paolapoletto@gmail.com
paolapoletto.com
My practice includes photography, drawing, sculpture, writing and creative collaboration. I am the independent co-producer of art/lit projects including OOL (Office of Life), an imprint I started in 2019. I am currently pursuing practice-based doctoral research at The Creative School, Toronto Metropolitan University, aiming to make a new museum experience map focused on artist-worker perspectives through an auto-theory lens. It includes a blog where I write about what I am learning and thinking about for a transformational museum experience. It is ordered by panoramic images of the reflecting pool at Mel Lastman Square in North York, a series titled Glitch that I took over 10 months in 2022. It moves through additional images I took of the AGO's Walker Court, where I consider the symbolic resonances of a seasonal and cyclical water cycle and the metaphor of the pool with site-specificity and my own position stitching the narrative.
ARTIST
MUSEUM IN WATER: skated on ice and stone, in Machine a group exhibition curated by Lee Petrie, Gladstone House, Toronto,, January - April, 2026, supported by TMU.
MUSEUM IN WATER: iced, exhibition and artist-in-residence, 113Research, OCADU, Toronto, curated by Pam Patterson, January - April, 2026, supported by Ontario Arts Council.
MUSEUM IN WATER, exhibition, Neighbourhood Gallery, Toronto, curated by Lauren McKinley Renzetti, November 2025- January 2026, supported by Ontario Arts Council.
MUSEUM IN WATER, exhibition and artist-in-residence, ARTSPACE TMU, 401 Richmond, July - October, 2025.
MUSEUM IN WATER, artist-in-residence, Arquetopia Foundation, curated by Francisco Guevara, Puebla, Mexico, May, 2025.
Rabbit||Pause, site-specific installation with Samantha Sannella, Clarke Centre for the Arts, January 2024, supported by Ontario Arts Council.
Sounds of Wonder, photographic work with David Gauntlett in How Does It Feel? Dante’s Emotions Today, an exhibition accompanying the conference Community and Emotions in Dante, University of Toronto/Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Toronto, April 12 - 21, 2023.
Sounds of Wonder, installation with with David Gauntlett in Institution of Knowledge, an exhibition accompanying the conference organized by the Kule Institute for Advanced Study and the Research-Creation and Social Justice CoLABoratory. University of Alberta, May 15-19, 2023, curated by Natalie Loveless and Geoffrey Rockwell, FAB Gallery, University of Alberta, Edmonton, May 2023. Publication forthcoming.
DQA (Double Quadruple Axel - Unentitled), 8 digital photos as part of the virtual 10th anniversary on-line exhibition with North York Arts, October 2021.
StudioPeePee (2012-17 and 2020), artist-curator, a durational photo installation, bookwork published in signed limited edition of 25, 2020.
ego-portrait, artist-curator, installation, Community Gallery, Wychwood Barns, Toronto, 2019.
Ghosts of Monsters, artist-curator, photo installation, Lower Gallery at Toronto Centre for the Arts, supported by North York Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and presented as part of Contact Photography Festival and Doors Open Toronto, May 2018. Accompanied by bookwork, PARKHOME.
Gas Up!, photo series with Liis Toliao in Suburbed, curated by Patrick Macaulay, Harbourfront Centre, Sept - Dec, 2014.
Directions for Usefulness, photo installation in Survoyeurism: Reconsidering Surveillance, curated by Nives Hajdin, The Open Gallery - OCADU, April, 2014.
Oh Dear, Public Art that unhinges North York's sense of modesty, artist-curator, a multi-site-specific exhibition in North York, Jul - Aug, 2013, supported by Ontario Arts Council, North York Arts.
Tel-talk, artist-curator, site-specific installations across Canada co-produced with Yvonne Koscielak, Liis Toliao, with exhibition at Telephone Booth Gallery (Sharlene Rankin - Director) and book, Sept 2011 - Jul 2012, writing supported by Ontario Arts Council.
Boredom Fighters!, Graphic Poems, artist-curator, co-edited with Jake Kennedy, Tightrope Books, Toronto-Detroit, 2008.
California Dreaming, in Waypoint, exhibition curated by Patrick Macaulay, York Quay Galleries, Harbourfront Centre, Jul-Sept, 2005.
Kiss Machine, artist/curator/co-founder, zine published twice yearly featuring over 300 artists and writers, and performance series 2000 - 2005, supported by Ontario Arts Council, Canada Council and Canada Magazine Fund.
Banana Bread, in Geostash, with Jon Sasaki, exhibition curated by Michelle Kasprzak and Michael Alstad, year.01.com/geostash, October/November 2004, supported by YYZ, Toronto.
Girls and Guns, artist-curator, Forest City Gallery, London exhibition and performance/launch at YYZ Artist Outlet, Toronto, Apr 2003; Dorrotyea Galleria, Budapest, Aug, 2004; Tirana, Albania, Sept 2004; Novisad Media Festival, Serbia & Montenegro, Oct, 2004, Supported by Canadian Consulate in Budapest.
CURATOR - COORDINATOR - WRITER
Karl Mata Hipol: Maglayag ("Sail On,”), 2024—ongoing, residency curator of a series of mixed-media woven paintings exploring themes of migration, resilience, and survival through the lens of Filipino and Canadian histories, AGO X RBC ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE with workshops and installation, Art Gallery of Ontario, 2024 - 2025
Karl Mata Hipol: Maglayag ("Sail On,”), 2024—ongoing, residency curator of a series of mixed-media woven paintings exploring themes of migration, resilience, and survival through the lens of Filipino and Canadian histories, AGO X RBC ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE with workshops and installation, Art Gallery of Ontario, 2024 - 2025
Michelle Peraza: Cosmology, 2024—ongoing, residency curator: Peraza explores the complexity of the LatinX experience, postcolonialism, allegory, transculturation, resilience, repetitive stories, layered identities, and ambiguity, AGO X RBC ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE with workshops, Art Gallery of Ontario, 2024
Sharl G. Smith: (a)Mending: the ọ́bị̀à experience, 2024, residency curator of an exploration of sounds and movements from pre-colonial West Africa that endured the Atlantic Slave Trade and transformed into Ọ́bị̀à, Myal, and Revivalism in the Caribbean and Americas. It celebrates these potent medicinal practices, rooted in indigenous energy-based sciences, as a restorative antidote to ongoing colonial violence, AGO X RBC ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE with performance, Art Gallery of Ontario, 2024
In Canadian Perspectives: Negotiating Borders, Creative photo essay and written response to exhibition at SAW Gallery, Ottawa, 2024.
Clayton Lee: The Goldberg Variations, 2023, residency curator of a large-scale intervention in the Gallery at large; the latest in an ongoing series, the artist explores his own personal history through the lens of queer diasporic sexuality and aesthetics, classical music, and professional wrestler Bill Goldberg, AGO X RBC ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE with performance, Art Gallery of Ontario, 2023
Paul Hong, Ivetta SunYoung Kang, Jake Kennedy, Paola Poletto: Entanglements artist-curator, exhibition and self-published bookwork Entanglements (tea, maybe) with, OOL and Korean Cultural Centre – Ottawa, September – October, 2022, supported by Korean Cultural Centre, TMU, Okanagan College.
PARKHOME, self-published bookwork by Paola Poletto with Brendan George Ko, Paul Hong and Flavio Trevisan, OOL, Toronto, 2018.
Meera Margaret Singh: Echoes, Laughter and Female Body Builders, Case study in Feminism and Museums, edited by Jenna Ashton, Museums Etc., London, 2017.
EDUCATION
PhD, Media and Design Innovation (part-time studies)
The Creative School, Toronto Metropolitan University
Research-Creation focus: transformational experiences - artist work in museums
2021 —
Doctoral committee:
David Gauntlett (Supervisor), Canada Research Chair, Creative Innovation and Leadership
Heather Diack, Associate Professor in History of Art, Photography and Visual Culture
Ravindra Mohabeer, Associate Professor and Chair of Journalism
Master of Fine Arts, Western University, London, Canada
Bachelor of Fine Arts, York University, Toronto, Canada
WORK
2026 - : Toronto Metropolitan University — Lecturer
2013 - 2025: Art Gallery of Ontario – Director, Engagement & Learning
2008 - 2013: City of Mississauga – Supervisor, Cultural Programs
2000 - 2008: Design Exchange – Senior Director, Public Programs and Exhibitions
1998 - 2000: Canadian Medical Hall of Fame – Curator
1993 - 1998: Italian Cultural Institute, Toronto/Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Italy – Programs Coordinator/Assistant Curator
AWARD
AWARD
2017 John Hobday Award in Visual Arts Management, Canada Council for the Arts
MEMBERSHIP
Photography Network
International Committee for Museums and Collections of Modern Art (CIMAM)