Performance Series: Perlieu 

Andy Rubio, Levin Ifko and Alexa Bunnell  
Curated by Dan Cardinal McCartney 

The history of the IKG is full of innovative and bold performances. Continuing this tradition, artist and curator Dan Cardinal McCartney guest-curates a series of performances by AUArts alumni. The featured artists include Andy Rubio, Levin Ifko, and Alexa Bunnell, all of whom are key figures in the Calgary arts community and have contributed to arts administration, programming, and technical roles in recent years within the artist-run centres in the city. Each artist will perform works exploring themes related to connection, transition, and rest.  

Andy Rubio ( No-Body:) ) is a Queer, Trans*, and French-Can./Chinese mixed-race artist practicing in Calgary, Alberta; Mohkinstsis, Treaty 7 Land Territory. Proudly graduated from AUArts in 2023, with a BFA majoring in Print Media and minoring in Fibre Arts. They are a printmaker, fibre artist, Exhibition Preparator & Studio Caretaker for The Bows, and an avid volunteer in the arts community. Through play with humor, tense absurdity, and juxtaposition, they enjoy exploring themes of Queer and mixed-race visibility, experiences, liminal space, representation, commodification, and nostalgia. Lately, they have been focusing on starting a Carpenter Apprenticeship, and they live sweetly with their partner and their two kitty babies, Dandelion and Bingus. 
 

Levin Ifko is an interdisciplinary artist and writer. Blending practices in textiles, photography, sculpture, and installation, his visual art is playful and intimate, often engaging with ideas of queer and trans memory, speculative futures, and his fascination with objects and sensory perception. Levin received his BFA in Media Arts (2022) from AUArts, where he cultivated his interests in audio, video, and interactive art. Lately, he’s been putting his energy into reconnecting with his passion for music and performing. 

Levin has shown their work across Alberta as part of travelling exhibitions, as an artist-in-residence at The New Gallery, Stride Gallery. His first solo exhibition was shown in Esker Foundation’s Project Space in 2024, and he recently launched his first curatorial project, Odd Objects: Things We Believe In, showing as part of the TREX Travelling Exhibition Program from 2025-2027. 

Gratefully from and based on Treaty 7 land in Calgary, Levin is heavily involved with the arts at a local and national scale. This includes regularly writing about local exhibitions for the online publication Akimbo, collaborating with other artists to create audio, video, and design projects, working as an arts administrator and technician, as well as designing and facilitating arts programming. 
 

Alexa Bunnell is an emerging curator, artist, writer, fermenter and bike enthusiast. Their practice is currently based in Mohkinstsís (Calgary, AB) on Treaty 7 Territory. Adoration, playfulness and multi-species conspirators guide their practice and research. They are influenced by doom metal, plant histories, bike paths shaped by rivers, mycorrhizal webs, and cold, fermented beverages on hot days.  

Their artistic work has recently been presented at EMMEDIA Gallery and Production Society, Marion Nicoll Gallery, White Rabbit Festival, The Bows and The New Gallery.  Their writing has appeared in ReIssue Magazine, LUMA Quarterly, CMagazine, Galleries West and Canadian Art. Alexa has received numerous scholarships and grants, including from Calgary Arts Development and Canada Council of the Arts.  In 2020, they were awarded runner up for the Canadian Art Writing Prize. They are currently the Program Manager and Curator for TREX SW.  
 

Dan Cardinal McCartney (he/him) is an interdisciplinary artist and curator who holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from AUArts (2016) in Drawing. Most importantly, they are a full-time caregiver for their sister, Karri. Dan is of Athabasca Chipewyan First Nations with family ties of Mikisew Cree, Metis, and mixed settler lines from Treaty 8 territory, specifically Fort Chipewyan. He was raised in foster care in the northern boreal region of Fort McMurray. 

As a Two Spirit transgender artist, Dan sifts through patterns of intergenerational trauma. He relates his personal, ongoing reconnection with his family to his yearning for gender euphoria through storytelling. Dan focuses on mixed media collage, painting, moving images, and performance. He is interested in the genre of horror through a contemporary, Indigenous lens. Currently, Dan is a Co-Artistic Director at Stride Gallery in so-called Calgary, Alberta.