So strange, that process: how things come out of boxes and wrapping to take on a life of their own for a while, and then disappear again.
It was a great experience – a lovely way to come ‘full circle’ with this work and see it from a different vantage point (coming out on the other side, so to speak).
That was in fact the case when a delightful group of poets I had worked with in 2007 (a decade, already?!) came to the gallery to do a reading of work from a collaborative collection titled Eyeing the Magpie. It was nice to re-connect with these poets, and to have this bird-inspired work presented in the context of this exhibition was really fun. My thanks to Nancy MacKenzie, Anna Mioduchowska, Julie C Robinson, Myrna Garanis, and Rusti Lehay (all pictured below) for presenting their work!
I am so grateful to the McMullen Gallery for the opportunity to exhibit this body of work; the context and the feedback I received throughout the exhibition was invaluable to me, and allowed me to see my work and my practice as a whole in a new way.
Deep Thanks also to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, for the support in creating the soundscape for this exhibition!
So now, a shift to new things – the first inklings of the coming spring are in the air, a new project going up for exhibition this week, and lots of studio work and new ideas percolating.
I am extremely happy to say that the McMullen Gallery at the University of Alberta Hospital will be hosting my exhibition 21st Century Nesting Practices!
This iteration of the work will feature a new video piece, and a soundscape created from a combination of my own field recordings and a selection of recordings from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology holdings.
The Exhibition Opening Reception is January 10, 2018 from 7pm – 9pm.
If you are in the Edmonton area, please stop in! The exhibition is up until February 25, 2018.
My thanks to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for their support in realizing the soundscape for this exhibition, and to the McMullen for hosting me.
Thanks Also to Julianna Barabas & John Waldron for their invaluable assistance in making this exhibition possible.
I am very happy to let you know that TIX on the Square in Edmonton, AB is carrying some of my limited-edition artist books!
NEST {types} is a collaborative work, with lovely poems written by Vancouver-based poet Catherine Owen, and hand carved linocut prints by me. Each print/poem pairing revolves around a particular type or shape of nest: cup, saucer, scrape, burrow, and so on.
I printed and bound only 50 books; the linocuts were printed on rice paper, and the text is printed on eco-friendly straw paper; cover stock is FSC-certified. Hand-bound with unbleached linen cord.
Get in touch with the lovely people at TIX if you’d like a copy – they are perfect gifts!
It seems growth and change are afoot in almost every way imaginable.
Last night, the province in which I live held a remarkable election, with results that have transformed the political landscape here – and certainly made history. A blast of fresh Spring air in this place.
I’ve been back for a couple of weeks from Vienna, recovered from the jet lag and hit the ground running; digging into a big new project that has me very excited: York:Moments. A project that revolves around reclaiming the history of a place and a neighbourhood, gathering stories and memories with a community. A new life of sorts for streets and empty spaces that allow them in some small way to live again through images and (re)tellings … making a place that no longer exists live again.
These things are about potential, about working and building new things out of the old, and saving what’s precious in one way or another … just like the birds do each year:
Here, a nest within a nest. A bird decided that one of my nest sculptures would be a good spot to build a new home, perhaps.
It remains to be seen what will come of these various activities – for me and for the birds.
But I do know that right now, starting new things and seeing change unfold is exactly what has to happen. It’s Spring (even if the snow today would have us believe otherwise).
After the busy-ness of getting the work up for exhibition, and then the opening reception on the 9th, I thought life was going to slow a little bit. Not so.
I have been elsewhere (metaphorically) – catching up on all sorts of things that needed attending to.
Amongst those ‘to-do’ list items: A few images from the exhibition, and the curator’s essay.
A quick shot of the installation work I did in the exterior window of the gallery. The quotation is taken from Roger-Pol Droit’s lovely book, entitled How Are Things? It seemed to sum up so perfectly that I have been striving for, in this body of work, and in my practice as a whole.Another quick shot, this a face-on view of the main window.A closer shot, showing some of the detail. I will be back out to the gallery shortly, to shoot a proper set of images of the work, but this does give you some idea.
This exhibition took the effort of many minds and hands to produce. My thanks to my co-exhibitor, Brenda Danbrook, and to Brenda Barry Byrne for comments, support, and great input and feedback, and to Strathcona County, for building such a beautiful gallery in which to show work!
My thanks and gratitude too to Kaylee Low from Gallery @ 501, Paddy Lamb, and Angele Karosi for their help in getting the work on the walls, and to Sara McKarney for helping me pack it and John Waldron for getting me and the work to the gallery!
Many preparations afoot for the upcoming opening of Elsewhere on January 9 2015.
What it all amounts to is what happens ‘the rest of the time’ in the work of working on my practice.
And for the last several days, that has looked like:
400 square feet of ethafoam
two large rolls of bubble wrap
half a roll of cling wrapping
three and a half rolls of packing tape
20 feet of 12″ diameter concrete forms
48 square feet of foamcore
a large roll of heavy weight plastic sheet
cardboard … lots of corrugated cardboard
several large tubs
And this:
**Extra-special thanks to amazing artist Sara McKarney for her mad preparator-skills and help with some of the packing!
… and once all of that was done, it looked like this:
AND special thanks to John Waldron for the assistance with packing the truck and getting all of this, and me, to the gallery to unload!
So. That bit is done: work is packed and delivered to the gallery, and installation of the exhibition will begin January 5th. (ah, the glamourous life!)
In a bit of serendipity, this evening I came across a pertinent bit of writing concerning the whole subject of the artist’s life and practice. It’s a speech by artist Teresita Fernandez, and it hits so many salient points. Read excerpts (and hear it too) at the lovely Brain Pickings, here.
But first – before I get back to considering all of the relative successes and potential failures in this and other work to come, I can actually take a little bit of time and catch my breath, and reacquaint myself with the world outside my studio walls (like my kitchen … oh, ya … and the laundry).
I have some things I’d like to share with you, that I hope you buy from me, to give as gifts to people in the next while.
First off, I have some lovely hand-bound poetry books that would like to have new homes.
… and the finished product! 10″ x 8.5″, text stock is 80% wheat straw; block prints are on rice paper; 65 lb FSC certified cover stock. 50 numbered copies.
Text by award-winning Vancouver poet Catherine Owen; 7 hand-pulled block print illustrations by me. I carved the blocks, printed the images on rice paper, the text on straw paper, and bound the books. Limited edition of 50.
Seven Limited Edition, hand carved and pulled block prints of Nests will be in the chapbook …
The poems are based on the seven basic building forms that birds use to build nests, and deal with love and the work of living and caring for one another in ways that are insightful, and always threaded through with a keen understanding of human relationships.
$50 each, shipping via Canada Post extra (if needed).
I also have a new series of photo-based work I’ve just put up at Credo on 104th Street in Edmonton AB. These are a selection urban/street based images I’ve been collecting for the last several years: quirky little moments from various cities in Canada.
Manipulated digital images printed on mylar and archival fine art photo paper, framed and ready to hang. These are non-editioned images, so if you want something in a different size, get in touch, and we can talk.
Prices range from $45 – $90, shipping via Canada Post extra (if needed).
But there is a point to me telling you about these things, beyond the possible sale …
Buying from the maker of the goods you choose gives both buyer and seller so much more than just the positive conclusion to a mutually agreeable monetary transaction.
You have the option to get to know the person who made the thing you like a little better – find out the story behind the item you like.
The thing you choose will be unique in some way; it’s not going to be one of several million items produced in a factory. It comes from a different kind of economy, and a different understanding of ‘value.’
You know that the money you spend is going to support the effort of someone trying to make a living from making. From self-employment in creative work. Local workers making local products.
Props to the many Maker’s Markets and Farmer’s Markets her and elsewhere that serve as venues for makers of all types … all those places where people gather to show and sell what they make – and make the cities they make in a little bit more awesome all the time.
(ok – my mini rant is over … and I hope you consider purchasing gifts for people throughout the year from local artists and artisans. It matters!)
I’ve been invited to participate in a Blog Hop Around the World, in which people share something about their current projects and creative processes. I think it’s a lovely opportunity to learn a little bit more about the work that goes on ‘behind the studio door’, and see the threads that run through creative work of all types across the globe.
My thanks to June Hunter – The Urban Nature Enthusiast for the tag! June creates beautiful photographs and photo-based art, home decor pieces, and jewellery items in her Vancouver studio. June and I share a passion for corvids – ravens, crows, magpies and the like – and I really appreciate her keen eye, and her ability to capture the intelligence and quirkiness of these creatures.
So … to answer the Blog Hop questions:
WHAT ARE YOU WORKING ON?
I think like most artists, I have several things on the go at the same time in the studio and otherwise. This is a life of juggling: there’s the time spent in the studio, making work and sorting through ideas, of course. But I spend a good deal of time on the ‘administration’ of my practice as well: writing exhibition proposals and grants, keeping my files and expenses in order, keeping on top of the work flow, materials orders, and contract details for upcoming exhibitions, and doing a little self-promotion via the web. Add in taking the time to see other artists’ work at exhibitions, volunteer work at various art-related organizations, laundry, gardening, a little downtime, and sleep … and it’s a pretty full life.
Currently, I am preparing for a big two-person exhibition that will open in January 2015. I will be showing some of the NEST series that I have been working on and refining for the last couple of years. The images below are from the last time this work was exhibited, at the Art Gallery of St. Albert.
I’m quite excited by the way the work has evolved, especially in the last year; I have several new pieces well underway, and at this point (maybe that should read ‘for now’!)
I am happy with the way things are developing. I’ve been doing some writing about the background “raw material” for newest pieces I’m working on, which you can find here and here.
CARFAC is a national non-profit organization dedicated to improving the socio-economic position of professional visual artists in Canada. CARFAC has been instrumental in establishing a professional fee structure that pays artists for the use of their copyrighted work and for their professional services: exhibition fees, copyright payments for image reproduction, payments for artist talks, and so on. I’m really looking forward to re-connecting with the artists that I have come know through CARFAC, and meeting a bunch of new faces too! Back home, I volunteer my time on the Board of Visual Arts Alberta-CARFAC, the provincial affiliate for CARFAC National.
HOW DOES YOUR WORK DIFFER FROM OTHERS?
This is by far the most difficult – and interesting – question I’ve faced in some time. Perhaps it comes down to approach. I see myself as having several things in my ‘toolkit’, that I take out and use or experiment with, depending on the subject of a given piece or body of work. That is to say, I don’t use just one method of expression or image creation or discipline within the visual arts. That makes me a bit hard to pin down for some – because I don’t fit neatly into one category … and I quite like that on a number of levels.
I have two distinct (but increasingly related) “threads” to my practice. One is studio based, and results in a range of output, including photo-based 2D work, drawings, assemblages, block printing, and some sculpture.
Digital Photo on Silk Organza; YORK project, created with Marian Switzer
Archives of Absence, Installation view, Naess Gallery (with Catherine Owen)
Sculpture, installation view; pvc, wire, gimp. Dimensions variable (approx 60″h x 36″w x 36″d)Installation view, suspension: 75 small void nests 44″ x 44″ x 60″ approx; charcoal on vellum, dipped in wax; each image 4″ x 4″
The other is very much away from the studio, and revolves around creating large-scale, site-specific installation and sculpture.
Make:Believe … view down a covered walkway between structures
long shot showing the entire installation and both cutoff points, offset in the beach, August 31 2013
Boundary|Time|Surface
In terms of materials and formal elements, my studio-based work often is created with transparency in mind, and on translucent or transparent substrates, and that’s not tremendously common. I am drawn to layering and accretion in image making, and also to the idea of ‘peeling back’ and exposing elements that rest below the surface – literally and metaphorically.
WHY DO YOU CREATE WHAT YOU DO?
I am fascinated by narrative in many ways – that’s my training in literature talking! But really, what I’m getting at here is the connections between stories and things and places … and how all of those things work together to contribute to our understanding of identity, of self.
I guess really I am a ‘closet phenomenologist’ … I work with things and the way our understanding of things tells us about how we perceive the world and ourselves. And how changeable and slippery all of that is … that’s the fun part.
HOW DOES YOUR CREATIVE PROCESS WORK?
I begin with an issue or idea that I need to investigate. It’s really about exploration and detective work in a way: I use the work I create to explore ideas about how we live in the world and make sense of who we are in relation to it.
So, things like time, memory, absence … ideas about home, identity … these areas are the jumping off points for the creation of work. Reading and research – and writing – offer things that flesh out the ideas, and bring me to starting points for making work. For example, the NEST series that I am (still) working on began with rereading Gaston Bachelard’s Poetics of Space – chapter 4 concerns nests in particular.
In the end, it’s about communicating. Finding threads of common experience, and talking about living in the world through visual means – because for me, sometimes words can’t quite transmit what I see or want to say.
It’s about find a path through it all, and occasionally making sense of it.
(en)compass, 2014
(en)compass, Bay of Fundy, July 2014
And it is now my pleasure to pass the Blog Hop on “across the Pond” … to Emily Hughes at Searching to See. I’m really interested in hearing more about Emily’s process and sources of inspiration – and I think you’ll enjoy hearing from her too!
Going through the old photographs I have unearthed for this part of the NEST work has been quite disarming in many respects – not the least of which has been the brief glimpse they have offered of the many and varied contexts in which my own parents found themselves. These were other worlds and lifetimes that they carried within themselves always, but that I can never hope to really understand or access.
This is particularly true in my father’s case; he wasn’t a talker, wasn’t prone to providing stories about himself. I am fortunate enough to have a fairly broad photographic record of his early life, though, which offers some small indications and hints about his existence. I do remember him saying once, upon coming across George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London that he didn’t need to read it; he’d lived it. He didn’t elaborate.
Odd in some ways to think that he was born over a century ago. 1911.
The world was a tremendously different place in many respects …
This is one of the earliest photos I have of my Da, taken in the back lane behind the house in which he was born in Tynemouth, Northumberland. I think he was about 4 or 5 when this was taken, so that would date the photo to about 1915 … during WWI. His father would have been in active duty, in the British Army, Artillery.
Here he is a few years later (the inscription on the back states he is 8 years old). He doesn’t seem terribly impressed to be having his portrait done, nor to be wearing that stiff collar and tweedy suit.
So formal, and such a serious occasion. So very different from the world I knew of annual children’s school photos (my own and that of my children), the now omnipresent camera phones and interminable ‘selfies’ of today.
The War was likely done by then, but I expect that it was still tough going in Tynemouth, being a naval and port city on the North Sea.
Not much of the man who I knew as my father there yet, but some … the set of his eyes and brows, the ears(!) … . His hair seems to grow in a similar pattern as mine (though he was always bald on top in my recollections).
This is, I think, the only photo I have of my father with both of his siblings. An odd thing, that. Again, my father, formally dressed, serious expression for the camera. His younger brother and baby sister somehow permitted the costume of childhood where he was not. I don’t know how old he was here, perhaps a couple of years older than the previous shot.
A family falsity: I had been told that his brother was the eldest … this was obviously not the case, but I don’t know why I was told that by both my parents. It also appears that the role of first/eldest son was adopted early on, and was a position to be assumed with gravity. I wonder what that did to his relationship to his brother. He never spoke much of him at all; only to say that he had returned to England not long after the family settled in Canada, and that they never heard from him after that. I don’t know how much of this is true, any more than I know why I was told the things I was that have been revealed to be otherwise.
There are large gaps in what record I do have of my father’s life, visual and otherwise; for starters, my father only reappears in Grannie’s photo album when he is a grown man. Most of the photos of him from this point on document his working life in some way or another.
Here, a live radio broadcast, from where I don’t know. From the clothing – and my father’s youth and full head of hair – I would guess he’s in his early 30’s. So, sometime in the 1940’s, perhaps … the uniformed man in the foreground points to that timing as well.
Another undated image of my father, working. He appears to be taking notes on what he is witnessing.
There were a few things that were somehow fixed in my mind when it came to my father: the suits he wore, and his work. Always, his work. Reporting – and broadcasting in particular – was a huge part of who he was, and how he framed himself to the world, and even to us at home.
He put on that identity.
The suit.
The job.
Armour.
It kept people out; it kept him feeling safe in a way too, I suppose.
When all else failed, one could always talk about the day’s news.
