180 x 120 cm / Courtesy of the artist
Temperatures in the streets of Montreal dropped below freezing this morning, but it’s still warm at PHI. The contemporary center-museum-gallery-collective will celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2027. To mark the occasion, the fall-winter exhibitions are sublime—somewhat documentary in nature and just campy enough to be utterly delightful.
Cheryl Sim, curator of Stephanie Comilang’s exhibition *HYMNES*, discusses her collaboration with the artist as well as PHI’s philosophy, speaking of “joy, beauty, and individual stories, and how they come together.” Daniel Fiset, curator of Jean-François Bouchard’s exhibition *FOI OU FEU*, speaks of the “power of collective work.” What we feel above all is a passion and a confidence that create something exceptional.
Both exhibitions this season are centered around the work of a single artist, and it is through the collaboration between the curators and the artists that spaces are created just beyond reality—where we touch the heart and where our breath quickens.
The exhibitions open today, October 28, 2026, and will run through March 14, 2027.
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FOI OU FEU (TURN OR BURN), JEAN-FRANÇOIS BOUCHARD
Jean-François Bouchard organizes the absolutist thinking of street preachers into rhythms and concentric circles to address black, white, and moral division in Western society. It is a documentary work that breaks down, piece by piece, the screaming evangelism and the men who lend their voices to it.
There is a “DOOM ROOM” featuring posters claiming that abortion is a one-way ticket to Hell, as well as triptychs of preachers’ faces—mouths agape, eyes possessed—cut into pieces to give them a 3D effect.
But the centerpiece of the exhibition is the video installation *TURN OR BURN*, where seven channels show preachers (real ones) in the midst of their sermons. There’s the preacher’s rhythm, the pointed fingers, the wide-open mouths, the microphones like those of pop stars. And, cut up, repeated, cascading: SIN / PEACE / YOU / JESUS / HEAVEN / HELL / REPENT. It’s camp, it’s musical, it’s delightfully stereotypical.
And the windows are covered in pink plastic, like in an ugly church, and you feel a little like a sinner.
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HYMNES (ANTHEMS), STEPHANIE COMILANG
Stephanie Comilang’s work is spread across two buildings and features five video installations created over the course of her 10-year career.
She describes it as “documentary science fiction,” and the way she films and edits the footage for her videos and installations is reminiscent of *2001: A Space Odyssey* that had been hit square in the face by a reality TV episode.
It’s incredibly dynamic, and the stories and people interviewed by Stephanie Comilang are woven together into a poetic puzzle. What we liked best was above all the subject matter—more or less the same, the common thread that ties her works together: immigration and emigration, the OFWs (Overseas Foreign Workers).
Connectivity, visual collages, poems, and near-failed interviews are at the heart of Comilang’s video installations, which are slightly pop-inspired and full of life.
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PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Where? At PHI
FOI OU FEU (TURN OR BURN), Jean-François Bouchard / at 407 Saint-Pierre Street
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HYMNES (ANTHEMS), Stephanie Comilang / at 451 and 465 Saint-Jean Street
When? October 28, 2026, through March 14, 2027
How? A regular-price ticket is $20 CAD, and one ticket is valid for both exhibitions.
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