Jay Dart will be exhibiting at Drawing Now art fair in Paris, France March 22-25 2018. He will be showing work alongside fellow Galerie Youn artist, Peter Morstad. Galerie You has produced limited edition catalogue which is available for order at the gallery. He will also be showing work at Papier 18 in Montreal with Slate Gallery in April and in August he will have a solo show at the Agnes Jamieson Gallery, in Minden, ON.
Roll up, rollup, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Arts Club Band - Arts Talk Mar 15 at Station Gallery
Station Gallery curator Olex Wlasenko conducts a talk Thursday Mar 15 2018 on the art of the Beatle's iconic Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover. The album was a revolution in itself in so many ways, the music being one but the cover too. Wlasenko will speak to the many clues the four moptops inserted into the art and what they say about the band, the music, the times and the future as it was then.
Wlasenko's talk will be followed by a talk by movie poster collector and restorer, Dan Miles whose own collection of posters is currently on display at the Gallery.
Looking in on 'Look Out / Look In' at the Visual Arts Centre until Apr 4, artist talk Mar 25
By Will McGuirk
The Visual Arts Centre in Bowmanville has Fiona Crangle's "Look Out/ Look In" on exhibit. The show runs from Saturday Mar 10 - Sunday Apr 4 with an artist talk on Mar 25 at 1 - 3 p.m.
In the accompanying catalogue there is a question asked - "by reclaiming the process of painting the woman, and positioning contemporary woman in place of historical ones, Crangle, becomes the actor and raises questions about the ways women are scrutinized in painting. How are we looking at them today?"
Lets answer that. There have been quite a few female-centric exhibitions in Durham Region in the past while. Read about some of them here and then look at some of the works by Toni Hamel and Shaun Downey for their looks at women.
Latcham Gallery Annual Juried Exhibition opens Saturday Mar 10 in Stouffville
David Samila is one of the many artists currently on exhibit at the 2018 Annual Juried Exhibition at the Latcham Gallery in Stouffville. The opening reception is Saturday Mar 10, 1 - 3 p.m.
Other artists on display include Jim Hurtubise, Cate McGuire, Kyungmin Kate Lee, Judy Sherman, Fiona Evans, Ray Shivrattan, Tibor Hargitai, Virginia Dixon, Jeannie Pappas, Stephanie Thompson, Diana Hillman, Justin Mencel, Joanna Strong, Kim-Lee Kho, Kal Honey, Andrew Cripps, Leonora Husveti-Frenette, Bob Tunnoch, Fong Ki Wan, Patrick Stieber, Kyle Yip, Clare Ross, Ronald Regamey, Peter Adams, Vicky Talwar, Doris Purchase, Yang Yang Pan and Allan O'Marra who also writes extensively on Durham Region arts and history for durhamregion.com.
The Latcham Gallery is located at 6240 Main Street.
Two thumbs Up for Olex Wlasenko exhibit at Art Gallery of Northumberland
Artist Olex Wlasenko celebrates film on canvas, drawing room-sized works based on historic movie stills. Wlasenko, who is also the curator at the Station Gallery in Whitby, has an exhibit running Mar 8 to Apr 29 at the Art Gallery of Northumberland in Cobourg, ON.
Wlasenko is a film buff and has hosted a series of film related talks; on Apr 4 he will host "Overlooked: Canadian Art in 'The Shining.'" Kubrick's classic uses, according to Wlasenko, a wide selection of Canadian works, from Norval Morriseau to Alex Colville to members of Group of Seven. The paintings add another layer of complexity to an already complex movie.
This layered approach to art can be found too in the work of Wlasenko; a simple process dating back to cave man times belies the deep complexity of the story he is telling, building it layer upon layer upon layer.
Screenshot: "Woman and Terrier" by Alex Colville, on the wall above the TV.
Two chances on Brooklyn Doran's latest tour to see the singer/songwriter in Durham Region.
Singer/songwriter Brooklyn Doran is hooked on touring and has lined up an extensive Spring tour of Ontario. She will be on the road with Rory Taillon, a frequent tour mate.
Doran says she is working on a new record to be available later in the year but for now just enjoys performing.
"I won't be touring a new record this time around, I just like the tour life and Rory is a pretty rad tour bud to have! That being said, I think I'll have a few songs coming down the line later in the year."
Originally from Kenora, but now based in Toronto, Doran has played Durham Region previously, most recently at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery in November 2017. She plays Cork and Bean in downtown Oshawa May 1 and the Second Wedge Brewery in Uxbridge May 6 2018.
Wunderlit poster artist Jay Dart is the focus of CBC Arts Exhibitionists
We have been a fan of Jay Dart's Yander Wanderings for some time and were happy he agreed to be the poster guy for the first issue of Wunderlit. See more of his work here.
And we are happy too to share the news he is the subject of a new episode of CBC Arts: Exhibitionists.
Aura (feat. Chief Lady Bird) Sacredness 2018
Nancy King (Chief Lady Bird feat. Aura) Kinship 2018
Pete Smith's 'Can I Kick It Remix Party' kicks off at the RMG Friday Mar 2
The Remix - perhaps the defining artistic process of our time. To take previous works and using their elements make something new. We live at a time of disruption, of fragmentation when the entire planet, everything we know is being broken down into its essential base elements. We can take those pieces and build a new world., not just a song, not just a collage not just mash-up, but an entirely new world. Which is why we at www.slowcity.ca believe creativity is the most important tool and artists our greatest resource.
The remix is the process, the trial and error, the practise. Bowmanville artist Pete Smith is collaborating with other artists to recreate new works from those original works. Smith is working with Lyla Rye, Anda Kubis, John Kissick, Jessica Thompson, James Olley, Chief Ladybird and Paulette Phillips to choose an artist to partner with. They’ve chosen Christina La Sala, Jennie Suddick, Stu Oxley, Duncan Macdonald, Jennifer Wigmore, Mike Pszczonak, Aura and Jean-Paul Kelly.
The Remix party kicks into action at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery Mar 2, 2018. Everyone who brings an artwork in for trade (regardless of age or experience level) is welcome to participate, and will leave with their own remixed piece of art. Anyone and everyone who enjoys making things are welcomed and encouraged to participate!
The Kick It Party is part of the RMG FF monthly events. This month musical guests are Melanie Hebert and Morgan Steele.
In Memoriam Dr. B. George Blake (1922 - 2018)
By Steven Frank
Guest Writer
For the past three decades many people knew Dr. George Blake as a storyteller, having founded the Durham Folklore Society, however, when one looks back at the trajectory of his life, perhaps the greatest story of all is the one of George’s own life.
Born Buxton George Leopold Blake in 1922, George led a rather conventional village life in Green Island, Jamaica until at age 18 he enlisted and found himself on the RMS Queen Elizabeth heading to England to join the Royal Air Force. He was stationed on the home front as a meteorologist in northern Scotland. After the war, George, having turned down a university scholarship, decided to work as a government clerk in London. He grew restless feeling he had a higher calling and after reading a book on Buddhism, which told him he was responsible for his own mental, spiritual and psychological health, would study and eventually become ordained a samanera (novice monk) at the Sinhalese Centre in London. He received his full ordination as a Theravadan Buddhist Monk at the Wat Paknam Temple in Bangkok, Thailand in 1956.
George then decided it was time to work on a degree in psychology at the University of Edinburgh. He would find work in a mental health ward in London and eventually return to Scotland to train in clinical psychology at the University of Glasgow where he became renowned for treating alcoholism. One can’t help but think that his Buddhist teachings informed his successful behaviour therapy techniques helping patients overcome habits and fears.
In 1966 a married George moved to Whitby, Ontario by invitation of York University in Toronto to teach and this led to his work at the Whitby Psychiatric Hospital (now Ontario Shores). This in turn would lead to his founding of the Pinewood Centre for Addiction in Oshawa and the Alexandra Clinic at the Oshawa General Hospital.
Upon ‘retirement’, George returned to his Buddhist studies and even taught courses on Buddhist meditation. Always a great raconteur, George founded the Durham Folklore Society, which continues to celebrate the oral tradition of storytelling nearly three decades later. (They are now known as the Durham Storytellers.) He was an accomplished drummer and drum maker and combined his African/Caribbean stories with the Buddhist legends he learned known as Jataka Tales in another ensemble known as Kalalu Folklore Theatre.
The storytelling and music would all come together and George shared his many talents at various venues including schools, libraries, Durham Art Fest and festivals across Canada including Toronto’s Festival of Storytelling Listen Up!
George was also an author and wrote The Legend of Harriet Tubman; Kaipora Cove; A Buddhist Approach to Managing Stage Fright; A Buddhist Odyssey (A Manual on Meditation) and Bypassing Ego: The Buddhist Way.
George leaves two sons and two grandchildren and a unique legacy as a man who saw life as a journey and a quest for inner harmony and delighted in sharing his stories and wisdom with the world. In 2014 he received the African Canadian Lifetime Achievement Award.
This article first appeared as the text in a display about Blake at the Whitby Station Gallery.
Artist Grant Cole's Parade of Life marches on at The RMG
The artist marches to their own beat. All those beats form the parade of life. Artist Grant Cole explores this parade as it marched its way through the city of Oshawa. Using The Robert McLaughlin Gallery's vast Bouckley collection as a source, Cole has created a series of works which add another beat, another flag, another banner and another voice to the city's parade. The exhibit opens Feb 11. Curator Sonya Jones will conduct a Q and A with Cole, 1-3 p.m.
Photo by Steven Frank
Look Up - Bill Lishman (1939 - 2017) an appreciation - a final interview with Steven Frank
By Will McGuirk
There were no limits to artist, author, filmmaker and environmental activist Bill Lishman, not even the sky was out of bounds.
Lishman, aka Father Goose, because he most famously taught geese to fly, passed away Saturday Dec. 30 2017, at his underground home in Purple Woods, which overlooks the southern shore of Lake Scugog, Ontario.
The home itself is a piece of art, marrying nature and technology in a seamless blend of domes curving into each other. The workflow of tasks, chores and family life were all considered at the project’s inception, right down to the fridge Lishman designed; a circular set of shelving which is pulled up from the kitchen counter top.
His daughter Carmen Lishman posted on her Facebook page, “A beautiful thing that Dad often said: ‘there are no straight lines in nature’. . . Dad's nature followed no straight lines. He provided our human world with beautiful curved lines and natural inspirations. His explorations of bird flight and migration captured our imaginations. An active mind kept him conjuring creative solutions to the world's problems.”
Flow and movement were central to the mind of Lishman. How a family moves in a space below, how a bird moves in the space above, how the world moves in space around - all were thoughtfully answered in his work. Everything he made seemed to either take flight or was about to.
In 1993 Father Goose successfully led 18 hand-raised geese to their traditional migratory home in Virginia. The following Spring the geese returned to Lishman’s farm. The 1996 movie “Fly Away Home”, starring Anna Paquin and Jeff Daniels, was inspired by Lishman’s experience and was nominated for Best Cinematography at the 1996 Academy Awards. Lishman continued migratory explorations (Operation Migration) with other birds including sandhill cranes and whooping cranes. His work led to an additional migratory path which will help preserve the whooping crane.
Photo by Steven Frank
2017 began with his participation in the Durham Reach exhibit at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery, the piece “Wild Man” from the IMAX movie “The Last Buffalo” was displayed. Lishman also had a piece in the Durham ArtFest 25: Reframed held at Gallery 67 in September. Displayed was a maquette of his sculpture “Transcending the Traffic". The piece was created for Expo’86 and is a 26 metre tall cone wrapped with a spiraling flow of traffic, from wheeled vehicles through to walking.
In the 2015 year-end update on Lishman’s website, he writes he was involved in producing a coffee table book on microflights over the Oak Ridge Moraine, was working on a project for relief aid using the small aircraft he designed and built, installed 25 steel figures at Bridgepoint Hospital in Toronto, unveiled his stainless steel Iceberg sculpture at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa and listed a treehouse on his property on Airbnb.
At the end of the letter he says he was asked in an interview what he thought 2016 may bring he says - ‘Aliens will finally reveal that they are actually Angels and will save us humans from ourselves’.
One can imagine Bill as a young boy staring up , under a clear night sky over his parent’s farm in Pickering, at the blinking lights of planes passing overhead, planes or space craft perhaps. One can imagine his awe at the beauty of such a scene, the openness of the sky, the cosmos, the mystery and a building desire to go there, to get up there, to be up there. In a way the entirety of his life’s work has been as if he was reaching up from Durham to his destiny beyond, as if he has been constructing his own Jacob’s Ladder to join the heavens with the earth.
Filling in the blanks; time spent with portraits of the ladies at the Station Gallery
Is it a coincidence it was Alice who navigated us through Wonderland or that it was Dorothy who walked us through the Land of Oz. We are all inside the Looking Glass now, inside the storm, whether environmental or political. This is a time of disruption and artists of all genres are gathering up the pieces of the past and rearranging and rebuilding. But out of the corner of my eye I see something else. I see more and more women emerging as the central force behind the rebuild.
As the world, built on colonial paternalistic pillars, crumbles it is women who are towers of strength. As men thrash around looking for someone to blame, it is women who are getting on with the work of creating a new home. Before the disruption men were born complete, their roles defined, their destiny ordained while women could only be completed by the presence of a man in their life. Not so much anymore. The Old White Males and their acolytes are hanging on but their grip is weak. While they cling to power the artists, the female artists, have been working.
From left: Virtues & Vicissitudes detail, 2.5x4.75m, mixed media on board, 2017, Ramune Luminaire; Separation, 70x100cm, oil on board, 2017, Judith A. Mason; Dementia detail, 91x213cm, mixed media on paper, 2017, Mary Kainer.
At the Visual Arts Centre in September there was an exhibit, “Coming of Age” featuring three mature female artists, Mary Kainer, Ramune Luminaire, and Judith A. Mason. They were collectively exploring what being old means. Old age has meant fear for men but for women it can mean freedom. The Old Crone archetype of myth and legend wields substantial power. It is power that comes with wisdom, knowledge, comes of having lived and worked and shared the unwritten over the work. This sharing is explored in Toni Hamel’s exhibit “The Lingering” shown in 2015 “The Lingering” explored the role of the female as homemaker, simultaneously rejecting those homes as gilded cages and celebrating the creativity of the work done by the women.
The work of women does seem tilted towards the creative arts however. Although female artists are underrepresented in the 'HIS'tory of art, women are well represented in the management of galleries, at least here in Durham Region.
At every level whether private or public it is females who are at the helm, even at the municipal level; Oshawa’s CultureCounts department and its overseer, Parks and Recreation, are manned mostly by women. It makes for an odd situation; Females are in charge of the walls and stages yet females are underrepresented when it comes to shows and exhibits.
But something is changing. Female artists are missing from the canon yes but we are finding them, or rather they are finding us.
I took a walk a week or so ago, well a drive, to three Durham Region galleries and what I saw was capital W Work, the getting on with the Work, the doing.
Ingrid Ruthig’s solo show Re/Visions at the Station Gallery is a massive engagement for the eye and mind. One is struck immediately by the volume of work. 120 portraits of 120 ladies, each woven from images and text. It is not something absorbed in a glance. These portraits are not icons, cartoons. It is architectural, sculptural, it is deep thoughtfulness and one can see perhaps it is the work of it which is at the centre of it. Not art for art’s sake but work for art’s sake.
Finding Florence is the other show on at the Station Gallery. Florence Helena McGillivray was born in 1864 in Whitby and painted her whole life, teaching at what is now Trafalgar Castle School. She travelled Europe and brought the modernist influence to her paintings.Her work is in the National Gallery, the AGO, the RMG and the Art Gallery of Hamilton. But as the kids say Who knew?
She was lost but like Alice and Dorothy has found her own way back. Sometimes its a matter of time. Sometimes its a matter of what endures, of what lasts.
Teri Donovan, Push Pull 1 (detail), 2017
The work of Alexandra Luke and Isabel McLaughlin has lasted. The two were a force in Canadian Abstract art, enabling and creating a home for those men who would become the better-known members of Painters 11. Margaret Rodgers has curated an exhibition at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery, pairing the works of Luke and McLaughlin with two modern artists, Teri Donovan and Gwen MacGregor. Donovan and MacGregor show how difficult it was for women of the past to build an identity for themselves separate from the relationship with a man.
The Paint Factory Gallery has a show too featuring not just females but males too. While the paintings by Joaquin Manay are gruesome in a way, I do not see them as purposefully so. What I see is an artist endeavouring to capture how people create their own identity. How we create ourselves one piece at a time, taking one piece from someone else, one piece not quite fitting, but over time an identity will emerge, the picture will reveal itself from a distance. Give it time.
So it is with Ruthig’s work. The further one steps back from the portrait the closer one comes to the identity of the subject. It is an exhibit which demands time, which demands distance. It took time and distance to make and all of that is present in the work. To fully understand this show one needs to give it what it asks. It is not something delivered on your terms. This exhibit of women will be seen on its terms. I stepped away from Ruthig’s Re/Visions and saw better the women within. These are women as activists, as makers, as creators, as doers, as lost and found, as figure and ground, as a new gathering force.
The next step demanded by this force is for us, or for me at least to stop making random connections based on gender. These artists are not female artists, just artists.
The singer has left the song: The importance of the artist to a community's identity
This print by David Bastedo, official photographer for the Tragically Hip will be a feature offering at RMGExposed 2017 live auction Nov 25. www.rmgexposed.net
Music, a musician of all things. A nation as a song who knew?
With all the bluster and posturing, bravado and warmongering, territorial pissings, whatever, it is the people who find their own heroes and the people who will define the nation. And it seems this nation has decided to define itself by music. A nation as sound. Marshall McLuhan would dig it.
So Gord Downie of all of them; with his passing he is being heralded as the idea of Canada personified. Who would disagree. At some time in the future this land will stop for him. At a time in the past this nation, 11 million, stopped to watch the Tragically Hip’s final concert in Kingston. This was Canada as Hip Nation and Gord made it hip to be Canuck. He embedded its history, its geography, its past and present into his lyrics and at the Kingston concert he made a plea for its future. Canada can be better.
It took a musician to bring this diverse, divided, wide as it is long, three seas and too many lakes, this cold country to a better sense of itself.
Its the work of the artist - they give us options, choices about what we can be.
In Oshawa on Thursday Oct 19 there will be a summit of culture at the Arts Resource Centre downtown. It is organised by the Culture Counts department at City Hall and will feature theatre, a Tamil poet, a presentation on the Canadian Automotive Museum and a high school dance group. It will also feature music from duo Crown Lands.
Crown Lands’ sleazy diesel power rock is a peculiar brand - one heard around these parts, one we call ShwaRock. It is equally parts classic rock riffs and grit, sponging up radio hits and live and local. Its a blend of rock and oil, call it hunnypot rock. I hear it in The Standstills and the Micronite Filters and every local kid band that ever dragged gear across the sticky floor of The Dungeon.
There are roots spreading into Rush, the Hip, Zeppelin, DFA, White Stripes but Crown Lands make it all their own. Its the harmonies. Just delve right into “Misery” from their most recent release, ‘Rise Over Run’. Its anything but miserable. Its a road rag rocket launcher, a speed king demon, all desert sands and open top and loud loud loud chugging riff ready trip-out, a space trucker of a mother that has not been out of my car deck and when the turbo kicks in the diesel rock of Crown Lands is the only soundtrack I need on my fly by night.
But is Oshawa ready to embrace its own sound and define itself by it. Is Oshawa ready to seek out the artists to find itself as it moves away from its one time role as a factory town. It was defined by work one time. How will it define itself now? Will it be by players?
Culture defines a place, a city, and a nation. Nothing else.
We are only our culture nothing else. We are only a song and Gord Downie has written more of that song than any other.
Arts and About in Durham Region - Oct 14
Tony and Anne Labelle-Johnson @ the Beech Centre in Bowmanville: to Dec 31and is open 9 am to 4 pm.
Oct 14 - 15: Oshawa Art Association Fall exhibition at Camp Samac. 70 artists showing
Oct 15: the Visual Arts Centre of Clarington Annual Juried Show - to November 12th.
Oct 21: Joaquin Manay Opening Reception @ the Paint Factory, Oshawa
ON NOW:
Painters & Patrons: Luke, McLughlin and Aked @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery: to Jan 14 2018
Heavy Hitters: The gifts that keep on giving @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery: to Jan 14 2018.
RMG Heavy Hitters exhibit
Arts and About in Durham Region - Oct 7
Its been some week for art - began with the opening of Steven Frank's Durham ArtFest 25 (closing Oct 7) and then continued with the first meeting of Oshawa's Pubic Art Task Force (I am the rep for the Cultural Leadership Committee), Thursday I met up with folks from the Station Gallery at the AGO and wandered through Rodins, Moores, Van Goghs, Group of Sevens and a performance by Peaches, so much great work - and last night I was at RMG FF taking in probably their best line-up of shows in some years. Locals and legacies on display and the Heavy Hitters show is just mindblowing (as you see above). Lots going on, make art part of your Thanksgiving.
Oct 21 Joaquin Manay Opening Reception @ the Paint Factory, Oshawa
ON NOW:
Painters & Patrons: Luke, McLughlin and Aked @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018
Heavy Hitters: The gifts that keep on giving @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018.
Frances Ferdinands: Between Latitudes @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Bernard Leroux: Reclaiming the Bois-Brules @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Isabelle McLaughlin and Alexandra Luke on horseback outside Tuscan, Arizona
Arts and About in Durham Region Sep 29
Its Culture Days this weekend and there are many, many events going on – for a complete list go to their website but here’s some recommendations:
Sep 30 Durham Art Fest – REFRAMED - I have a piece up now on Slowcity.ca about Steven Frank's Reframed and Margaret Rodgers' Legacies exhibits.
Sep 29/ 30 - Celebrate the official opening of Durham Region's first Urban Art Gallery at The Paint Factory! Come see recent works by portrait artist, "Seven", photographs by Judy Krajcik and airbrushed works by Keegan De France. Students from UASC Graffiti School will also be exhibiting their work in a pop-up exhibition. Live Graffiti painting at the Paint Factory Owner, Chad Tyson, will be on hand to run free graffiti painting demonstrations and workshops for anyone interested in learning about tools and techniques to great your own graffiti
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ON NOW:
Painters & Patrons: Luke, McLughlin and Aked @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018
Heavy Hitters: The gifts that keep on giving @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018.
Frances Ferdinands: Between Latitudes @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Bernard Leroux: Reclaiming the Bois-Brules @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Coming of Age: Mary Kainer, Ramune Luminaire and Judith A. Mason @ the Visual Arts Centre - to Oct 1
Sean McQuay's 'Uncertain Seas'
Legacies and Durham Art Fest - Margaret Rodgers and Steven Frank curate art exhibits
If there were ever two voices determined to amplify the voices of artists in the Durham Region it is the voices of Margaret Rodgers and Steven Frank. Both are artists in their own right and both have been deeply involved in this area’s art scene for decades; Rodgers as a member of the IRIS Group and Frank as founder of Oshawa Space Invaders. Both, too, have exhibits of local artists on now at galleries in downtown Oshawa; Rodgers curated ’Legacies’ at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery and Frank’s ’Durham Art Fest 25: REFRAMED’ is at Gallery 67 (main floor of the Holiday Inn downtown Oshawa.)
Rodgers' 'Legacies' features works by early abstract art pioneers Alexandra Luke and Isabel McLaughlin, alongside reinterpretations of those works by two present day artists, Teri Donovan and Gwen MacGregor.
Frank’s Durham Art Fest 25 - Reframed, opening this weekend, marks the anniversary of an independent art fest he curated in the same downtown two and a half decades ago. His original Arts Fest featured works by Bill Lishman, Edward Falkenberg, Sean McQuay, Jay McCarten, Maralynn Cherry and others. Many of them are showing again at Reframed
Five years ago the Durham Art Fest 20th anniversary was marked with another downtown invasion of art pop-ups and music performances, called Oshawa Space Invaders. Space Invaders inspired this year’s RMG 50th anniversary event, ‘Durham Reach’ featuring over 70 regional artists (including many of whom took part in the O.S.I. pop-ups and Art Fest.)
This is the legacy of DAF 1992.
40 years earlier in 1952 Alexandra Luke took part in Canada’s first Abstract art exhibit at Hart House in Toronto. Many of the artists exhibiting would form Painters 11. They met regularly at Luke’s cottage on Thickson’s Point in Whitby. Oshawa resident Ronald Malcom Lambert was also at those gatherings and took part in the Hart House exhibit. It was his last showing until this year when new works went on display at the Kent Farndale Gallery in Port Perry. Lambert had studied with colour theorist Hans Hofmann down in Rhode Island at the urging of Luke. At just 20 years old he had created abstract works which are in the Permanent Collection of the AGO and the RMG as well as in private hands. But he retired from painting to find paid work and raise a family in Oshawa. This is the legacy of being a professional artist in the Motor City.
Not much has changed for the professional artist of any genre in this city in the interim 60 plus years.
Teri Donovan, Push Pull 1 (detail), 2017
There is one work, In Margaret Rodgers’ curated ‘Legacies’ which speaks volumes about how art is looked at in this city. Push Pull 1 by Donovan is a riff on Hofmanns’ colour theories about the push and pull of colour fields and how colours create their own spaces on a canvas.
In Donovan’s work Luke is the colour, she is the one being pushed and pulled. A suited man, (her husband, C.E. McLaughlin?), standing behind her, grips her arm. Children are on one side, paintings are on the others. Those same paintings by Luke are on display on the wall beside Donovan’s piece. Luke looks resolute in pushing onward out of the image towards us but the man is pulling her back? He is a symbol of the paternalistic mindset of stewardship and authority of the time but is still very much part of these times too. Yet Art marches on.
Perhaps the legacy of Luke and Isabel McLaughlin is that steely determinism to push on past the past, to the future, to be heard, to create, to build, to not be pulled back.
Perhaps the legacy of Luke and Isabel McLaughlin is seen in Frank’s and Rodgers' determination to champion artists, over and over and over again. Because the work is that good. It has been for decades.
"In addition to bees and butterflies, there are over 1000 species of pollinating animals in Canada. Over 80 percent of flowering plants need pollinators such as birds, bees, butterflies, moths, and other animals to develop seed or fruit. Since pollination is central to the reproduction of most flowering plants, much of the Earth's ecosystem and food supply depend on pollinators. Faced with a declining population of pollinator species it is important to provide extra support to pollinators by providing suitable habitat." - from City of Oshawa webpage
The Culture of Horticulture: Oshawa's pollinator gardens
Amid a wide range of activities celebrating the beginning of Fall I took the opportunity to visit the planting of the pollinator garden behind the Legends Centre Saturday Sep. 23 2017. The garden is an initiative by Parks and Rec., CN EcoConnexions, Tree Canada as well as the Community In Blooms program. The planting event was not so well attended but is of no less importance to the culture of Oshawa. This city needs to foster pollinators of the environment as well as pollinators of ideas. Both bear fruit, you dig?
As a member of the Culture Leadership Council (and the Culture Counts planning committee which gave rise to it), my main focus has been and continues to be the enablement of local voices. Culture rises from geography and place does matter. The environment is an important aspect of culture and the city's advocacy for natural heritage, its maintenance and fostering is to be congratulated.
The pollinator garden will be a mix of native and non-native plants but as the garden and meadows are there to encourage local species of birds, bats, bees and butterflies the emphasis will be on the indigenous.
The garden is an apt metaphor for fostering local culture. To grow the creative community in this area there needs to be a willingness by the City to provide the resources, a willingness by the public to focus on self-sustainability and most importantly by both public and private sectors the need to understand culture, like the garden, is not there to pay their bills, but to foster well-being for all; birds, bees, bats, butterflies and peoples of all backgrounds and cultures. Art makes life better period.
It will be a few years before we can fully enjoy these new gardens, enjoy the sight of a thriving natural community flitting and buzzing its way around the flowers but it will be worth it. We know that intuitively.
Now imagine what this city will look like in those same few years if we apply the same thinking to our creative community.
Arts and About in Durham Region - Sep 22
Sep 23/ 24: Fall Apple Harvest Tour - Rosemary Jenkins Pottery. Gallery on the Farm, Timeless Essentials are some of the nine stops on this self-guided driving/cycling tour of Clarington
Sep 23: Art Day in the Rouge - guided photography walks, artist stations, classes.
Sep 23: Pollinator Garden and Meadow planting event @ Legends Centre, Oshawa - Come help plant pollinator friendly trees, shrubs and flowers. The event beginning at 9 am is part of Trees Canada CDN 150 celebration.
Sep 30: The Painted Ladies @ the Kent Farndale Gallery, Port Perry - to Oct 26.
ON NOW:
Photographer Leif Petersen @ the Kent Farndale Gallery in Port Perry - to Sept. 28, 2017.
Painters & Patrons: Luke, McLughlin and Aked @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018
Heavy Hitters: The gifts that keep on giving @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018.
Frances Ferdinands: Between Latitudes @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Bernard Leroux: Reclaiming the Bois-Brules @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Coming of Age: Mary Kainer, Ramune Luminaire and Judith A. Mason @ the Visual Arts Centre - to Oct 1
Arts and About Durham Region - Sep 16
Its the most beautiful time of the year . . . because The Uxbridge Studio Tour - Today Sep 16 and 17, twenty five studios, 64 artists, an annual tradition for 32 years - doesn’t get much better and this year Second Wedge Brewery is offering folk the opportunity to win a $1000 gift card for a work by an Uxbridge Studio tour artist. A passbook is available, collect five stamps from any of the 25 studios or sponsors and submit to the brewery. Draw takes place Sept 22 at Second Wedge.
Sep 19 - HustleMe is hosting a Start-Up rap-off @ the Moustache Club in Oshawa. It starts at 7 p.m. Several local creative entrepreneurs, from graffiti to music to apps, will pitch their idea for a prize of $1000. I have been asked to be a judge so come by and hang out with us and see who making what.
Betty McGowan has been selected for the juried Arts and Letters Club exhibit, Next2 which will run throughout October. The piece selected is titled “Lascaux”. Betty says her intention was to produce a modern abstract that had the feel of a cave painting. She incorporates moulding paste, charcoal, paper, conte crayon and acrylic paint into the work, one of an ongoing series.
Sep 17: Oshawa Culture Counts Meet-up at Berry Hill in Oshawa. An opportunity for creative folks in the area to get to know each other. 2-4 p.m.
Sep 16/ 17: Birds Beavers and Butterflies @ Thickson Woods - guided walks and talks, nature box building, hawk watch, bug identification - not an exhibit but Nature is her own artist.
Sep 18/ 24: the Durham Region International Film Fest - Seven days of films and film flavoured events at various locations around Durham. The red carpet is unfurled Sep 22 at the Regent Theatre in Oshawa.
Sep 21 - Books & Authors @ Uxbridge Music Hall - Speakers include Linden McIntyre, Linda Spalding, Alison Pick and Terry Fallis.
Sep 23/ 24: Fall Apple Harvest Tour - Rosemary Jenkins Pottery. Gallery on the Farm, Timeless Essentials are some of the nine stops on this self-guided driving/cycling tour of Clarington
Sep 23: Art Day in the Rouge - guided photography walks, artist stations, classes.
Sep 23: Pollinator Garden and Meadow planting event @ Legends Centre, Oshawa - Come help plant pollinator friendly trees, shrubs and flowers. The event beginning at 9 am is pat of Trees Canada CDN 150 celebration.
rom left: Virtues & Vicissitudes detail, 2.5x4.75m, mixed media on board, 2017, Ramune Luminaire; Separation, 70x100cm, oil on board, 2017, Judith A. Mason; Dementia detail, 91x213cm, mixed media on paper, 2017, Mary Kainer.
ON NOW:
Painters & Patrons: Luke, McLughlin and Aked @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018
Heavy Hitters: The gifts that keep on giving @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Jan 14 2018.
Visitor Information @ the Robert McLaughlin Gallery - to Sep 19
Frances Ferdinands: Between Latitudes @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Bernard Leroux: Reclaiming the Bois-Brules @ the Station Gallery - to Oct 8
Coming of Age: Mary Kainer, Ramune Luminaire and Judith A. Mason @ the Visual Arts Centre - to Oct 1
Photographer Leif Petersen @ the Kent Farndale Gallery in Port Perry - to Sept. 28, 2017.