QUID PRO QUO, installation view, latex house paint wall-text painting (painted with Marc Bell & Eric Glavin), exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, latex house paint wall-text painting (painted with Marc Bell & Eric Glavin), exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, latex house paint wall-text painting (painted with Marc Bell & Eric Glavin), exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
Wall-painting working drawings over THE COLOURS OF CITIZEN ARAR, installation view, exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
QUID PRO QUO, installation process, latex house paint wall-text painting (painted with Marc Bell & Eric Glavin), exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
QUID PRO QUO, installation process, latex house paint wall-text painting (painted with Marc Bell & Eric Glavin), exhibition, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, 2012. Photo: Diaz Contemporary.
QUID PRO QUO (2013), installation detail, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with Malaspina Printmakers), exhibition view from Garry Neill Kennedy: Ya Ummi, Ya Ummi …, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Canada, 2018. Photo: Don Hall, courtesy of the MacKenzie Art Gallery.
(left) AN EYE FOR AN EYE (2013), screen prints (in collaboration with Malaspina Printmakers), (right) QUID PRO QUO (2013), 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with Malaspina Printmakers), installation detail, exhibition view from Garry Neill Kennedy: Ya Ummi, Ya Ummi …, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Canada, 2018. Photo: Don Hall, courtesy of the MacKenzie Art Gallery.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with printmaker Matthew Parisien), exhibition, AHVA Gallery, UBC, Vancouver, 2016. Photo: Scott Massey.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with printmaker Matthew Parisien), exhibition, AHVA Gallery, UBC, Vancouver, 2016. Photo: Scott Massey.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with printmaker Matthew Parisien), exhibition, AHVA Gallery, UBC, Vancouver, 2016. Photo: Scott Massey.
QUID PRO QUO, installation view, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with printmaker Matthew Parisien), exhibition, AHVA Gallery, UBC, Vancouver, 2016. Photo: Scott Massey.
QUID PRO QUO, studio view, 36.2 cm x 152.4 cm 5-colour screen print (in collaboration with printmaker Matthew Parisien), Vancouver, 2016. Photo: Scott Massey.
QUID PRO QUO (2012)
QUID PRO QUO was first exhibited in 2012 as a floor-to-ceiling wall-text painting at Diaz Contemporary using the colour palette from THE COLOURS OF CITIZEN ARAR (Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, 2007). The latin phrase "quid pro quo" is commonly translated to English as ‘a favour for a favour,' and is used to connote an exchange of services where both parties benefit from the transaction. The phrase can also be used to describe scenarios of bribery or blackmail.
QUID PRO QUO is part of Kennedy's Ethics 101 series which utilizes familiar phrases alluding to relationships of exchange, compromise and reciprocity while exploring how power is navigated between parties including nation states. These relationships further nod to the power dynamics in Museum spaces (artist and curator, artist and the viewer, institution and the visiting public etc.) Other works in this series include TIT FOR TAT ON THE TANTRAMAR MARSH (Owens Art Gallery, 2004), YOU SCRATCH MY BACK AND I'LL SCRATCH YOURS IN THE COLONIAL ROOM (Articule, 2004), and AN EYE FOR AN EYE (Museum London, 2005; The Apartment 2014; MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2018).
In his wall-text paintings, Kennedy often used ‘Superstar Shadow’, his variation of the superstar font type, referencing the font used on American naval vessels and the numbering on football uniforms. QUID PRO QUO is a variation where Kennedy used the typeface ‘Chisel’, which is more commonly associated with monuments, such as tombstones.
In 2015, he created a series of ten large-scale QUID PRO QUO paintings on canvas, one per letter, displayed all together at AHVA Gallery, UBC (2016), and gifted to Canadian public galleries to spell the words: Q, Belkin Gallery, Vancouver; U, Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge; I, Kamloops Art Gallery; D, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina; P, Rodman Hall, St Catharines, ON; R, Musée régional de Rimouski, Rimouski, QC; O, University of Manitoba; Q, Confederation Art Gallery, Charlottetown; U, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax; O, Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton.
In 2013 he made a 5-colour QUID PRO QUO screen print (36.2 cm x 152.4 cm) in collaboration with Malaspina Printmakers, Vancouver. It was exhibited in Since Then, curated by Kegan McFadden (PLATFORM Centre for Photographic and Digital Arts, Winnipeg, 2016; Kamloops Art Gallery, Kamloops, 2017), and later in Garry Neill Kennedy: Ya Ummi, Ya Ummi … (MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, 2018).