Nova Scotia-born and Montreal-based writer and artist J.R. Carpenter lectures at Dalhousie Art Gallery (Dalhousie Arts Centre, 6101 University, Thursday, February 28, 8pm) about her electronic literature. Her web project, The Mythologies of Landforms and Little Girls (1997), uses a map of Nova Scotia to generate a non-linear story. Her work has evolved over the years—both in her themes, and with the technology at hand. Her 2007 work Les huit quartiers de sommeils (luckysoap.com/huitquartiers) uses Google Maps to “chart different qualities of sleep in the eight neighbourhoods she has lived in since moving from Nova Scotia to Montreal on the night train,” according to Dal Art Gallery literature. Carpenter’s sites can be taken as unique sites—works unto themselves—as the gallery staff point out. But they also form an “atlas” of experience.
This article appears in Feb 28 – Mar 5, 2008.