Jonathan Middleton
Confounded by Time
September 2025
Thanks to all who visited in September, and all who joined us for the closing celebration on Saturday, September 27, evening.
Photo: Rachel Topham Photography
WHALE ORBIT*
A sound performance work by Jonathan Middleton was presented in public September 22–26, 2025, in conjunction with the exhibition Confounded by Time, and featuring the album Songs of the Humpback Whale (1970) by Roger Payne.
Performance Dates and Times
September 22
12pm-1pm: Southeast False Creek**
4pm-5pm: Point Grey & Kitsilano***
September 23
11am-12pm: Kensington-Cedar Cottage***
12pm-1pm: Stanley Park Seawall**
September 24
12pm-1pm: False Creek Flats / Great Northern Way**
7pm-8pm: Grandview-Woodland***
September 25
12pm-1pm: Stanley Park Seawall**
9am-10am: Mount Pleasant***
September 26
1-2pm: Kerrisdale***
*the 'R' is silent
**Performed by Kaleb Thiessen
***Performed by Francesca Bennett
As an exhibition in moving parts, floorplans and lists of works changed weekly, and can be downloaded as PDFs: Part I; Part II; Part III; Part IV; a text for the occasion to follow.
Photo: Rachel Topham Photography
Photo: Rachel Topham Photography
Photo: Rachel Topham Photography
An unspecified number of Jonathan’s open edition of chewed pencils, Monument to the Gallery Worker, was available for purchase in the ECHO-ECHO reading room.
Jonathan Middleton (b. 1974, Edmonton) is an artist, curator, publisher, and educator, who has contributed significantly to artist-run culture as an arts worker, manager, and board member, since 1996.
Presently, Jonathan co-manages the Vancouver Art Book Fair and serves as coordinator for the Artist-Run Centres and Collectives of Ontario; previously he was Executive Director of Art Metropole, Toronto (2019–2024), Director/Curator of Or Gallery (2007–2017) and Or Gallery Berlin (2010–2015), publisher and editorial board member of Fillip (2004–2008), Director/Curator of Exhibitions at Western Front (1999-2005), and administrator and long-time co-curator, with Steven Brekelmans, of RubyArts.org (1996–2008).
As an artist, Jonathan was a founding member of DYNAMO (est. 2006) and Duplex Artists’ Society (est. 2017), and his work has been included in group exhibitions at Libby Leshgold Gallery, Vancouver (It’s difficult to put a painting in the mailbox: Toward new models of artists’ publishing, 2018); Slakthusateljéerna / Konsthall 323, Stockholm (Peace, Love and Frustration: Grounds for Exchange, 2018); PLAZA Projects, Richmond (Peer Pressure, 2017); Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver (An Invitation to an Infiltration, 2010); Or Gallery, Vancouver (Why I'm So Unhappy, 2006);
A frequent collaborator, Jonathan has worked with Hadley Howes, Maxwell Stephens, and Kathleen Ritter, as Please Pay Here Collective; with Aaron Carpenter as Jeneral Joke Store; and his work has been included in exhibitions by the artist collective Instant Coffee at Western Front, Vancouver (with Aaron Carpenter, 2012); Mercer Union, Toronto (2007); Lobby Gallery, Vancouver (2006); and
Jonathan's practice engages language, comedy, and institutional operations, and in recent years, his own work has centred on the extraordinary life and work of the 16th century Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe; this research was developed in 2018 when he was artist-in-residence at The Nordic Guest Studio, Stockholm, of Nordiska Konstförbundet, through a partnership between Duplex and Slakthusateljéerna, a studio association and project space for contemporary art in Stockholm.
ECHO-ECHO was honoured to present Confounded by Time, Jonathan Middleton's first solo exhibition, to coincide with his return to Vancouver, where he began his MFA at the School for Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University in the fall.
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