RIZIERO VERTOLLI / OAKVILLE BEAVER

Arts community comes together to remember
By David Lea, Oakville Beaver Staff
Arts & Entertainment
Nov 04, 2009

Old bunkers covered in graffiti, crumbling fortifications atop chalk-white cliffs, moss covered anti-tank barriers silently guarding an empty beach.

The photos, currently on display at the Oakville Galleries, are of the beaches of Dieppe as they appear today.

The tranquil and hauntingly beautiful images, taken by Bertrand Carrière, belie the violence and destruction of the setting’s Second World War past.

In 1942, Dieppe was the scene of one of Canada’s greatest military catastrophes when a raid by nearly 5,000 Canadian soldiers was met with murderous resistance from the occupying German forces.

At the conclusion of the battle, more than 900 Canadians had been killed with more than 1,800 taken prisoner.

“The artist Bertrand Carrière went to these beaches and photographed the way they look today, which is basically how they were left after this raid,” said Elizabeth Underhill, interim curatorial assistant and registrar.

“These images are quite beautiful, but they are also quite haunting in the way this moment in history has been frozen in time.”
For Second World War pilot Wess McIntosh, the exhibit serves as a reminder of just how poorly planned the Dieppe Raid really was.

A photo of an abandoned concrete bunker embedded within the nearby cliffs illustrates just how protected the Germans were and how exposed the Canadians would have been as they charged up the beaches.

“They didn’t have a chance,” said McIntosh, gesturing to the bunker photo.

“They weren’t killed, they were murdered. Some of our guys tried to climb up the cliffs and the Germans were just shooting them. How can you shoot a gun when you’re climbing up a hill.”

For local writer Tom Douglas, who has written extensively about Canada at war, the photos stirred memories of his own journey to Dieppe and of those who fought there.

“I had a Sunday school teacher, when I was a young boy, who fought at Dieppe. One Sunday it happened to be the anniversary of Dieppe and he tried to explain to us what it was like to give your life for a fellow man. This didn’t mean anything to us at the time and we giggled and laughed and threw bread crusts at each other and he broke down and cried and left,” said Douglas. “To this day I feel so bad about that and I wish I could go back to him and say, ‘Now I understand.’”

Besides the photos, the exhibit also features a documentary of Carrière’s visit to Dieppe.

During this visit Carrière took the photos of more than 900 current members of the Canadian Forces and placed them on the beach in an effort to show what 900 casualties really looks like. The Dieppe photos, which will be on display until Nov. 22, is not the only war-related art exhibit in town, with the Oakville arts community unveiling many others in honour of Remembrance Day.

Another such exhibit, displayed at the Oakville Museum, located at 8 Navy St., is entitled Words to End All Wars and features letters, postcards, diaries and poems written during the First World War.

With many of the letters written by Oakville soldiers within the trenches of France and Belgium the exhibit goes a long way to allowing readers to understand not only what the war was like, but who the soldiers writing the letters really were.

“The Germans are pretty lively this morning and shells have been coming at regular intervals and while I write (Fritz) is shelling one of our flying machines, but they never seem to hit one yet and they just torment the life out of them by turning and flying back over our lines,” reads one letter.

“We had some great fun the other afternoon. A bunch of us fellows got some pails and went drowning rats out from under our huts. We finished three huts and it kept the two dogs busy killing them. The first hut we killed 47, the second 85, and the hut we sleep in over 30 so you can see for yourself just the amount of rats we have around.”

Other artifacts at this exhibit included German First World War helmets, Canadian First World War uniforms, a German belt with the words ‘Gott Mit Uns’ (God is with Us) inscribed on it and a piece of a German airplane, which was dissected by souvenir-hungry Allied soldiers after it was shot down.

Curator of Collections Carolyn Cross noted that seeing these artifacts, which were generously loaned to the museum by numerous Oakville residents, allows observers to see the shadows of war in a way history textbooks simply cannot match.

“There are two letters from George Brock Chisholm, one that was written to his father, so military man to military man as well as a letter written to his friends back home. It’s neat to see the different tones of these letters coming from the same man and how he grows over the years and his experiences in the First World War,” said Cross.

“He’s not just a name and a soldier, he’s a real person with hopes and dreams and a personality.”

Words to End All Wars will be on display until June 6, 2010.
Information on additional artistic tributes to Oakville’s veterans can be seen online by visiting www.hometown-stories.ca .

Original Link: Oakville Beaver

Larry Towell - keynote speaker at Exposure 2010 in Calgary, Banff

Monday, November 9, 2009
More on Larry Towell

Arguably Canada's best known photojournalist, Larry Towell will be the keynote speaker during Exposure 2010 this February.

But before that Towell's work will be showcased in a gallery operated by the famed photo collective Magnum that opens November 20th.

It will be situated in the Saint Germain des Prés district of Paris and Towell's unwavering photojournalism will be key to the exhibition in this new venue.

http://exposure2010.blogspot.com/2009/11/more-on-larry-towell.html

Related Link:
Exposure 2010

Jeff Thomas, Home/land & Security, artist and curator

Home/land & Security
A project by Jeff Thomas commissioned by RENDER
November 6, 2009 through February 13, 2010

Opening reception, roundtable discussion and video screenings:
Saturday, November 21
1 - 4 pm @ RENDER, University of Waterloo main campus
6 - 9 pm @ Waterloo Architecture, Cambridge
(additional screenings and gatherings TBA)

With Home/land & Security, artist and curator Jeff Thomas offers a distinct response to the land disputes that have erupted along Ontario’s Grand River valley on land defined as the Haldimand Tract. Initially developed out of a consideration of the ongoing conflict between members of the Six Nations and building developers in the town of Caledonia, Thomas’s project has expanded to embrace broader concepts of home and security and to explore the divisions between native and non-native communities. Commissioned by RENDER, the project embodies a hybrid artist/curator approach, with Thomas producing a new body of work that forms the basis of a dialogue with other artists. Thomas’s goal is to encourage cross-cultural dialogue and a deeper understanding of the history of the region.

The Six Nations were granted the Haldimand Tract by the British crown in 1784 following the American Revolution. Originally encompassing all of the land six miles back from each shore of the Grand River, the tract was reduced over the years through land transfers (many disputed) and government intervention, leaving the Six Nations with only a small reserve located between Brantford and Caledonia. Challenges to the loss of land have been ongoing since the late 18th century, however, in recent years these have become more high profile and confrontational with the recent standoff at the Douglas Estates near Caledonia being a prime example. Much of the original Haldimand Tract is now the site of established towns and cities, including Waterloo, Kitchener and Cambridge (RENDER’s primary programming region), and areas of these communities are the focus of additional land disputes.

Home/land & Security includes new works by Barry Ace, Sara Angelucci, Mary Anne Barkhouse, Michael Belmore, Ron Benner, Rosalie Favell, Lorraine Gilbert, Jamelie Hassan, Pat Hess, Penny McCann, Wanda Nanibush, Shelley Niro, Bear Thomas and Eric Walker, along with works by Jeff Thomas and archival images from Six Nations. Home/land & Security is a major programming initiative for RENDER. It represents a considered extension of RENDER’s interdisciplinary research approach and further expands on the critical links between the university and surrounding community by engaging with a complex issue that will actively define the future of the region.

In addition to the exhibition in RENDER’s gallery space on the main campus of the University of Waterloo, works will also be installed at Waterloo Architecture and at the Grand House in Cambridge. Home/land and Security has received the support of The Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.

Media Contact:
Andrew Hunter, Director/Curator
RENDER
519-888-4567 x33575
renderprojects@gmail.com

RENDER
East Campus Hall
University of Waterloo
263 Phillip Street
Waterloo, Ontario
www.render.uwaterloo.ca

Waterloo Architecture
7 Melville Street South
Cambridge, Ontario
www.architecture.uwaterloo.ca

Grand House
68 Roseview Avenue
Cambridge, Ontario
www.wacsa.org/grandhouse

Image: Jeff Thomas, The Delegate posed along the Grand River, Waterloo, Ontario, 2009
GPS: N43 21.452 W80 19.002. Courtesy of the artist.

http://www.akimbo.ca/exhibitions/?id=17210

Join us tonight to launch Vincenzo Pietropaolo's new book "Harvest Pilgrims"

Reginald Cabey, from Montserrat, loading cauliflower, Waterford, Ontario, 1987

The gallery would like to invite you to join us in celebrating the launch of Canadian photographer Vincenzo Pietropaolo's new book Harvest Pilgrims: Mexican and Caribbean Migrant Farm Workers in Canada (BTL Books, 2009).

VINCENZO PIETROPAOLO
Harvest Pilgrims: Mexican and Caribbean Migrant Farm Workers in Canada

Book Launch and Artist Talk: Tuesday, November 10th, 7–9pm. The Artist Talk will take place from 7:30pm-8pm (please arrive early as seating is limited).

Award-winning photographer and social activist Vincenzo Pietropaolo has been photographing migrant agriculture workers and recording their stories since 1984. He has travelled to forty locations throughout Ontario and visited the workers’ homes in Mexico, Jamaica, and Montserrat.

Pietropaolo has borne witness to these “harvest pilgrims”: the tens of thousands of migrant workers who arrive in the spring and leave in the fall. They are the backbone of the agricultural industry in Canada and, yet, continue to be denied many of the basic workplace rights that protect other workers in Canada.

Pietropaolo has published six previous photographic books, which include Not Paved with Gold (2006) and Celebration of Resistance (1999) with BTL Books. His work can be found in many prominent collections, including the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa; National Archives of Canada, Ottawa; amongst many others.

Harvest Pilgrims was published by BTL Books (www.btlbooks.com) and made possible by a grant from the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada (www.ufcw.ca).

On their first morning in Canada, Mexican workers are taken shipping
for food and supplies,St. Catharines, Ontario, 1987

Sunil Gupta screens "I WANT TO LIVE" and discusses queer activism at Tish School of the Arts, NYU

I WANT TO LIVE
Directed by Sunil Gupta
India, 2009, 39 min. Festival Premiere.

Synopsis: In visual artist and photographer Sunil Gupta’s documentary film, conversations with people living with HIV across India, and from a wide range of professions and social classes, are woven into a composite portrait, making a powerful plea for HIV Patient’s Rights. The film was commissioned by the Human Rights Law Network, New Delhi. Sunil Gupta in person.

WITNESS will present an after-screening panel discussion.

Screening Venue:
The Quad Cinema - 34 West 13th Street, between 5th and 6th Avenues. Saturday, November 14 at 12:00 PM

Panel Discussion Venue:
QUEER PRESENCE AND ACTVISM ON THE INDEPENDENT SCREEN
Sunday, November 15 at 3 PM
Room 606, Tisch School of the Arts [NYU,] 725 Broadway

Open and free to the public.

Gabor Szilasi awarded Prix du Québec 2009

MONTREAL/November 2, 2009—

Concordia University is pleased to announce that professor emeritus Gabor Szilasi is among the eleven recipients of the Prix du Québec, the most prestigious award conferred by the Government of Quebec, in recognition of his exceptional body of work spanning the past 50 years. Mr. Szilasi will receive the award at a ceremony being held tomorrow afternoon in the Legislative Council Room of Quebec's National Assembly.

The award-winning professor and photographer is receiving the Prix Paul-Émile-Borduas for visual arts, fine crafts, architecture and design. Mr. Szilasi's 50-year photographic heritage has unique aesthetic and human value. It consists of a very personal look at his homeland of Hungary, as well as his adopted Quebec together with its people, artists, cityscapes and rural scenes. The Eloquence of the Everyday, the latest retrospective of Mr. Szilasi's photography, will be showing at Montreal's McCord Museum in 2011. The Family exhibition of 378 family pictures, initiated by the Montreal Arts Council, is touring the city's exhibition halls until 2011.


About the Prix du Québec

Les Prix du Québec were instituted in 1977 as the highest honors bestowed annually in various fields of endeavour. The winners receive a tax-free $30 000 cash prize, a handwritten parchment certificate, a pin bearing the Prix du Québec symbol and a silver medal created exclusively by a Québec artist chosen through open competition.

Source:
Fiona Downey
Senior Media Relations Advisor
Concordia University
Full Story

Vincenzo Pietropaolo -- witness to the Harvest Pilgrims

A short documentary featuring the work of acclaimed photographer and social activist Vincenzo Pietropaolo has recently been released in honor of his new book, "Harvest Pilgrims," made possible by a grant from UFCW Canada.

Pietropaolo has spent the last 25 years capturing images of farm workers and their struggle for justice, dignity and respect.

The 10-minute short film has also been selected for screening at the upcoming Canadian Labour International Film Festival (CLiFF) in November.

The Video:
Vincenzo Pietropaolo -- witness to the Harvest Pilgrims video

The Full Story:
www.ufcw.ca

Sarah Ann Johnson in The New York Times

Friday, October 30, 2009

Art in Review

SARAH ANNE JOHNSON
'House on Fire'
Julie Saul
535 West 22nd Street,
Chelsea
Through Nov. 14

"Explosion," a bronze and plastic figure by Sarah Anne Johnson, in her show "House on Fire."

"The Canadian artist Sarah Anne Johnson is struggling with remarkable family history in her second New York solo exhibition.
The back story is that when her maternal grandmother, Velma Orlikow, sought treatment for postpartum depression in the 1950s, she was subjected to a horrifying experimental regimen. Under the care of Dr. Ewen Cameron, a psychiatrist affiliated with McGill University, she underwent powerful shock treatments and prolonged periods of drug-induced sleep in which suggestive tapes were played. In addition, as a subcontractor for a C.I.A. program that was investigating drugs as brainwashing and interrogation tools, Dr. Cameron gave her heavy doses of LSD. After her release Ms. Orlikow suffered from debilitating mental illness for the rest of her life. In the 1970s she joined a class-action suit against the C.I.A., but she died before a settlement was reached in 1988.

To represent the essence of this harrowing tale, Ms. Johnson has drawn lacy patterns over old family photographs to represent hallucinatory experience and created a series of doll-size bronzes representing her grandmother's psychic torment. In one her head explodes into a mushroom cloud; in another she has a squirrel's head.

Ms. Johnson has also constructed a kind of psychotic's dollhouse. Peering in the windows you see topsy-turvy furniture, a snowbound room and other signs of delusion.

While intriguing, Ms. Johnson's works remain fragmentary and elliptical, like illustrations without the text that explains them. Maybe only a written memoir could do justice to this history. But it will be interesting to see how she takes it from here. KEN JOHNSON

Corrections:

House on Fire is Sarah Anne Johnson's third solo exhibition in New York.

Velma Orlikow lived to see the settlement reached in 1988.

Links to additional press on House on Fire exhibition:

Time Out New York, October 22-28, 2009

The Village Voice, September 15, 2009

New York Magazine Fall Previews, August 31-September 7, 2009

Art Gallery of Ontario Acquisition Press Release, House on Fire

* * *

UNFRAMED

Artists on New Topographies, Part 1: Mark Ruwedel

In honor of LACMA's re-staging of New Topographics, UNFRAMED invited Mark Ruwedel for an exclusive interview. Mark has photographed the topography of the American West for nearly three decades, focusing on nature’s reclamation of the land over time.

For the full interview with Edward Robinson, Associate Curator, The Wallis Annenberg Photography Department, please follow this link.

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 31 st, 2009
Lieux Mêmes
3:00 PM

CHEMIN DE CENDRES
Dir. Bertrand Carrière (Canada: 2009) 9 min. 40 sec.

Chemins de cendres, a project that developed out of an ongoing photo series “Lieux Mêmes” retraces images of the Western Front taken by an unknown Canadian photographer during the First World War. Projected as a dual-frame display, the video juxtaposes still video shots of current day sites related to the WW1 -battlefields, rubble-strewn streets, soldier’s portraits in cemeteries, against travel views through train windows in France and Belgium. Opposing stillness and motion, the video becomes a journey of visual and sound contrasts between fixed historical narratives and the changing views of modern memory.


PASSCHENDAELE
Dir. Paul Gross (Canada: 2008) 114 min.

Set during the height of the First World War, Passchendaele tells the story of Sergeant Michael Dunne (Paul Gross), a soldier who is brutally wounded in France and returns to Calgary emotionally and physically scarred. While in the military hospital in Calgary, he meets Sarah (Caroline Dhavernas), a mysterious and attractive nurse with whom he develops a passionate love. When Sarah's younger asthmatic brother David (Joe Dinicol) signs up to fight in Europe, Michael feels compelled to return to Europe to protect him. Michael and David, like thousands of Canadians, are sent to fight in the third battle of Ypres, a battle against impossible odds, commonly known as "Passchendaele". It is a story of passion, courage and dedication, showing the heroism of those that fought in battle, and of the ones that loved them.

Sanaz Mazinani - DIASPORArt

We are pleased to announce that the work of gallery artist Sanaz Mazinani has been included in DIASPORArt: Strategy and Seduction by Canadian Artists from Culturally Diverse Communities in Works from the Collection of the Canada Council Art Bank.

To read more about the exhibition and to see Mazinani with Her Excellency the Right Honourable Michaëlle Jean, Governor General of Canada, please visit: http://www.artbank.ca/News+and+Events/Activities/bulletin54

Gabor Szilasi wins the Paul-Émile Borduas Prize!

We are pleased to announce that gallery artist Gabor Szilasi has won the Paul-Émile Borduas Prize!

For more information please visit:
http://www.prixduquebec.gouv.qc.ca/presse/paul-emile-borduas.html?presse
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/arts/200910/26/01-915254-prix-du-quebec-paule-baillargeon-roland-lepage-et-gabor-szilasi-honores.php
http://communiques.gouv.qc.ca/gouvqc/communiques/GPQF/Octobre2009/26/c2569.html

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 24th, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

LAURA
Dir. Otto Preminger (USA, 1944) 88 mins

Beautiful Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney) is found shot to death in her apartment. Hard nosed Lieutenant Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) is assigned as the lead investigator for the case. As he gets into the investigation, he learns that all the men in her life were in love with her including her fiancé Shelby Carpenter, and the women either loved her as a person or were envious and jealous of the attention she received from men. As he questions the suspects and witnesses, reads her diary and private letters, and most importantly stares at the large portrait of her that hangs over her mantle, McPherson himself falls under the spell of Laura Hunt. Three days into the investigation, someone walks through Laura's apartment door that changes the focus of the investigation and answers some nagging questions on McPherson's part, but also adds one more person to the long list of suspects.

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 24th, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

LAURA
Dir. Otto Preminger (USA, 1944) 88 mins

Beautiful Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney ) is found shot to death in her apartment. Hard nosed Lieutenant Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) is assigned as the lead investigator for the case. As he gets into the investigation, he learns that all the men in her life were in love with her including her fiancé Shelby Carpenter, and the women either loved her as a person or were envious and jealous of the attention she received from men. As he questions the suspects and witnesses, reads her diary and private letters, and most importantly stares at the large portrait of her that hangs over her mantle, McPherson himself falls under the spell of Laura Hunt. Three days into the investigation, someone walks through Laura's apartment door that changes the focus of the investigation and answers some nagging questions on McPherson's part, but also adds one more person to the long list of suspects.

Press for Gabor Szilasi's Exhibition at the National Gallery of Canada

"National Gallery of Canada snaps new digital strategy" - Media in Canada
by Melita Kuburas
http://www.mediaincanada.com/articles/mic/20091019/lxb_gallery.html

"Out of great darkness" - Canwest News Service
http://www.kelowna.com/2009/10/15/out-of-great-darkness/

"Fab Photolands: An Interview with Gabor Szilasi" - Unedit my heart
By Leah Sandals
http://neditpasmoncoeur.blogspot.com/2009/10/fab-photolands-interview-with-gabor.html

Toronto International Art Fair - Booth # 1006

We are pleased to announce that we will be participating in the 10th Annual Toronto International Art Fair 2009. Please visit us at Booth # 1006.

We hope to see you there!

TORONTO INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR

Founded in 2000, the Toronto International Art Fair is one of the most successful fairs in North America!

Fair Dates: October 22-26, 2009
Opening Night Preview: Thursday October 22, 6:30-10pm
Special Collectors Preview : Thursday October 22, 4:30-6:30pm
Location: Metro Toronto Convention Centre, North Building, Exhibit Hall A & B, 255 Front Street West
Public Hours:
Friday, October 23, 12-8pm
Saturday, October 24, 12-8pm
Sunday, October 25, 12-6pm
Monday, October 26, 12-6pm

For information on tickets and event details please visit: www.tiafair.com/dates_loc/

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 17th, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

CLASH BY NIGHT
Dir. Fritz Lang (Sweden, 1952) 105 mins

Mae Doyle (Barbara Stanwyck) comes back to her hometown a cynical woman. She moves in with her brother Joe (Keith Andes) and although he is not happy to see her, and fears that his love Peggy (Marilyn Monroe) may wind up like Mae, he accepts her back into the family. Mae dates and then marries Jerry (Paul Douglas), a simple but hard working fisherman. She also has her eye on his friend, Earl Pfeiffer (Robert Ryan), a film projectionist. Earl makes his feelings known to Mae as well, and though he is married, pursues her. Mae and Jerry have a baby which brings her much joy; however she remains restless, and can’t help being drawn to Jerry's friend Earl.

Scott Conarroe: By Rail reception @ Art Gallery of Windsor Opens Tonight!

Scott Conarroe, Monorail Station, Miami FL, 2008

Scott Conarroe: By Rail
October 3 to January 3 2010

In 2007 Scott Conarroe embarked on a journey across North America to photograph railroad infrastructure. His pictures of this sprawling socio-geographical network are a remarkable testament to its past glory and future potential. In these large, arresting photographs railroad tracks unify urban and rural environments. Largely empty of trains or people, these contemplative, elegiac photographs evoke a range of responses to what is arguably the defining technology of the modern nation state. Without implicitly articulating the critical role trains played in continental economic and social development, Conarroe’s singular, understated vision provides a phenomenal platform for viewers to consider the profound impact the railroad has had on our lives.

Conarroe is increasingly well known for his social landscapes of familiar places, which evoke romantic pictorial traditions while participating in contemporary photography’s critical discourse. His photographs of empty hockey rinks, town squares, back alleys and looming bridges have been exhibited in Canada and the USA. Conarroe is represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery, Toronto.

Accompanied by a major publication with texts by Robert Bean and exhibition curator James Patten, Scott Conarroe: By Rail will tour nationally starting in 2010.

Join us for the opening reception at 7:00 P.M. on October 16, a Fridays’ Live! event.

Sponsored by Scotia McLeod


AGW 401 Riverside Drive, Windsor, ON N9A 7J1 | www.agw.ca

Gilbert Garcin: Retrospective in eighty photographs opens tonight!

The story of a tyro
… or the extraordinary adventure of Monsieur Garcin seen by a gallerist who is still under the shock

Gilbert Garcin is a tyro who this year will be celebrating his eightieth birthday and fifteen years of a dazzling career. We are happy to share this pleasure with his public and his many fans by putting on a retrospective and publishing a handsome volume from his favourite publisher, Filigranes.

Exhibition runs from October 15th, 2009 to December 21st, 2009
Opening October 15th, 2009

Galerie les filles du calvaire
17, rue des Filles-du-calvaire - 75003 Paris
Open from tuesday to saturday from 11:00 AM to 06:30 PM

Press for Gabor Szilasi's Exhibition at the National Gallery of Canada

"Gabor Szilasi's perfect photos of plain people" - The Big Beat
By Peter Simpson
http://communities.canada.com/ottawacitizen/blogs/bigbeat/default.aspx

"Gabor Szilasi's perfect photos of plain people" - Canadian Voices
By Ottawa Citizen
http://communities.canada.com/shareit/blogs/canadianvoices/archive/2009/10/12/gabor-szilasi-s-perfect-photos-of-plain-people.aspx

"Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography CMCP features Photographer Gabor Szilasi"
http://www.artknowledgenews.com/2009-10-09-21-17-12-canadian-museum-of-contemporary-photography-cmcp-features-photographer-gabor-szilasi.html

David Scopick at The Korean Consulate of the Republic of Korea, Toronto Canada

We are pleased to announce that David Scopick's series "Alone and Lost" will be exhibited at the Korean Consulate of the Republic of Korea.

DAVID SCOPICK
Alone and Lost

Exhibition Dates: October 26th - 30th, 11am - 5pm
Opening Reception for the Artists: Saturday, October 24th, 12 - 3pm

David Scopick presents a series of new photographic works from international locations. The majority of his images were photographed with a panoramic camera displaying a 140 degree angle of view.

Scopick’s photographs explore the experience of isolation and the constant sensation of being lost in the world.These images hold a desolate, mysterious vision, with a surreal degree of intimacy.

Related Link:
Korean Consulate of the Republic of Korea - www.koreanconsulate.on.ca/en
Located at 555 Avenue Road and St. Clair Avenue West

Rosalind Solomon's lecture as part of the Image Arts CONTACT Lecture Series 2009

Rock of the Devil/Poems will Come from This Day To see the Rock of the Devil, walk from the ruins of Chavin de Huantar, towards Machac. Look high up for a rock in the shape of a uterus and a vagina. They say that inside that rock, a candle washes blue light over the devil and his band. Snakes in the rock’s womb curl around the devil’s arms and legs. His 4-piece band whines and howls with the moaning ghosts of Chavin’s sacrificed virgins. Don’t listen. If you hear the band, the devil will pierce your heart.

Quince Julio, mil nove cientos noventa y cinco.
July 15, 1995 Chavin, Peru
5am –I wake up in the dark. No electricity at this hour. Use a flashlight and read two chapters of On the Road. Eat half a banana.

5:30, cocks crow. take the top off the toilet tank, pull up the bulb and flush away the night’s droppings. I look at the postcards I tacked on the wall for inspiration: Frida Kahlo. Rembrandt, Nadar and Picasso.

I take a sponge bath, dress and arrange my photo vest: 12 rolls of film, black plastic bag, insect repellent, anti-histamine, raisins, toilet tissue, kleenex, passport, water bottle, pencil, notebook, color coded dots, sunblock, film slide, small flashlight, money, lipstick, comb and light meter. In the courtyard, I watch a hired hand cut- up a slaughtered pig. Ricky, a guide at the Chavin ruins, who speaks a little German, but no English, arrives with La Rosa Palacio. La Rosa came from Lima for the week of the festival. He is a poet, but he’s studying law. He knows only a few English phrases, so we speak Spanish. He recites 3 poems and invites me to visit and photograph his Chavin relatives. At lunch his nephew, Javier, mentions the Pochac Inca burial ground at 12,000 feet above sea level. The trail begins behind the family house; you ride three-hours up a path of rocks. Horses and riders have slipped off the rocks and rolled down the mountain, but with a good horseman, you should be fine. I will hire horses and burros, and La Rosa, Javier, Ricky and I will ride to the burial ground the day after the fiesta.

July 16th –Fiesta: Celebration of Chavin’s Virgin Carmen. After the procession, people dance and feast into the night, but during this important occasion, I will photograph without any help and without the equipment I wanted to use, because the van driver and his son disappeared. They brought me to Chavin. They agreed to help on this date, all day and evening. They are abandoning me. I suppose they got drunk and sick last night. After 10:00 mass, a crowd makes way for the village saint outside the church and the procession begins. I leave the video cam and several lenses in my room, take my 2 1/4 camera and a strobe, and follow the band which plays a dirge behind the virgin. Twelve men strain carrying the statue on a flower-covered board. I move in-step with the funeral beat. The band stops. I run ahead and photograph the crowd, pontificating politicians, a chanting priest and the mayor duomo, the man who will provide a feast for the entire village this afternoon! The procession circles the plaza three times and then enters the church. The bearers put the virgin in her place: trumpets salute her, and everyone returns to the square. Mobs sweat in the sun. Bands play the Huayno, off-key and out- of- synch. No matter. The rhythm tantalizes. A one-eyed man, Crosby, La Rosa’s grandfather, takes my arm. A band encircles us and I stumble through the dance. La Rosa breaks through the circle and removes my dangling Hassleblad. He pulls me away from Crosby. Cups of chicha pass from mouth to mouth and then someone offers a bottle here gringa, take a swig you have to drink it gringa -- we march in time with music, stop at various houses while friends embrace. Men toss scarves around women’s necks and pull them closer. Everyone in good clothes, twirling white handkerchiefs… me in hiking boots, a photo vest and a canvas hat!....... Trumpets wobble, drums pulse. I am la Senora Rosalinda. Rosalinda, dancing the huayno!
July 17th 6:15am- Now Don Quixote Solomon, eager and ready to conquer the world, awaits her poet and her steeds. Ricky comes with Ramon, the horseman, who ties up a mule, 2 burros and 2 horses. These scrawny creatures are all between us and disaster. Ricky gives me a note I love you always and La Rosa’s grandfather loves you,too, and wants to dance with you again! (I am not on the sidelines here.) La Rosa and Javier arrive and we mount. …
Ricky on a mule, Javier on a burro, La Rosa on a grey and me on a white. Ramon, in the rear, carries a eucalyptus, twig-whip and hisses hasa, pisa, hasa pica, HASA! We dismount and he walks the animals over steep rock outcrops. Each time we stop, Ramon helps me off, and tries his best to get a feel of breast and crotch.
I gasp. Too little oxygen. Walking in slow motion, I haven’t enough breath to explore the graveyard! I manage some pictures of La Rosa. He strikes a variety of poses like Valentino in a silent movie. Rosalinda, please, I want a Polaroid kissing you on the cheek. I try to relax while Javier takes instant pictures. As Javier and Ricky watch, La Rosa leans over, frenches me and then says: poems will come from this day.
The cemetery caretaker brings some cooked potatoes which the people of Pochac sent for us. We eat them with our bananas, but soon the caretaker and Ramon argue in Quechua, the indigenous language, which only Javier and Ricky understand. He tells us that Ramon pastured the animals on communal land and the caretaker said move them now. Ramon says the villagers think we are cannibals and maybe they poisoned the potatoes. Ramon eyes the mountain across the valley and puts his hands above his shoulders, ready to cover his ears. He says I have heard the devil’s fiddlers on that mountain and I stopped grazing my herds there.

July 21st
The day of the Bullfight. Before sunrise, the dogs bark and cry. They smell blood in the air. In the plaza, Kiki, the pension mutt, raises her head. She sniffs the bulls crammed in corals. At the 10:00 o’clock mass, heads bow, por favor, please Virgin Carmen, our mother, keep us safe today.

At the Corrida, La Rosa’s nieces titter when he introduces me as his amiga. He wants a romantic tale. A 24 –year-old man in love with a 65-year-old woman is not unknown in Peru. Mario Vargas Llosa married his Aunt Julia!

The second bull jumps over the horizontal rails into the crowd. Chaos. Danger for spectators. Anything can cause a stampede. People jam against one another, gulping beer and liquor. No one knows where the next bull will land.

In the evening, La Rosa visits me. My room has no chair, so we sit on the bed. La Rosa reads his new poem, La aroma de tu pelo, The Aroma of Your Hair. And then, ohhhh…the slats under the mattress give way. We fall onto the floor. We laugh and then we whisper.

I dreamed and dreamed the same dream again and again,

I am dancing the Huayno with Crosby and La Rosa.
I am bigger than the men …
floating in mist over
Turquoise Lagoon,
Naked…
The old man licks my breast
Grasps and
pleads for more but
I push him away.

La Rosa touches a nipple,
fist in my belly,
he nibbles and sucks,
toes combing my hair.
Above us
Huascaran Glacier,
Teeth bared
Silent.

………….

© Copyright Rosalind Solomon 2009

Please do not reproduce this text without the artist's consent.

The Image Arts CONTACT Lecture Series 2009 is presented by Ryerson University supported by KODAK.

Ottawa

Yesterday I flew to Ottawa to see Gabor Szilasi’s opening at the CMCP.

Doina Popescu happened to be on the same flight, so we were able to discuss the new Ryerson Gallery and Research Centre which gets more exciting by the day. It will open in the fall of 2010, with its inaugural exhibition in January 2011.

Michel Gauthier graciously gave us a ride downtown and over coffee he reminded me about the great work that Khalia Scott is doing with the School of Photographic Arts: Ottawa, which prompted me to visit. It has a great energy and I was very happy to get a tour with Khalia and hear first hand about their great activities. It is easy to see why this school has become a catalyst for the Ottawa community.

I headed over to see Ann Thomas at the National Gallery to further some research I’m doing with 19^th Century photographs. My 1 hour visit lasted over 4 hours! It was so much fun looking through great material with someone so knowledgeable who had as much fun as I did. Amongst the treasures I saw were two albums by Alexander Henderson that made my quite envious. I was also happy to ask her about any new gems that have entered into the collection and she showed me the Frederick Evans ‘Sea of Steps’ that they recently acquired. This was a very special opportunity to hold this historic photograph in my hand and marvel at its beauty. I can only imagine how much pride Evans must have felt when he held the same photograph in his hands for the first time!

We were lucky to have looked at a clock because we were rather lost in the photographs and raced downstairs to catch the tribute for Gabor. He is so deserving of this exhibition that there was a wonderful energy to the opening as colleagues and admirers gathered from all over to share in the occasion. The exhibition looks fantastic, filled with old favourites and new discoveries. There are a good number of photographs I was surprised to not see included in an exhibition of this magnitude, but that only serves to highlight the extraordinary contribution Gabor has made. Congratulations to David Harris for his duration and book, to Musée d'art de Joliette who hosted the first stop of this show and to Martha Hanna and the CMCP for mounting such a terrific exhibition. I hope this collection’s location in the National Gallery gives them the larger audience they deserve. Although no longer in its own building, this collection can remain an important part of Canadian photography. I hope they are able to keep this gallery space and that the Photographs Collection is given at least the same amount of space for their programming.

Stephen

Gabor Szilasi’s retrospective opens at the National Gallery of Canada tonight

NATIONAL GALLERY OF CANADA
380 Sussex Drive, Ottawa, Ontario
www.gallery.ca | 613-990-1985 | info@gallery.ca
Meet the artist talks

Gabor Szilasi: Friday, October 9 at 1:30 pm
Valérie Blass: Thursday, October 15 at 6 pm
David Hoffos: Friday, November 6 at 12:15 pm
Mark Lewis: Thursday, November 19 at 7:30 pm

Gabor Szilasi: Friday, October 9 at 1:30 pm
Over the course of the last 50 years, Gabor Szilasi has created one of Canada’s most significant and influential bodies of photographic work, comprising environmental portraits, domestic, commercial, and urban views of Montreal and Budapest and images of rural Quebec. His photographs have been sustained by an unwavering belief in the humanistic and documentary value of the medium. Gabor Szilasi speaks about his work in the exhibition Gabor Szilasi: The Eloquence of the Everyday .

In French with bilingual discussion. In the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography exhibition galleries. Included with Gallery admission.

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 10th, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

REBECCA
Dir. Alfred Hitchcock (USA, 1940) 130 mins

Joan Fontaine plays the unnamed narrator, a young woman who works as a companion to the well-to-do Mrs. Van Hopper (Florence Bates). She meets the wealthy widower Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier) in Monte Carlo, where they fall in love and get married. Maxim takes his new bride to Manderlay, his large country estate in Cornwall.
However, the mansion's many servants refuse to accept her as the new lady of the house. They seem to be strangely devoted to Maxim's first wife, Rebecca, who died under mysterious circumstances.

Robert Burley dicusses the use of digital media

Mike Landry discusses the meaning behind Robert Burley's recent work at the Canadian Centre of Architecture titled Photographic Proof, and the significance behind the installation of a huge Polaroid in the age of digital media. To read the article, please click here.

Flash Forward - Emerging Photographers 2009 opens tonight at Lennox

The Magenta Foundation is pleased to announce year five of its Emerging Photographers exchange opening tonight at the Lennox Contemporary, located at 12 Ossington. Flash Forward showcases the future of photography, focusing on emerging talent that jurors have identified as having great potential, and one of this years winners is Josh Morden who is represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery and is currently enrolled in the masters program at OCAD.

Agatha, 2008, Copyright Josh Morden

Previous winners include Scott Conarroe and E. J. Major, also represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery.

25th International Fashion and Photography Festival Villa Noailles, Hyères

Every Spring in the South of France, the 'International Fashion and Photography Festival' spotlights young promising artists in the fields of fashion and photography from April 30^th to May 3^rd, 2010. The festival proposes diverse exhibitions, professional panel discussions and two competitions. The competitions showcase 10 fashion designers and 10 photographers selected by a jury of professionals in each field. The work of the chosen candidates is presented to the jury and the public in either fashion shows (designers) or group exhibitions (photographers).

To learn more and apply by the deadline November 15th, please click here.

Flash Forward 2009 Opens Tomorrow at Lennox Contemporary

Flash Forward 2009

October 8 – 25


Book Launch and Reception: Thursday October 8, 7 – 10 pm
Location: Lennox Contemporary: 12 Ossington Avenue, Toronto, ON, M6J 2Y7

Now in it’s 5th year, Flash Forward 2009, is Toronto’s most expansive exhibition of contemporary photography. The show is international in scope featuring emerging artists from Canada, the United States and Great Britain. Flash Forward 2009 is an opportunity to view and acquire photography by some of the worlds most dynamic young photographers.

Curator’s Note

by Sara Knelman

Welcome to the 2009 edition of The Magenta Foundation’s Flash Forward. This fifth-anniversary collection showcases the most exciting work from emerging photographers in Canada, the UK and the US. The project continues to grow, reaching new and wider audiences as both a publication and a touring exhibition, becoming an invaluable resource for everyone invested in the development of the photographic arts.

On behalf of the 10 members of this international jury, I’d like to thank The Magenta Foundation for the opportunity to see the work of so many talented individuals dedicated to making, and sharing, their photographs. This edition was created from the ever-increasing volume of submissions, and the final selects bring to light work by more artists than ever before, with 30 from each country.

In 1851, more than 150 years ago, six million people came to see the photographs on display at London’s Great Exhibition, the world’s inaugural public exhibition of photography. About a century later, Edward Steichen’s touring exhibition The Family of Man also drew record crowds and welcomed a new era of recognition for the medium. In the last half-century, technological advances and widespread access to photography have led to a proliferation of photographic images in and outside art museums, which has in turn contributed to a newfound global visual literacy—a determined, often urgent need to understand and connect with the world through images.

All of the photographers whose unique contributions make up Flash Forward 2009 are driven by a similar desire to help us make these connections. The photos in this book reflect an unprecedented moment in time and generate a visual intelligence that ultimately empowers a raised consciousness of the world we share now. They offer powerful glimmers of understanding and help illuminate our complex relationship to photography.

Each artist in this collection frames an individual vision of the world, building on almost two centuries of photographic history and helping to define the future of the medium.

Related Links:
Magenta Magazine - www.magentamagazine.com
Lennox Contemporary - www.lennoxcontemporary.com

Larry Towell performs and displays his work in Wallaceburg

By Tammy Howlett – Special to the Daily Post October 5th, 2009

Wallaceburg Museums, Jeanne Gordon Theatre, was filled to capacity for Larry Towell’s “Collected Works” exhibit on Saturday, October 3.

The event was hosted by the Wallaceburg Arts Council, and featured harmonica sound vibrations from Mike Stevens, of Bright’s Grove.

Towell is a world renowned visual journalist, poet and oral historian, currently residing in Shetland, Ontario, just outside Chatham-Kent. He has been affiliated with Magnum Photos since 1988 and has written several books, including his newest book “The World From My Front Porch”.

For the full article and link to video, please click here

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

October 3rd, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

BORN TO KILL
Dir. Robert Wise (USA, 1947) 92 mins

Sam Wild (Lawrence Tierney) murders two innocent people over a simple social slight. He chances to meet Helen Trent, (Claire Trevor), who discovers the victims but chooses to remain silent as she is leaving town and doesn’t want to be impeded by the police. Though Sam Wild and Helen Trent fall in love, Helen Trent is already married. Wild continues to aggressively pursue her even as he marries her half-sister. The two disturbed characters parlay their dark secrets into a morass of trouble.

Sarah Anne Johnson's "House on Fire" purchased by the AGO

Stephen Bulger Gallery, Toronto and Julie Saul Gallery, New York, are delighted to announce the purchase of the entire installation of Sarah Anne Johnson’s new work entitled “House on Fire”, originally exhibited at the Art Gallery of Ontario in the summer of 2009.


AGO Acquires Acclaimed Sarah Anne Johnson Installation
‘House on Fire’ to join AGO’s permanent collection in its entirety

(TORONTO – September 30, 2009) The Art Gallery of Ontario has acquired a major new installation by Winnipeg based artist Sarah Anne Johnson, supported by a generous donation from art collector Michael F. B. Nesbitt. House on Fire explores the story of Johnson’s maternal grandmother’s unwitting participation in CIA-funded brainwashing experiments at the Allan Memorial Institute at McGill University in the mid-1950s.

As in her previous work, The Galapagos Project (2007) and Tree Planting (2005), Johnson works in series, switching between media to comprehensively explore her subject matter. House on Fire consists of 13 works on paper (paintings and drawings on photographs and newsprint); 9 bronze sculptures; and a major sculpture in the form of a surreal dollhouse, from which the series takes its title. The AGO is acquiring all of the works listed above.

“House on Fire is a tremendous achievement, significant both in its broad artistic scope and intimate personal vision that grapples with unsettling subject matter,” says David Moos, the AGO’s curator of contemporary art. “The installation joins David Altmejd’s monumental work The Index as a symbol of the AGO’s ongoing commitment to featuring works of defining importance by Canadian contemporary artists.”

Says Johnson, “It is such a thrill to know that the works will remain together and in context as part of the collection of one of Canada’s most important art institutions. I couldn’t be more excited.”

Michael F. B. Nesbitt is a noted contemporary art collector based in Winnipeg who has contributed to Plug In ICA and the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Says Nesbitt, “Sarah Anne Johnson is a shining example of an artist able to tell unique, personal stories in a universal way. I am happy to support her work and the wonderful collection at the Art Gallery of Ontario.”

House on Fire was first installed at the Art Gallery of Ontario in the summer of 2009 to critical acclaim. It is currently on display at the Julie Saul Gallery in New York. Says Saul, “We’ve had a special relationship with Sarah from the beginning of her short but highly impressive career. We’re thrilled that her work continues to receive the recognition that we know it is so worthy of and that the installation will be housed within Canada’s leading art museum.”

Sarah Anne Johnson was born in Winnipeg in 1976. She completed a BFA at the University of Manitoba and an MFA at the Yale School of Art. In 2005, her exhibition Tree Planting, comprising more than 60 images, was acquired by the Guggenheim Museum. In 2008, Johnson was the inaugural winner of The Grange Prize, a photography prize co-sponsored by Aeroplan and the AGO. The prize includes a $50,000 cash prize and a solo exhibition at the AGO, for which House on Fire was created. In addition to the aforementioned museums, Johnson’s work is also part of the collections of the Spencer Museum of Art, Lawrence, Kansas; Yale University Art Gallery; and the National Gallery of Canada. Johnson lives and works in Winnipeg.

ABOUT THE AGO
With a permanent collection of more than 79,000 works of art, the Art Gallery of Ontario is among the most distinguished art museums in North America. In 2008, with a stunning new design by world-renowned architect Frank Gehry, the AGO opened its doors to the public amid international acclaim. Highlights include Galleria Italia, a gleaming showcase made of wood and glass running the length of an entire city block along the Gallery’s façade; and the feature staircase, spiralling up through the roof of Walker Court and into the new contemporary galleries above. From the extensive Group of Seven collection to the dramatic new African art gallery; from David Altmejd's monumental installation The Index to Peter Paul Rubens' masterpiece The Massacre of The Innocents, a highlight of the celebrated Thomson Collection, there is truly something for everyone at the AGO.

For images or more information, please contact:
Sean O’Neill, 416-979-6660 ext. 403, sean_oneill@ago.net
Antonietta Mirabelli, 416-979-6660 ext. 454, antoniettamirabelli@ago.net

The Art Gallery of Ontario is funded in part by the Ontario Ministry of Culture. Additional operating support is received from the Volunteers of the AGO, the City of Toronto, the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Sunil Gupta curates Images of Desire : Queer Fantasy

Queer subcultures the world over have been the repository of fantastical other lives. In the face of oppressive realities they have famously responded by honing their powers of expressive imagination; be it in language or dress codes. Images have played a very significant role in this. We share a hidden art history only now becoming an appropriate subject for investigation. At times like now, post 377, there is a shift in societal norms and empower us to make visible our desires. How would you visualise your queer fantasies?

The Nigah Queerfest '09 invites you to share your queer fantasies. Send us a queer fantasy image - photos, collages, illustrations, or any other kind of scanned artwork that you can email. Submission guidelines:

1. Images must be submitted in digital format in highest possible resolution to: photo@nigah.org
2. Please include the following information with each photograph: Title (if any), Place, Year
3. Please include contact information, if applicable, for our records.
4. All submissions are due by October 10th, 2009.
5. Entries may be anonymous. But you must still submit contact details, your name or details will not be made public.
6. Entries may be modified in terms of size for display purposes. No modification or alteration of content will be undertaken.
7. Photographs submitted to The Nigah Queerfest'08 may be used for non- commercial, educational purposes, or in promotional material for the exhibit.
8. Entries submitted indicate an acceptance of the Terms and Conditions of The Nigah QueerFest.

About the curator: As an artist, curator, writer, teacher and cultural activist, Sunil Gupta challenges stereotypes and questions beliefs, by exploring issues of race, gender, and sexuality, and related issues of access, place, and identity. Gupta's photographs are autobiographical, drawing on his experiences as a gay man of colour living with HIV who moves fluidly within the landscapes, traditions, and cultures of his native India, and his adopted homes in Canada and England. He has been widely shown around the world, and is now based in New Delhi. For more information: www.sunilgupta.net

We welcome all contributions!

Please forward widely.
Nigah
www.thequeerfest.com

Ontario Association of Art Galleries / Association ontarienne des galleries d’art

111 Peter Street, Suite 617, Toronto ON M5V 2H1 (416) 598-0714 www.oaag.org

2009 OAAG AWARDS / REMISE DES PRIX AOGA
PARTNER AWARD / PRIX DU PARTENARIAT

Jason and Susan Martin
Drive By: Subway Installation, University of Toronto Art Centre, 2008
Jeff Thomas, Artist

For more results please click here

Rosalind Solomon lecture at Ryerson Tonight!

Please join us tonight to hear Rosalind Solomon speak about her work for the first time in Toronto.

Image Arts CONTACT Lecture Series and Stephen Bulger Gallery present Rosalind Solomon - Beautiful and Ugly All Eyes All Sides

When: September 25, 7pm
Where: Ted Rogers School of Management , Lecture Theatre TR2-166 (575 bay Street, enter south side of Dundas Street W., just east of Bay Street).

Please arrive early as seating is limited.

Éliane Excoffier - Salle Deux

Éliane Excoffier's opening is Sept. 24th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
at the Musée régional de Rimouski
Du 24 septembre au 15 novembre 2009
Salle Deux
Artist will be in attendance

Book Launch Tonight!

Please join Monica Kulling and Bill Slavin in celebrating the launch of their book, It's a Snap! George Eastman's First Photograph.




Date: Wednesday, September 23rd.
Time: 7-9pm
Place: Stephen Bulger Gallery
Address: 1026 Queen Street West, Toronto, M6J 1H6

Both the author and artist will be on hand to sign books!

www.tundrabooks.com

NEW Magenta Magazine- ONLINE

After a summer of rumours and innuendo, the Magenta Foundation is pleased to present you with the truth: YES, MAGENTA MAGAZINE IS BACK!

BIGGER, BOLDER AND BRIGHTER THAN EVER! Our first issue is online NOW at www.magentamagazine.com. With a fresh new look, a revamped editorial mandate,
and a roster of knowledgeable and dedicated contributors (who we can not thank enough for delivering such insightful and well-written texts),
the editorial team at MAGENTA MAGAZINE hope you enjoy our first online issue. So, what are you waiting for?

A world of art is just one click away at MAGENTA MAGAZINE! http://www.magentamagazine.com/

Sarah Anne Johnson - The Village Voice

Sarah Anne Johnson's exhibition, House on Fire, at Julie Saul Gallery in New York City has been reviewed in The Village Voice. Click here.

Éliane Excoffier - Salle Deux

Éliane Excoffier

Du 24 septembre au 15 novembre 2009
Salle Deux
Commissaire : Bernard Lamarche
Vernissage le jeudi, 24 septembre à 17 h
En présence du commissaire et de l’artiste

Rimouski, le 10 septembre 2009 – Le Musée régional de Rimouski invite la population au vernissage de l’exposition de la photographe Éliane Excoffier, le jeudi 24 septembre à 17 h, dans la salle Deux du Musée. Obscures (série no 2) – 01, 2006

L’exposition se veut un bilan du travail de l’artiste depuis une dizaine d’années. Cette dernière est animée d’une double inspiration : d’un côté, l’attrait pour la représentation du corps féminin, de l’autre un intérêt pour la photographie, son histoire, ses techniques et sa tradition.

Depuis 1996, Éliane Excoffier met en scène devant l’appareil photographique des rituels de beauté qui impliquent le corps féminin. Ses images cultivent un sens du mystère soutenu par la gestuelle des corps photographiés, mais aussi par les technologies anciennes de prises de vue qu’elle utilise. Les séries d’images de l’artiste ont été réalisées avec de vieux appareils, peu performants et même parfois défectueux, comme le mythique Kiev 60, ou encore le sténopé, un petit trou perforé dans une boîte de carton qui permet à la lumière d’entrer et de former des images.

Grâce à ces manipulations techniques et un travail dans la chambre noire, Excoffier donne à voir des images sensuelles et capte des lumières enveloppant les corps. En se servant de technologies jugées désuètes et par des images à l’aspect vieillot, l’artiste touche au coeur d’une actualité criante, soit la manipulation des images à une époque du tout numérique. Un catalogue d’exposition sera lancé cet automne pour accompagner l’exposition. Il sera publié en collaboration avec la galerie Simon Blais de Montréal et la galerie Stephen Bulger, de Toronto.

Titulaire d’un baccalauréat en arts visuels et en histoire de l’art obtenu en 1996, Excoffier vit et travaille à Montréal. Ses oeuvres font maintenant partie de plusieurs collections, notamment du Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal; Loto-Québec; Giverny Capital ainsi que Prêts d’oeuvres d’art du Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec.

Heures d’ouverture du Musée régional de Rimouski :
du mercredi au dimanche de 12 h à 17 h, jusqu’à 21 h les jeudis.
Profitez des dimanches gratuits, une collaboration de L’Avantage, votre journal et de Radio-Canada.

Le Musée régional de Rimouski est subventionné par le ministère de la Culture, des Communications et de la Condition féminine du Québec,
le Conseil des Arts du Canada et la Ville de Rimouski.

Le Musée régional de Rimouski remercie les présentateurs de cette exposition, Encadrex et Rézin.

Source : Sophie Roch
Agente aux communications
418-724-2272

Éliane Excoffier to give artist talk at 2pm today

Open to everyone.

Bertrand Carrière - Caux

Opens Today!
19 September - 22 November 2009
Oakville Galleries at Centennial Square
Curated by Marnie Fleming

Éliane Excoffier's Opening and Elizabeth Siegfried's Closing

Thank you to everyone who attended last Thursday!

Elizabeth Siegfried

Éliane Excoffier

Elizabeth Siegfried's friends and family

Gerald and Helen Pisarzowski

Bertrand Carrière and Melissa LaVallee

Éliane Excoffier and family

April Hickox and Bertrand Carrière

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

September 19th, 2009
Obsession Series
3:00 PM

GILDA
Dir. Charles Vidor (USA, 1946) 110 mins
Just arrived in Argentina, small-time crooked gambler Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford) is saved from a gunman by sinister Ballin Mundson (George Macready), who later makes Johnny his right-hand man. But their friendship based on mutual lack of scruples becomes strained when Mundson returns from a trip with a wife: the supremely desirable Gilda (Rita Hayworth), whom Johnny once knew and has now learned to hate. The relationship between Johnny and Gilda, a battlefield of warring emotions, becomes even more bizarre once Mundson disappears.

Sarah Anne Johnson - House on Fire

Opens tonight, and runs from September 17th to November 14th at the
Julie Saul Gallery

Robert Burley: Photographic Proof

Video of Robert Burley's installation "Photographic Proof" at the CCA
11 September to 19 October 2009, North Facade
To watch the video please click here.

Anthony Koutras in "Signs of the Times"

"Signs of the Times", part of the Impact 6 conference in Bristol U.K running from September 16th -19th 2009, will address how we navigate the increasingly complex, interrelated political, economic and social conditions of our global future.

As directional signage attracts attention to, establishes identities and communicates instructions to a fast paced moving public, "Signs of the Times" exhibition will utilize the inherent qualities of directional signage.

“Signs of the Times”, organized by Stefanie Dykes, University of Utah, and Curtis Readel, Northern Illinois University, is an exhibition opportunity open to twenty-five graduate level students world wide.

For more information on this exhibition, please click here.
For more information on Anthony Koutras and his work in this exhibition, please click here.

Ruth Kaplan Teaching Photography Classes this Fall

Ruth Kaplan is teaching a black and white photography course in association with Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography at the Toronto School of Art. Classes begin September 23rd and run through to December 9th, 2009
http://www.tsa-art.ca/Courses/Courses_by_Term/92/15/1355

Ruth Kaplan is also teaching 3 Sessions of BASIC BLACK & WHITE photography at Gallery 44 on Saturdays, Oct. 17, 24, 31, 10am - 2pm
http://www.gallery44.org/navbar/index.html

Bertrand Carrière: "Caux"

19 September - 22 November 2009
Oakville Galleries in Centennial Square

Opening and artist talk: Sunday 20 September at 2:30 pm at Oakville Galleries at Centennial Square, followed by a reception at Oakville Galleries in Gairloch Gardens at 3:30 pm.

Bertrand Carrière, Berneval-le-Grand, France (Stairs and cliff), 2003

Bertrand Carrière's Caux captures muted aspects of a turbulent history along the Normandy Coast, particularly the beach at Dieppe, where many Canadian soldiers fell in the Dieppe Raid. His photographs uncover the ruins of the strange legacy left behind in the landscape, where cliffs rise up in an impenetrable fortress of harsh and arid beauty.
Curated by Marnie Fleming.

For more details on the following event, please visit www.oakvillegalleries.com.

FREE SATURDAY SCREENING

September 12th, 2009
By Rail Series
3:00 PM

3:10 TO YUMA
Dir. James Mangold (USA, 2007) 122 mins
Dan Evans, an impoverished rancher and Civil War veteran witnesses a stagecoach robbery led by the infamous outlaw Ben Wade. Shortly thereafter, Wade is captured and arrested by the law in Bisbee, Arizona. Evans, in an attempt to save his livelihood, agrees to escort Wade to the 3:10 train to Yuma for the reward of $200. The transport to Contention is hazardous and filled with ambushes, pursuits by Wade's vengeful gang and Wade's own conniving demeanor that makes the ride all the more intense.