Eye Level - Photos by Children

Exhibition view Exposure Gallery

A unique approach: Photographs by children (from toddler to teenager)! Exposure Gallery shows very interesting photos by kids who share their view of the world. The photos are impressing in their originality in terms of perspective and subject matter. Children are also unhindered by notions of composition and, so, their photographs often express directly how they perceive their world.

Exhibition view Exposure Gallery

Exhibition view Exposure Gallery

Facts:

Eye Level
Exposure Gallery
October 4 -30, 2013
http://www.exposuregallery.info/eye-level-show/

Exhibition view Exposure Gallery

“Ascension” By Terry SanCartier

"Ascension", Exhibition view, Exposure Gallery, Ottawa

Geometric shapes, sharp lines, unusual views: Photographs by Ottawa photographer Terry SanCartier – like the seemingly never ending spiral staircase inspired by nature in Barcelona – are rather representation than documentation. That's why they perfectly correspond to the Festival X’s theme of “Otherwise Than Seeing: Photograph, Image, Representation”.

Today is the last day to visit the exhibition at Exposure Gallery that shows places all over the world that had inspired the photographer.

"Ascension", Exhibition view, Exposure Gallery, Ottawa

Some of them remind me at the German movement of the 1920s “Neues Sehen” (New Vision), with their unexpected framings and the use of high and low camera angles. Like the artist says: “At first glance, photographs from this exhibit may suggest the obvious but on closer enquiry, another interpretation may be evident. [...] Can the viewer grasp the unseen?”

"Ascension", Exhibition view, Exposure Gallery, Ottawa

  
Facts: 
Ascension By Terry SanCartier
Exposure Gallery
June 28 to October 2, 2012
http://www.exposuregallery.info/exhibitions/terry-sancartier/

  

Regarding the Barcelona photographs on the right side: "Does the staircase lead to the upper floors of a museum and thus transport one to a place of higher learning?" asks Terry.

Festival X

The Ottawa photo Festival X is going on right now!

The theme is "Otherwise than Seeing: Photograph, Image, Representation".

It explores in exhibitions all over the city how the photographic image frames and re-presents the world to us, and how it invites us to see otherwise.

Facts:
Fextival X
2012 Edition
September 20 to 30, 2012
Various locations in Ottawa
http://www.festivalx.ca/

And the Karsh Award goes to... Rosalie Favell

The City of Ottawa has recently announced that The Karsh Award 2012 is presented to Ottawa artist Rosalie Favell. In combining images from popular culture and her family, she emphasizes on the complexity of Aboriginal identity – inspired by her Métis heritage. In doing so, the ambiguity of some of the photographs even seems to be humorous by all appearance. But her photo-based works demonstrate Favell's struggle to find her place in the world. Her exceptional work is now on display at the Karsh-Masson Gallery.

 

Longing and Not Belonging #1, 1998, Polaroid and chromogenic print, 50 x 40 cm. Copyright by Rosalie Favell

Artist statement:

“My photo-based work centres on issues of identity and culture, inspired by my Métis (Cree and English) heritage. For my audience, both Native and non-Native, I hope to show the diversity of issues brought up in photography and the photograph. Most can choose to deal with the politics implicit in the photograph: others cannot. The camera is a powerful weapon used to colonize minds and memories. The challenge is to know your own part in this, to know your own place in the picture.” (Catalogue excerpt, Rosalie Favell, 2012)

Facts:

Karsh-Masson Gallery
Rosalie Favell
The Karsh Award
September 7 to October 28, 2012

http://ottawa.ca/en/rec_culture/arts/gallery_exhibit/karsh_masson/2012_exhibits/favell/index.htm

Van Gogh: Up Close @ National Gallery of Canada 

 

My first outing last Sunday without the baby (that's why I had no time for posting lately!) led me to the lecture by Anabelle Kienle Poňka, co-curator of the exhibition Van Gogh: Up Close at the National Gallery of Canada (NGC). She gave a very interesting insight in the concept of that summer exhibit at the NGC. It indeed follows an unique approach in showing Van Gogh's distinct gaze on nature, demonstrated in some of his famous still life and landscape paintings now at view at the NGC.

Exhibition booklet of the exhibit, copyright by the NGC

This exhibition explores – like Anabelle pointed out - Van Gogh’s period in France from 1886 to 1890; actually the last four years of his life. In this late period he represented the world around him in paintings which experiment with the depth of field and focus. Impressed by the works of the Impressionists and Neo-Impressionist during his stay in Paris from 1886 to 1888, he modernized his brush stroke and choose lighter colours. Further, he created compositions that draw us 'up close' into the paintings; like placing the horizon line near the top of the painting, zooming in, focus on details, and strong diagonals. One of the main works in the exhibition is the 'Iris' painting of the NGC collection (1890) in which he shows his fascination for this flower that he came across during his time in Arles (he stayed there from 1888 to 1889).

Exhibition booklet of the exhibit and ticket, copyright by the NGC

This is the first major Van Gogh exhibition in Canada in over 25 years. It brings together more than 40 of Van Gogh’s paintings from private and public collections around the world, as well as a selection of Japanese woodblock prints (the artist was fascinated by them and collected them), nineteenth-century photographs, and works on paper from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. It is organized by the National Gallery of Canada and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the NGC is the only Canadian venue for this unique exhibition, so take your chance to see it until September 3rd!

NGC Exhibition catalogue; Comparison Cezanne and Van Gogh. Also very enlightening: the article by Ulrich Pohlmann about Van Gogh and photography and the artist's visual memory.

Facts:

Van Gogh: Up Close

25 May 2012 - 03 Sep 2012

National Gallery of Canada

http://www.gallery.ca/en/see/exhibitions/current/details/van-gogh-up-close-70

“Where the Wild Things… Aren’t?” @ Wall Space Gallery

Exhibition view, Wall Space Gallery. Front right: artwork by Tony Taylor; at the back: performance video by Gareth Bate: Penance, 2011 http://www.garethbate.com/artwork_pages/penance_performance.html

On Earth Day 2012 opened an environmental art exhibition at Wall Space Gallery that explores the human relationship to nature - or at least the concept of it.

The exhibit bases on the “central paradox” of human and nature, like scholar and environmental theorist William Cronon writes:
“This, then, is the central paradox: wilderness embodies a dualistic vision in which the human is entirely outside the natural. If we allow ourselves to believe that nature, to be true, must also be wild, then our very presence in nature represents its fall. The place where we are is the place where nature is not… We thereby leave ourselves little hope of discovering what an ethical, sustainable, honorable human place in nature might actually look like.” (excerpted from "The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting back to the Wrong Nature")

Jessica Marion Barr, Augury: Elegy, 2011

The show features works by artists who share a keen interest in exploring themes of environment: Ottawa-area natives Stefan Thompson, Barbara Cuerden and Carmella Karijo Rother, along with Gareth Bate, Karen Abel, Jessica Marion Barr, Tony Taylor, Ingrid Koivukangas, and Jane Fulton Alt.

Karen Abel: Hibernaculum, 2012. Bats made of Cast sugar. http://karenabel.ca/projects/hibernaculum/

The exhibition aims for an intimate reflection, and rises questions about our relationship to nature and the environmental crises – without prescribing solutions. Rather, the viewer is prompted to rethink the human-nature connection, and to question his habits.

Photographs by Jane Fulton Alt that deal with the environmental desaster of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

This exhibition represents a partial fulfillment of curator Cynthia Mykytyshyn's degree requirements. This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Mixed media works by Ingrid Koivukangas. Underneath the photographs of herbs and flowers, you will find their seeds in little glass cases. 

Facts:
Wall Space Gallery
“Where the Wild Things…Aren’t?”
April 22 – May 6, 2012
www.wallspacegallery.ca/

Megan D'Arcy @ Orange Art Gallery

"Stepping into Paris" starts next week at the Orange Art Gallery in Hintonburg. Ottawa artist Megan D'Arcy presents her works from her recent trip to Paris: During her one week tour, Megan visited the river Seine, Monmartre, Saint Germain de Pres and the Moulin Rouge in the red light district. The Paris streets were the inspiration for her new series of funky urban landscapes. She incorporates photography, collage, acrylic and resin in her photo-collage based pieces that strongly remind me at the futuristic movement of the early 20th century, in particular Paul Citroen's "Metropolis" (1923) with its skyscrapers in a claustrophobic perspective... And I'm sure the Vernissage will be a pretty good party!

Facts:
Orange Art Gallery
"Stepping into Paris" - Paintings by Megan D'Arcy
April 4 - 22, 2012
Vernissage: Thursday, April 5th, 6 -10 pm

www.orangeartgallery.ca

Patrick Mikhail Editions

Looking for affordable original works of art? Priced from $125 to $1000, a new project and exhibition at the Patrick Mikhail Gallery features exclusive limited-edition artworks! From today on till March 4, 2012, the gallery provides the opportunity to acquire artworks by some of Canada’s leading emerging and mid-career contemporary artists (some of them local), like:

Jessica Auer
Stephen Brookbank
Andrea Campbell
Olga Chagaoutdinova
Josée Dubeau
Scott Everingham
Adrian Göllner
Jonathan Hobin
Kristopher Karklin
Thomas Kneubühler
Jennifer Lefort
Deborah Margo
Andrew Morrow
James Olley
Cheryl Pagurek
Josée Pedneault
Michèle Provost
Andreas Rutkauskas
Amy Schissel
Cindy Stelmackowich
Andrew Wright
Jinny Yu
Ewa Monika Zebrowski


The exhibition and online catalogue includes photographic prints, photo-based works, digital prints and paintings, video paintings, artist books, original drawings, and sculptures. They are all offered in editions of 30 or less. Each original artwork has been specially conceived and created for the editions project.
 
Facts:
Patrick Mikhail Editions
February 15 - March 4, 2012
Artist Reception:
February 17, 2012
5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.
http://www.patrickmikhailgallery.com/artists/

Interview: Aerial Photographer Louis Helbig

Aerial art photographer Louis Helbig recently gave an interview with CityTV Edmonton about his series "Beautiful Destruction":

http://video.citytv.com/video/detail/1367742830001.000000/beautiful-destruction/

Helbig explains his interest in the oil sands in the tension that arises between his truly beautiful images and the environmental disaster going on there. With his neutral aerial photographs, Helbig gives the viewers the opportunity to form their own opinion. This documentary approach nevertheless is an important contribution to the current debate.

To see more of his work, check:
http://visualencounter.blogspot.com/2011/02/aerial-abstractions-burtynsky-gursky.html

Louis Helbig's web site: http://www.louishelbig.com/

Made in America 1900-1950. Photographs from the National Gallery of Canada

It took me over one month but I finally made it to the photographs exhibition at the National Gallery (NGC). “Made in America 1900-1950” belongs to a series of exhibitions that has shown 19th-century British and 19th-century French photographs in the recent years. Now the first half of the 20th century American photography has its turn… and it turned out very well.

The exhibition at the second floor shows just over 100 photographs, and follows the approach to present both photography as art and documentary. This clearly lies in the nature of the show, presenting American photography in the first half of the 20th century which of course includes art and documentation – just thinking about names like Edward Steichen, Dorothea Lange, Berenice Abbott, Lisette Model, and Weegee. And it lies in the nature of photography; so this approach is not entirely new. It even might leave some of the visitors a bit wondering about the combination of these photographs that follow so different approaches. (Still, regardless of the discussion about photography as art and its place in museums that seems to be obsolete by now!) But on the other hand, the exhibition gives an excellent overview about the development of American photography and its most famous photographers – and it shows amazing vintage prints that we all have seen in textbooks about this era.

The exhibition starts with Pictorialism of the first two decades of the early 20th century. In particular Gertrude Käsebier’s romantic gum bichromate prints (one shows Edward Steichen standing beside her sister and friends) caught my attention. The photographs clearly show the Pictorialist aim to advance the status of photography as a true art form. But it left me wondering, why the curators decided to NOT include photographs of the 19th century in the exhibition (after all, the Pictorialist movement started in the late 19th century and not strictly with the year 1900).

Furthermore of interest: The NGC designed the first two rooms of the exhibit in homage to Alfred Stieglitz’ Gallery 291 with its distinctive look: with muted green walls, dim lights and curtains hanging low from wooden chair rails. The second room shows stunning portraits by Stieglitz, Edward Steichen and Frank Eugene etc.

The exhibition also shows photographs by the Group f/64 that followed a modernist aesthetic in opposition to Pictorialism. Edward Weston, Ansel Adams and Imogen Cunningham (I love her portrait of Frida Kahlo (1931)!) are represented with some of their most iconic photographs.

In the field of documentary, in particular Lewis Hine’s and Dorothea Lange’s works are worth to be mentioned. The NGC owns one of the best prints of Lange’s iconic “Migrant Mother” (1936) in which the baby’s face is visible. Also represented are photographs by Margaret Bourke-White, Berenice Abbott, Lisette Model, Weegee (I love the shot of the sleeping kids on the fire escape platform), Andreas Feininger, and the members of New York’s Photo League.

So, in case you are wondering why the exhibition stops at 1950: That’s because the NGC holds so much more interesting photographs from the following decades that they will get their own show. When, is not announced yet. I am already very curious to see works by Lee Friedlander and Diane Arbus then. And I am sure that this exhibition will be also worthwhile a visit – like this show is!

Facts:

Made in America 1900-1950. Photographs from the National Gallery of Canada

09 Dec 2011 - 01 Apr 2012

http://www.gallery.ca/madeinamerica/

Preview: Karen Jordon "Slow Dance"

On my way through the Byward Market last weekend, I curiously stopped by at the Karsh-Masson Gallery. Turned out, the gallery is closed in the moment for the installation of an upcoming exhibit: Karen Jordon “Slow Dance”. It starts in two weeks, on February 3rd.

But when you walk by, you can get a first glimpse of her works; like a huge mountain of record tape spaghetti, an old radio, a tape recorder, and other audio equipment, arranged in the display window.

As the Virtual Museum web site of the Karsh Masson states: “Slow Dance itemizes components from the period of the sound and culture industry bracketed by the decline of record albums and the advent of compact discs. The resulting work both maps and predicts the accelerating pace of changing technologies and subsequently diminished life spans of electronics and communication devices. Jordon juxtaposes the intimate and abiding place music holds in people’s lives against the unwanted technologies left behind when material and utility are parted.”

Karen Jordon received her BFA from the University of Ottawa in 1992. She also joined the Enriched Bread Artists (EBA) collective in the same year.

Her work is process-based involving the collection and manipulation of her own, and other people’s, discarded belongings. Her statement on the web site of the EBA:

“Part consumer parody and part lament my work is a parallel system of acquisition and abandonment that reassigns values, meanings and possible histories. My objective is to disrupt the frenetic pace of our post-industrial world, to slow the viewer and myself, down, to create spaces that invite acts of contemplation or of simply looking.”

Looking forward to that show! 

Facts:

Karsh-Masson Gallery

February 3, 2012 to April 8, 2012

Open Wednesday 12 to 5 p.m., Thursday 12 to 8 p.m, Friday to Sunday 12 to 5 p.m.

http://enrichedbreadartists.com/members/KarenJordon.htm

Three Must-See Exhibits… And Only Five Days Left!

First of all: Happy New Year! Isn’t it unbelievable how time is passing by?

In Ottawa, three must-see exhibits only run until January 8th – so just four more days to go! Take your last chance to visit these outstanding exhibits:

Ramses Madina, “Road Crew 29”, 2010, Silver Gelatin Print, from the web site: www.facebook.com/Public.Art.Ottawa, copyright by Ramses Madina

Ramses Madina – Night for Day: Road Crews @ City Hall Art Gallery

Ramses Madina’s black and white photographic series “Night for Day: Road Crews” already caught my attention when I visited the “Place and Circumstance” exhibition at the City Hall Art Gallery last June (http://visualencounter.blogspot.com/2011/06/place-and-circumstance-city-hall-art.html). In his stunning night photographs, he draws with light attention to the road workers who labour as the city sleeps enveloped in darkness. We see Ottawa by night in an uncommon way, like captured from an imagined landscape. Occurring in darkness, when most of the citizens are sleeping, these actions seem somewhat mysterious. The crew’s overnight activity ensures that the roads are ready for the morning shift to venture out to start its day. A stunning documentation!

http://www.ottawa.ca/rec_culture/arts/gallery_exhibit/city_hall/index_en.html


Cindy Stelmackowich: Dearly Departed @ Bytown Museum

A bit creepy but also fascinating is the work of Cindy Stelmackowich that examines the highly charged visual and written language of mourning in the 19th century. She draws her inspiration from various historic objects in the Bytown Museum and her own artefact collection.

Stelmackowich’s digital prints and sculptures reconsider and transform traditional mourning objects such as Victorian hair wreaths, bereavement verse and women’s black lace clothing regarding the cult of grief and remembrance. Her findings like jewellery, wreaths and watch fobs were actually made of human hair, some of it most likely clipped from the heads of corpses! The widespread cult of mourning was inspired by Queen Victoria who mourned the death of her husband, Prince Albert, for forty years.

Quiet an amazing show!

http://www.bytownmuseum.com/en/exhibits.html


David Askevold: Once Upon a Time in the East @ National Gallery of Canada

David Askevold (1940-2008) is recognized as an important contributor to the development and pedagogy of conceptual art. This full-career retrospective exhibition considers the four strains of Askevold’s exploratory journey – sculpture/installation, film and video, photo-text works, and digital images and includes key pieces from each stage of his career.

Like the director of the National Gallery, Marc Mayer points out: “He was a pioneering figure in the development of conceptual art in the 1970s, and continued to be an influential conceptualist throughout his career. […] For me, what’s compelling about Askevold is that he worked hard to maintain an independent artistic perspective in the exploration of new media. He believed in the role of the artist as unique in our contemporary set of professions.” (From the NGC web site)

http://www.gallery.ca/en/see/exhibitions/current/details/david-askevold-once-upon-a-time-in-the-east-66