Artist:
John Massey (born 1950 in Toronto, Canada; lives and works in Toronto).

Materials:
Series of ink jet print.

Description:
“The photographs pays homage to his architect father, Hart Massey as the images are of a house designed by him. John Massey puts objects (such as bikinis, blow-up dolls, porn, and a broom), as well as artworks of a modermist bent throughout the house, making his father’s house his own.”
—”John Massey: Phantoms of the Modern,” Art Metropole website.

“The images feature the home of the artist’s architect father, a modernist steel and glass pavilion. Into these pristine interiors, Massey has digitally inserted a variety of objects. Some seem to fit the environment, like the sculptures by Maillol, Brancusi, Arp, and Giacommetti, as well as works by Canadians Ron Martin and Michael Snow. Others seem wildly incongruous: a large blue exercise ball, a sex doll, a smattering of pornographic magazines. Massey’s choice to metaphorically defile his father’s house is revealing, particularly since his own patrilineal family line is such a highly charged one. John Massey is the grandson of Canada’s first Canadian-born governor-general, Vincent Massey, and the great-nephew of the famous actor Raymond Massey. The patriarchy—which Massey has examined through his interest in pornography, through his exploration of his own male sexuality in the ‘Jack’ series, through his examination of the clenched corporate ethos in Model Waiting Area —has long been his subject, but always held in a fierce restraint.”
—Sarah Milroy, “Massey’s Masterpiece,” The Globe and Mail, August 24, 2004.