Power Ballin’

Michelle and I were lucky enough to acquire tickets to the Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery‘s Power Ball gala. I had really high hopes for this party, because I had heard stories from last year’s event about hot tubs, hallways full of candy, mysterious holes in the wall into which people would reach their hands and squeal, bartenders in panda suits serving drinks against a backdrop of screens set to the panda porn channel… everything I want to see in an art party, in other words.

With that in mind, you might understand why I was mildly disappointed with the show this year. I hate when I go into something with such high expectations; if I could just remind myself that I am a no-account girl at the appropriate time, I might better appreciate what I had.

That said, I did have a fantastic time at the party. The gallery was packed with people, from the very rich, to the moderately famous, to…well, me. Power Ball isn’t just some gala fundraiser—it’s an art party, so you tend to see a broader spectrum of people than you might at any other event that costs a hundred and sixty bucks a head to get in. I counted at least seven Lady Gagas, three of them men. It was fabulous. Oh, and then there was the little matter of the open bar.

If there is anything I love in a party, it’s free stuff. Food, drink, swag, I will have it all. And Power Ball had all three…sorta. It was difficult to come across any prepared food unless you hung out near the kitchen door, or managed to make it out through the mass of people on the patio to where there was, apparently, although thankfully I somehow missed it, an entire bull on a spit. However, even if I had found myself in the convenient locations for food acquisition, the dishes they were offering were a celebration of animal carnage, and being more into the vegetable variety, I opted for the chips I found in one of the fridges in the fridge room.

Refrigerators lined the walls of the room, each containing something different. Some contained comestibles, such as candy or cold beer, for the taking, which came in handy for Michelle when she didn’t want to wait in line at the open bar, and some contained art—not for the taking. Or so you might think, although near the end of the night I did see someone carrying around a stuffed chicken that I had seen in a fridge earlier in the evening.

But my favourite of all was a fridge full of plastic eyeballs, the sort that are encased in some bit of liquid in the plastic sphere so that the iris always points upward. But even better than the mild creep factor of a fridge full of eyeballs was the fact that when you took two of the eyeballs and smashed them together, they began to glow. Fun! At the beginning of the night I overheard a security person tell someone not to touch the eyeballs, but by the time I made it over there a couple of hours later, they were practically handing them out like candy. Needless to say I filled my pockets.

The other draw to an art party, besides the art, of course, and the open bar—of course—is the people-watching. And the people-watching was second-to-none! The place was wall-to-wall rich folks. I also saw a few well-known Canadians, like hip-hop artist K-OS and dancer/choreographer Blake McGrath.

But I was more interested in meeting a couple of local artists that I really admire, Allyson Mitchell and Deirdre Logue. They run the Feminist Art Gallery (FAG), which is basically Allyson’s workshop turned into a display space. I went there a few weeks ago to see Elisha Lim’s Illustrated Gentlemen and fell in love with the whole project of FAG. So I was really excited to meet both of them and talk about art. I also gave Deirdre two of the glowing eyeballs I had acquired from the fridge. She seemed suitably impressed.

The bathroom was a mess of plastic-surgered clones primping before the mirrors. At one point one Eurotrash-tourist asked the room where the next party was happening. I told her that North By Northeast was going on and there were plenty of after-hours parties all over downtown. She leaned into me and asked if these after-hours parties would be the kinds of places where she could find some marijuana. Being in a jovial and welcoming mood, I responded, “Oh, honey, you can find anything anywhere in this city—it’s always snowing in Toronto!” And she called out to her friend in delight: “Did you hear that, Mariana? She said it’s always snowing in Toronto!” And the two of them practically squealed with approval. I had to make a quick exit before she asked me exactly where the snow might be falling, because in truth I don’t know the answer to that question. I just know that the sentiment is true.

So Power Ball wasn’t without some spectacle; I had a fantastic time—not panda sex fantastic, but fantastic nonetheless—and hope to have the chance to go again next year.