“The story of Niagara Custom Lab dates to some time in the mid-90s, when the filmmaker Sebastjan Henrickson opened a film lab for artists on Niagara Street in Toronto. Niagara would process celluloid in ways no other lab would, treating it like the most versatile of artists’ mediums: a canvas coated in chemistry.”

Kate Addleman-FrankelCurator, Bright Lights Dark City: Niagara Custom Lab and Toronto Experimental Film

Acme was commissioned by curator Kate Addleman-Frankel and the Working Image Collective to design the catalogue for Bright Lights Dark City: Niagara Custom Lab and Toronto Experimental Film a feature exhibition in the 2015 Contact Photography Festival. Bright Lights Dark City explores the anarchic spaces of Niagara Custom Lab and the remarkable local culture it encourages, embodies, and sustains. The book brings together nine artists, both emerging and established, whose documentary and conceptual work showcases the significance of the lab to diverse projects and practices.

With work by Michael Barker, Carl E. Brown, Sylvain Chausée, Kelly Egan, R. Bruce Elder, Elisa Julia Gilmour, John Porter, John Price, and Izabella Pruska-Oldenhof.

Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Bright Lights Dark City
Exposed Film Tape
Bright Lights Dark City