For several years, the Internet and new technologies have revolutionized the art market, which has transformed the buyers’ behavior. Emphasized by the appearance of online galleries, this trend is shaking the habits of professionals, encouraging the emergence of new practices and opening up new perspectives for the art market. This conference will feature Jessica Backus, Director of the digital platform Artsy, Hugues Charbonneau, Founder and Director of the Montreal gallery that bears his name, and Alex McLeod, a Toronto-based digital artist. Our guests will share their professional experiences on the use of these new tools and highlight the various challenges that digital technology creates for the entire artistic sector. Julie Lacroix, director of Contemporary Art Galleries Association (AGAC), will be in charge of the moderation.
Presented by AGAC
Jessica Backus is the Senior Director of Gallery Relations at Artsy, the leading global platform for discovering and collecting art from the world’s top galleries, museums, art fairs, and auction houses. She previously served as the Director of Artsy Learning and The Art Genome Project, the classification system and technological framework that powers Artsy. Prior to joining Artsy in 2011, Jessica worked in special projects and client services at Phillips in New York, and as associate director of the gallery Peres Projects in Berlin. Jessica holds a B.A in comparative literature and society from Columbia University and an M.A. in art history from Hunter College, where her research focused on post-war German art.
Hugues Charbonneau is the founder and director of Galerie Hugues Charbonneau, in Montreal. The gallery fosters the individual practices of its artists, and expands theoretical discourse through the contextualization of projects within and outside of the gallery’s walls. Over the past six years, artists represented by the gallery have exhibited in museums and biennales, including those in Austria, Brazil, Belgium, Britain, Canada, China, Croatia, England, Finland, France, Holland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Switzerland, Uruguay and the USA. Charbonneau started his professional career in the arts at Esse magazine. Prior to opening his gallery, Charbonneau was the co-director of Galerie Division and contributed to the development of The Arsenal, in Montréal and Toronto. He served on the Board of Directors of multiple non-profit organisations, including Skol, Artexte and the Contemporary Art Gallery Association (AGAC). He served as judge for the RBC National Painting Competition and BMO 1st ART.
Julie Lacroix was Director of AGAC from 2013 to 2015 before coming back to lead the Association in 2018. She has organized several editions of the Paper Fair, three editions of the Visual Arts Gala and the inaugural Feature Art Fair in Toronto. She is particularly interested in trends shaping the Canadian and international art market.
Alex McLeod is an artist whose primary focus is on the interconnection of matter, life cycles, and otherworldly phenomenon. He has exhibited internationally including the Whitney Museum of American Art's "Immersive Cinema" show.