Koffler Arts presents As If by Chance… a two-channel video and photo installation by acclaimed multidisciplinary artist Vera Frenkel (May 21 – June 14, 2026).
Prompted by an “aversion to ageism at both ends of life’s arc” and a love of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence & of Experience, Frenkel has explored what happens when very young children and elders ten times their age meet.
As a starting point, a voiceover tells us that a beloved Toronto art centre, a sanctuary for visitors of all ages (especially children under ten and seniors over seventy), has suddenly been closed by City bureaucrats. Its founder, Natasha (surname unknown), has disappeared, and is now officially designated as a missing person.
It’s known that Natasha was fond of intergenerational programming and would sometimes invite players young and old to choose cards from a special deck, each card with a single word on its back. Then, turning the cards over, the words they found would suggest what to paint. Video footage of the game in use was discovered by the police after the Art Centre’s closure.
Given the founder’s absence, rumours have begun to emerge about the Art Centre being used as a cover for espionage of some sort. There is no evidence for these speculations, but the police investigation continues.
As If by Chance … produced during an artist residency at Charles Street Video in Toronto, is a work in two parts, the first half witnessing the intergenerational encounters, the second half inviting the viewer backstage into the making of the work. Multiple narratives thread through the work, exploring themes of connection, storytelling, truth and fiction, power and deception, human motivation and trust.
In a gallery configuration designed in collaboration with Frenkel, Koffler301 is presenting two distinct ways of viewing the project: A two-channel installation bounded by key video stills, with parts 1 and 2 shown together; and a single channel screening for private viewing, with the two parts in sequence.
