In When Do I See Photons? Oswald Wiener, cybernetician, author, and inspiration for the inaugural exhibition at the Goethe-Institut’s new locale, poses this very question. Photons, the smallest particles of light, stimulate our retinas. So what does it mean to ‘see’? Five artists, all students at Transmedialen Raum de la Kunsthochscule für Medien Köln, a prominent German media school, seek to answer this question through a mix of software and nature.

Four of the exhibit’s five works are short films projected onto a screen, and are visible from both inside and outside of the building through the institute’s floor-to-ceiling windows. These films looped one after the other, interrupted only by white-on-black titles and credits. Jan Goldfuss’ EntroPI, by far the most intriguing and unusual piece, used mathematical procedures and algorithms to create a complex black-on-white animation. This piece felt inherently organic, playing with the mind, making the viewer question what it is the eye perceives. Is it airborne bacteria, smoke, or dust? Lines, waves, and geometric formations emerge subtly from the multi-dimensional canvas created within, and just as quickly melt away from perception. While  entirely computer-generated (the artist goes so far as to leave exposed animation framework and holes to demonstrate this), EntroPI manages to be universal, and naturally stunning.

In Cellular Performance, Verena Friedrich documents the manipulation of human and animal cells in black and X-ray white. These cells shift to form words and letters that come in and out of focus with the motions of the living organisms that constitute them. It’s an interesting concept to wrap one’s mind around; is this a statement on the impermanence of language, the ever-changing nature of human invention, or the idea that technology takes on a life of its own? The answer is unclear, but Friedrich’s cells are engaging to observe and make one feel acutely mortal and self-aware.

Though interesting and emotionally engaging, the three remaining works are less visually arresting. Suija Kim’s [S] offers an up-close, greyscaled view of natural objects and phenomena. Stones, waves, and exploding geysers are filmed with dizzying camera angles and points of view that play with the ability to comprehend what it is that’s being shown on screen. Hörner/Antlfinger’s Two Homes juxtaposes footage of a farm and chicken coop with edited YouTube clips of a small parrot performing impressive tricks and caressing his owner’s hand. The fifth artist, Vera Drebusch, was present to engage visitors in her work Beamer Walks—essentially a tour of Montreal’s Quartier des Spectacles by the light of an electric torch. This was then captured on camera to become, in turn, one of the films being shown.

As my mom pulled up beside the Goethe-Institut to give me a lift home, she passed the films projected in one of the windows, as well as the glass room in which a mini-rave complete with colourful strobe lights and an excellent DJ imported from Germany for the occasion was taking place, and said bemusedly, “Are you sure this is an art exhibition?” Pass by the Goethe-Institut to see for yourself, but the five artists on display, though often esoterically, manage to raise not only the question of When do I See Photons and what it means to see, but the most fundamental question of all: What is art?

When Do I See Photons? runs through Dec. 31 at the Goethe-Institut, 1626 Saint Laurent. Admission is free. 

Samuel Beckett’s oft-cited yet largely misunderstood piece of absurdist theatre, Waiting for Godot, has had its own share of lingering­—not idly, but in a constant state of rework, reinterpretation, and reproduction. In the 60 years since its publication, the show’s vagabond characters Vladimir and Estragon have plodded from stage to stage, until finally setting up their meagre camp in McGill’s own Players’ Theatre this season.  Thoroughly re-envisioned for a modern audience, director Isaac Robinson’s take on Beckett’s slim but weighty work is one part respectful preservation, one part winking reinterpretation.

From Beckett’s vague set description, the Players construct a familiar Montreal site: the back alley of a seedy bar, the door marked “Delivery Room: Godot’s Bar.” Amid flyers plastered across the set’s wall hides the central set prop: the indispensable willow tree.  Estragon (Martin Law), in his patchwork jacket and ill-fitting boots slumped beneath the “tree,” could just as easily be the unlucky gentleman of the show’s original time as of today. Law, lank-limbed, unshaven, and slumped with all the pride of a man recently awoken after a night spent in a ditch, portrayed Estragon (“Gogo” affectionately) with deadpan excellence.  From tattered bowler to exposed toe, Law embodied the hardened Estragon with an appropriate lack of panache.

As his companion, compatriot, and sometimes combatant, Vladimir, or “Didi” (Rachel Resnik) played the clown to Estragon’s straight man. With arms splayed in pantomimed emotion, voice jumping an octave a minute, and face contorting from girlish pouts to livid glares, Vladimir acted (and acted indeed) as Gogo’s perfect counterpart.  Resnik played the traditionally male role with slight femininity, skewing the somewhat homoerotic undertones of Vladimir and Estragon’s bond.

In place of this, enter Pozzo and Lucky. In this production they were presented as near caricatures of queer stereotypes. Pozzo, played by Sebastian Biase with appropriate bombast, comes off as the aging aesthete toting a handsome young toy—or in this case, slave.  Martin Roy as Lucky, limp-wristed and pouty, shed his character’s traditional ropes and chains for bondage paraphernalia and biker shorts, modernizing and somewhat undermining the monstrousness of human ownership. As the vagabonds’ visitors confuse dominance and subservience, knowledge and madness, and all of life’s seeming opposites, the two distorted our notion of certainty in human existence.

For all its comically modern touches—replacing Pozzo’s chicken and wine for KFC and Molson—the Players’ Theatre production did Beckett’s work its due justice. The anxious irresolution on the page translated to the stage, giving viewers a substantial show that remains unresolved. Like the quasi-MacGuffin Godot, meaning loitered in every line and action, yet never quite materialized.  The characters were helpless and hopeless, the audience jarred and confused, and we are left with nary a conclusion in sight. This production of Waiting for Godot left us waiting—but in eagerness, not want.

Big names and voices will grace the Montreal stage this fall as the Segal Centre for Performing Arts kicks off its 2012-2013 season with its up-close-and-personal rendition of Tony-award-winning  performance Guys and Dolls. A sexy comedy of skewed morality, Guys and Dolls follows two gambling gangsters, Nathan Detroit and Sky Masterson, as they attempt to manipulate and one-up each other within the glamourized setting of a gritty 1940s New York City. Despite its small-scale setting, the production boasts an impressive list of seasoned Broadway and Stratford Festival veterans, all under the expert direction of Diana Leblanc.

Leading this skilled cast is Tony-nominated American actor Scott Wentworth, who portrayed the notorious Masterson in two previous runs of the musical at the Stratford Festival. Wentworth spoke fondly of his history with the show, referring repeatedly to its clever writing, humour, and edginess­—all of which he believes will appeal to a wide array of audience members.

Despite stereotypes surrounding older musicals—overly extravagant and disconnected from real human experience—Wentworth claimed that Guys and Dolls manages to bypass the sentimentality and old-fashionedness typically ascribed to its contemporary productions.

“It’s about your grandparents’ world, but it’s also about everybody’s world,” Wentworth explained. He praised what he and others have interpreted as being the central message of the show: taking risks and following your bliss. Wentworth believed that this prominent theme helps the show transcend generational barriers, and will particularly appeal to university students who are contemplating their futures.

“In a way, the message [of the show] is that you have to risk something, you have to gamble something […] if that’s what you want,” Wentworth said. “That’s a good thing to think about for those [of you] in your early 20s.”

Alongside the big Canadian names appears a group of Montreal performers and McGill graduates, most notably musical director Nick Burgess, comedian Massimo and Montreal-based actor Marcel Jeanin. Among the local talent is actor and stand-up comedian Mike Paterson, a graduate of Dawson College’s DOME theatre program. Paterson, responsible for most of what he described as the “low comedy” of the show, stressed the importance of the comedic aspects of both lyrics and dialogue. The well-written humour, he believed, played an important role in maintaining Guys and Dolls’ legacy.

Like Wentworth, Paterson believed that a modern audience will not find it difficult to relate to the show’s different characters and subplots, despite its dated setting. “Two gamblers bet that they can’t take a religious girl to Cuba, and that’s the kind of thing that I would [do] with my guy friends,” he joked.

Equipped with a stellar list of collaborators, along with a script and score which have entertained generations of theatre lovers, Guys and Dolls is likely to have something for everyone.

Guys and Dolls runs through Oct. 28 at the Segal Centre for Performing Arts, 5170 Cote-Ste-Catherine. Student tickets are $29.