Root Division is delighted to bring in the end of the summer with a medley of performative explorations. Sideshow Happening celebrates the links between conceptual art and the carnival, bringing together artists working in a variety of titillating forms, including: stand-up comedy, glass eating, instructive lectures, living sculpture, noise music, snake charming, fantasy travel, film, slideshow, dance, and their infinite combinations.

Located on the periphery of the circus, the Sideshow offers an intimate den of intrigue, captivation, and magic; a space of marvels and mysteries that was influenced as much by the emerging Cabinets of Curiosities of the late 19th century (the precursors to the museum), as they were by the rapidly developing public sphere of collective entertainment (vaudeville, varieté, radio). The Happening offers a space for experimentation and evaluation of the experience of art in everyday life, one not limited to products or objects. Sideshow Happening draws on popular culture, natural history, and artistic production to offer a bridge between performing and performance, audience and spectator, sentimental and obscene, constructed and unfolding.

The artists in this exhibition explore all these themes in captivating fashion and invite the audience to relish being entertained.