaching filmmaking at OCAD University.
The Funnel's video program included Noel Harding, David Clarkson, Elizabeth MacKenzie, Susan Britton, Peter Dudar, John Massey, Ian Murray, and members of the Development Education Centre and Trinity Square Video.