Blog of the Gerhard Richter Archive

 

Now there are no priests or philosophers left, artists are the most important people in the world.

SOURCE: Notes, 1966 (From Gerhard Richter's homepage: http://www.gerhard-richter.com/quotes/art-1)

I wish that would be the case! That astonishing quote is from Germany's top selling living artist Gerhard Richter (auction record price in October 2012 for Abstraktes Bild at £21m ($34m)).

Gerhard Richter is for sure one of the most significant artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. His oeuvre covers a period of nearly five decades, and he is well-know for his abstract and photo realistic painted works. I have also no doubt that he may be one of the contemporary artist about whom most articles, books, exhibition catalogues, videos, Cd's, posters etc. exist. They are all collected by an research institute that is located in Dresden, Germany, in his birth town: The Gerhard Richter Archive. It keeps and documents all books, catalogues, journals, articles, and photographs and so on that contain relevant information about Richter.

Gerhard Richter Archive blog, see: http://gra.hypotheses.org/1

Recently it has started a blog under http://gra.hypotheses.org/1, giving an insight into the archive's work and about ongoing developments about the artist like auction records, exhibitions, book releases... So, if you want to know which museum hosts the next exhibit on Richter: that's the place to go! Unfortunately, it's only in German!

During my last visit to Germany in 2011, I had the chance to see the two exhibition rooms in the Albertinum, Dresden, which were created by Richter himself. One room provides an overview of his work so far, including the 1964 painting “Portrait of Dr. Knobloch (41)”, which was purchased by the Gerhard Richter Archive, whilst in the other room new glass works created specifically for Dresden are presented. It was very impressive!

The Gerhard Richter Archive is a centre for research and communication concerning Richter's oeuvre. Very exciting, and an amazing research source: One section of the Archive’s holdings contains unpublished writings and documents, correspondence and photographs. Furthermore, the archive works on the catalogue raisonné of all of Gerhard Richter’s paintings and sculptures – an amazing project.

If you are interested in Richter's art and would like to look up a specific painting – or just get an overview - I also strongly recommend his own website:
http://www.gerhard-richter.com

A New Home for the Karsh-Masson Gallery

Entrance of the Karsh-Masson Gallery in the ByWard Market, Ottawa

June 2013 will be a significant month of change for the City of Ottawa exhibition spaces. The city-run Karsh-Masson art gallery is going to move from the ByWard Market to City Hall. There, it will be located on the ground floor, beside the existing City Hall Art Gallery in an expanded space. How exactly the two exhibition spaces will connect is not known yet. But it may be a wonderful opportunity for the city to present more contemporary visual arts by local, national and international artists – and have the two exhibit spaces interacting, or contrasting each other.

Erik Nieminen – Anonymous Reality, Installation view 2011, Karsh-Masson Gallery, ground floor, Copyright photo courtesy of Erik Nieminen

Since 2003, the Karsh-Masson Gallery has been located at 136 St. Patrick St. There, it has been one of the most exciting exhibition spaces of the city of Ottawa.

But the building is expected to need renovations. Further, the city’s lease will end in June 2013 (it was leased from the National Capital Commission).

As part of his speech introducing the draft 2013 budget in October 2012, Mayor Jim Watson said the city “will be relocating the Karsh-Masson Gallery into a refurbished and expanded facility and bringing it home to City Hall.” (see: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/travel/Karsh+Masson+gallery+moving+City+Hall+Mayor/7441433/story.html)

It will be a challenge, but also a huge chance for visual arts!


Facts:
Karsh-Masson Gallery

The gallery got its name from famous portrait photographer Yousuf Karsh and visual artist Henri Masson.

Now on exhibit: Heather Benning – Field Doll
January 25 to March 3, 2013
Free admission

http://ottawa.ca/en/residents/arts-culture-and-community/arts-theatre-music/now-exhibit-karsh-masson-gallery

Jake Morrison's "Breathing Light"

Exhibition view, Jake Morrison at Pressed Cafe, Ottawa

 "Photography is always, of course, about light – the texture of light, the shape of light, the subtleties of light. But there have been times, very occasional times, when it seems like I am immersed in light, surrounded by light, breathing light. There is a feeling of the spiritual. As a photographer I try to capture the moment but, in those times, it can be very difficult to break away from the experience to focus on recording it.” , so Ottawa photographer Jake Morrison.

Jake Morrison, from the series "Tilt"

 
His impressive photographs from the series "Breathing Light" are now on view at Pressed Cafe, 750 Gladstone, Ottawa. The show runs till end of January 2013. Also hanging are works from "Tilt", a series that focus on still lifes in the manner of David Hockney's photographic collages.

Like Morrison says, he experienced “Breathing Light” for the first time on a hillside in The Yukon in August, 2010. It evoked "the sacred" in him. "My relationship with nature is one of appreciation of the mystery and beauty without much interest in the categorization and science that we humans have created around it. I try to present my experiences in nature through my photography. I very much appreciate the immersive nature of the digitally‐stitched panorama and I use it often to help draw the viewer into the scene." — Jake Morrison (from: http://www.oldottawasouth.ca/index.php/oos-news/1976-new-jake-morrison-photography-show)

Jake Morrison: "Two Photographers", from the series "Breathing Light" (2010), courtesy of Jake Morrison

 
One photo in particular caught my attention: "Two Photographers". Here, Morrison's shadow falls into the picture. He therefore captures a place insight the pictorial space and produces an ”auctorial insertion” (after Philippe Dubois: The Photographic Act). The photographer shows himself here as the author and is visible in the image. In particular noteworthy is the fact, that the implicit demonstration of the production of the artwork itself destructs the illusion of the pictorial reality. Therefore the semiotic category of the index – that is related to the object by causality – apply to this photo as special kind of self-portrait.



Facts: 
Jake Morrison: “Breathing Light” and “Tilt”
Pressed Cafe, 750 Gladstone, Ottawa
http://www.pressed-ottawa.com/ 
Artist's homepage: www.withflare.org 
Jake has set up a gallery of show images at:
http://www.morrisonkeeler.org/bigflannel/BreathingLight.html

A Human Library

Human Beings as exhibition objects are nothing new when you think about it. Performance art, and its sub-category body-art exists at the latest since the Dada movement; and since the 1960s it is an accepted art form. Just think about Joseph Beuys with “How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare” (1965), and Chris Burden's performance piece “Shoot” (1971), in which he was shot in his left arm by an assistant. Or Gilbert and George's "Living Sculpture" performance (also 1971), just to name a few.

Recently, I would even count the natural birth in the Microscope Gallery in Brooklyn as a piece of performance art (see: http://www.microscopegallery.com/?page_id=8180)!

The Ottawa Public Library, in corporation with CBC Ottawa (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) take this approach now to a new level: A Human Library.

On Saturday, January 26th, 2013, at five different branches of the Ottawa Public Library, readers are invited to try out one of the 38 living books that have been lined up for the day. It is not really a performance, but rather a documentary with real people and real conversations.

The selection of “books” available looks very exciting, like e.g. a Mother of eight, an Algonquin

Spiritual Advisor, a Sex Worker, a Chinese Adoptee, and an Urban Inuk. People from the National Capital Region have volunteered to be a “living book”, to share their stories and answer questions from readers.

Launched in Denmark in 2000, the Human Library was a way to focus on anti-violence, encourage dialogue and build relations. It has grown in popularity with 27 countries taking part in 2008, including Brazil, China, Columbia, Cyprus, Malaysia and South Africa.


Facts:

Date: Saturday, January 26th, 2013

Open: 11:00 am - 3 pm

Participating Locations of the Ottawa Library: Main Library, Alta Vista, Hazeldean, North Gloucester, Ruth E. Dickinson

Duration of loans: 20 minutes

Link: www.BiblioOttawaLibrary.ca/HumanLibrary

Live Through This: Photographs by Tony Fouhse

When I first saw some of the portraits of crack and heroin addicts by Ottawa photographer Tony Fouhse, I was deeply moved. His portraits capture vulnerability and desperation, in shocking but also visual appealing documentary pictures. Now, on Monday, 14 January, 2013, the Carleton University Art Gallery (CUAG) opens his outstanding solo exhibition: "Live Through This: Photographs by Tony Fouhse".

Carleton University Art Gallery (CUAG), Ottawa

Tony Fouhse encounters a wide range of people through the course of his photographic works, including drug addicts in Ottawa's Lowertown, the subject of his renowned "User" series. So, in 2010 he met Stephanie MacDonald, a heroin addict. She asked him for help to get clean. And he did something that most photographers would never do: He stepped outside the boundaries of documentation to get involved. And he actually helped her.

For his upcoming exhibit, Fouhse selected 41 photographs from the thousands he took of Stephanie. They will be impressive for sure. Stephanie's drug addiction, and the steps she took to alter her life's course are captured with his lens in a documentary but also caring way. 

Tony Fouhse: Yvon, Ottawa, 2007, digital photograph on paper (in the exhibition: "Place and Circumstance", City Hall Art Gallery, 2011). This photo belongs to a series about crack addicts in Ottawa; and impressed me a lot when I saw it in the 2011 exhibit. 

The opening takes place on January 14th at CUAG from 5:00 - 7:30 p.m. Tony Fouhse will be present.


Facts:
Carleton University Art Gallery CUAG
Live Through This: Photographs by Tony Fouhse
14 January - 17 March 2013
http://cuag.carleton.ca/index.php/exhibitions/upcoming/

Happy New Art Year

Happy New Year to all my readers! May 2013 be filled with exciting exhibitions, challenging art events, and eye-opening artists' talks...

International contemporary art highlights will be for sure these biennials:

In  March 2013 the 11th edition of the Sharjah Biennial opens, in June the 55th Venice Biennale, in September the 13th Istanbul Biennial, and also the fifth Moscow Biennale. It will be an exciting year in the contemporary art world.

But I'm pretty sure that Ottawa will have its highlights too! I will let you know.

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/