This photo series taken in 1975 on the grounds of a farmhouse in Maple, Ontario captures the summer concert series that started the performance art group Maple Sugar (1975-1979). Among the permanent members of the collective were David Rosenboom, Jacqueline Humbert, and George Manupelli. Other core members of Maple Sugar were Michael Byron and Mary Moulton. The group at different times included various friends and faculty of Rosenboom at York University: James Tenney, Eugene Tellez, William Winant, and many others.

The group performed across many venues in Canada, including York University, where it was based, A Space Gallery, Art Gallery of Ontario, and the Music Gallery in Toronto, as well as in the US. Though dissolved in 1979 with the move of its key members to California, the collaboration proceeded in work on the recording and further performances of “J.Jasmine…My New Music” (1977), the film for Rosenboom’s composition “In the Beginning V (The Story)” made by Manupelli in collaboration with Rosenboom in 1981 and featuring Humbert, Winant, and Jean Moncrieff as the main actors.

The photo series presented here so far depicts the “Video in the Garden” installation by Paul Campbell (no. 7); audio rope tricks of David Rosenboom nos. 6, 9); David Rosenboom, Michael Byron, Jacqueline Humber, Ellen Band, and Dian Roblin (under scenic names – Dave Charles, Rosy Dawn & the Vi-Breasts) doing “experiment in extravagant floorshows” (no. 10); “Projections” made by Jacqueline Humbert and Terrill Maguire – designed for four slide projectors, a 12-foot cheesecloth cube suspended in a dark, outdoor setting, and a dancer to interact from within the cube with the light beams, creating a matrix of shadows and images on a 360-degree projected panorama.