LIFT announces Finnish Visiting Artist Charlotte Clermont
Photo by Renata Mohamed
THE LIAISON OF INDEPENDENT FILMMAKERS OF TORONTO (LIFT)
ANNOUNCES FINNISH VISITING ARTIST CHARLOTTE CLERMONT
Toronto, October 7, 2026—The Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT) is pleased to announce that Québec artist Charlotte Clermont, based in Helsinki, Finland, has joined us as a visiting artist from October 5 to December 31, 2026. She is the seventh resident in the residency program for alumni of the Academy of Fine Arts of the University of the Arts Helsinki. This residency, which started in 2019 as a partnership between the Academy and the Saastamoinen Foundation, is designed to provide international opportunities for alumni in the form of residency grants to prestigious residencies in New York, Maastricht, London and Toronto.
Clermont will be using the time and resources at LIFT to create an analogue film work that allows her to research different methods of optical printing and photochemical alteration. She will use optical printing to produce red monochrome images, exploring how prolonged light and sleeplessness can be articulated through photochemical transformation. She will work with black-and-white negatives, reprinting them with the optical printer and using coloured gels to create a spectrum of red hues, and will incorporate solarization and mordançage, allowing these processes to function as languages of their own and producing perceptual fields that oscillate between presence and disappearance.
“Over the past decade, I have developed a sustained engagement with analogue film, approaching its tools as sensory extensions of the body. At this stage in my trajectory, deepening connections within Canada’s experimental film community is both necessary and aligned with my practice and this residency offers an opportunity to reconnect with artists whose practices relate to my own in Toronto’s active media arts scene. I’m sure these relationships will form a foundation of trust and shared experimentation, enriching the creative environment of the residency. The residency would allow me to advance a body of work in a highly focused, collaborative environment, while strengthening ties to both local and international networks.”
—Charlotte Clermont
With a background in analogue experimental film, Charlotte Clermont explores the temporal dimensions of how the body shapes, preserves, and creates what we perceive as reality, using film, sound and text. Drawing on materials from her immediate environment, she works upon the chemical sensitivity of film through various alterations, while leaving a large place to chance. Her work generally develops an inherent, autonomous, and symbolically encoded metalanguage. Her most recent film “du soleil, que ça existe,” has been nominated by Nordic and Baltic Young Artist Award (2024) and has been exhibited at Filmverkstaden (Vaasa, 2025), Forum Box (Helsinki, 2026), and Photographic Gallery Hippolyte (Helsinki, 2026). Her work has been shown internationally in film festivals, such as International Film Festival Rotterdam (Netherlands), Fracto (Germany), Künstlerhaus Bethanian (Germany), Festival des cinémas différents et expérimentaux de Paris (France), Edinburgh International Film Festival (Scotland), Festival ECRĀ (Brazil), 25th Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival (Czechia), Beijing International Short Film Festival (China), and Saigon Experimental Film Festival (Vietnam). She has been an artist in residence at Studio Kura (Japan, 2016), Signal Culture (United States, 2017), Shiro Oni (Japan, 2018), Archipelago Artist Residency in Korpo (Finland, 2022), Baltic Analog Lab (Latvia, 2024), Mustarinda (Finland, 2025), ÖRES (Finland, 2025), Copper Leg (Estonia, 2026) and Adélard (Canada, 2026). https://www.charlotteclermont.com
Charlotte Clermont’s visit is made possible by the Academy of Fine Arts at the University of the Arts Helsinki in partnership with the Saastamoinen Foundation.
Academy of Fine Arts of the University of the Arts Helsinki is Finland’s only university-level educational institution in its field. They lead the way in contemporary art education, while fostering the dialogue between teaching in fine arts and the international art community. They train artists and professionals of fine arts who learn their own strengths and expression methods in a world where artists take on multi-faceted roles and profiles. The Academy of Fine Arts has offered artistic education since 1848, and it is at the vanguard of artistic research. They have approximately 280 students and 15 professors.
https://www.uniarts.fi/en/units/academy-of-fine-arts
Saastamoinen Foundation is a global partner to Art and Science, supporting artists and researchers on a long-term basis and promote their networks around the world. The foundation holds one of the most notable collections of modern art in Finland, which is displayed in EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art. The Foundation is also active in other fields, strongly supporting projects aimed at Finnish youth, such as the Yrityskylä societal learning environment and peace-building programme Gutsy Go. Long-term collaboration with the University of Eastern Finland and Aalto university on the ensure the foundation’s positive impact on research. The foundation has a close relationship with Uniarts Helsinki and supports their internationalisation programme and art pedagogy research in Fine Arts.
https://saastamoinenfoundation.fi/en
The Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT) is Canada’s foremost artist-run production and education organization dedicated to celebrating excellence in the moving image. LIFT exists to provide support and encouragement for independent filmmakers and artists through affordable access to production, post-production and exhibition equipment; professional and creative development; workshops and courses; commissioning and exhibitions; artist residencies; and a variety of other services.
http://lift.ca
LIFT is supported by self-generated revenue as well as the following year-round funders: the Canada Council for the Arts (CCA), the Ontario Arts Council (OAC), Ontario Arts Foundation, the Government of Ontario and the Toronto Arts Council (TAC).
As a charitable organization, LIFT graciously accepts donations via our CanadaHelps page. If you would like to support our filmmaking community, please visit https://lift.ca/donate
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For additional information please see http://lift.ca or e-mail Executive Director Chris Kennedy at director@lift.ca
Monday 5 October 2026 – Thursday 31 December 2026
Non-members:
Members:
Location:
Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT)
1137 Dupont Street
Toronto Ontario