The Great Pause, March 2020 (and then April…. and now into May)
below: Courage, joy, spirit, celebrate, community, equality, and one that has flipped over.
below: All you need is love.
below: What to do when spring seems so far away….
Posts Tagged ‘exhibit’
paused, paintings
Posted: May 1, 2020 in galleries, locationsTags: art, collage, Craven Road, exhibit, fence, flag, objects, outdoor, paintings
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the brains are back, 2019 edition
Posted: July 10, 2019 in events, locationsTags: #noblankbrains, 3D sign, Antonio Caballero, art, Baycrest, Brad Emsley, brain, brain project, Carson Teal, contest, exhibit, nathan phillips square, Orit Fuchs, pac man, people, public art, Romero Britto, sculptures, Toronto
This is the fourth year of the Brain Project. Forty five sculptures in the shape of a brain have been decorated by different artists. They are on display at Nathan Phillips Square for the month of July.
below: “Silver Bloom” by Carson Teal. Complex, random, and fragmented.
below: Here, pac man from the 1980’s arcade & video game, gobbles up yellow dots that represent brain cells. It is artist Orit Fuchs’s way of illustrating the destruction of brain cells in Alzheimers.
below: Brand Emsley’s “From Making to Thinking”, from the Brain Project website: “Toronto’s unprecedented building boom is reflective of the economic shift from the manufacturing economy to the knowledge economy. It is particularly acute in the area known as the railway lands and surrounding area.”
below: On the left, “The Routine Ride” by Antonio Caballero and on the right, “Beautiful Mind” by Romero Britto
A description of all the brains, plus information about the artists, can be found on The Brain Project website.
#noblankbrains
Aga Khan Park
Posted: October 20, 2018 in galleriesTags: Aga Khan museum, art, bottles, chairs, display, exhibit, glass, history, interior, Ismaili Centre, Javid Jah, knife, light, marble, medallion, mosaic, muqarna, Muslin, painting, reflections, room, stone, The Encompassing, wall, water
below: ‘The Encompassing’ by street artist Javid (aka JAH) stands in one of the reflecting pools between the Ismaili Centre and the Aga Khan Museum. This is one of a number of pieces on display. Each is painted on reclaimed corrugated metal. They are an examination of the geometry in Islamic patterns and architecture. His work will remain on display until the 31st of October.
below: On the other side of the above painting, is this one – “Beyond”, also by Javid. The Ismaili Centre is in the background with its large pale blue dome over the prayer room.
below: The large wood beams that cover the entrance to the Ismaili Centre were being re-stained this morning.
The Toronto Ismaili Centre is one of 6 around the world. It was designed by Indian architect Charles Correa and opened in 2014. If you go on the tour of the inside of the Ismaili Centre, you will see a building that is filled with natural light, as well as natural woods and stone.
below: A calligraphy based medallion made of stone is on a white wall. The Arabic word ‘allah’ is in the center and surrounding it are the ninety nine attributes of God, written in Arabic.
below: A closer look at the wall. It took two men, a father and son, fourteen months to carve the design into this wall and a matching wall on the other side of the room. They worked six days a week . The arabesque design was penciled on using a stencil and then carved by hand.
below: A second medallion is on a wall across the room from the one above (on the other wall that was carved).
Crossing back past the reflecting pools to the Aga Khan Museum….
below: Another Javid Jah painting, this time “The Manifest”. (To the left, you can see a metal sculpture called “Big Heech” ). Like all of Jah’s paintings here, this one is based on geometry. The basic shape here is a pentagon (sacral chakra) and it is seen on the floor. This type of archway is called a muqarna and it is unique to muslim architecture. Here the shape of the indentations in the muqarna are based on the pentagon.
The “Big Heech” is the work of Parviz Tanavoli, made from stainless steel in 2014. It is derived from the Persian word for “nothingness” and it is an important word in Perian Sufism.
“Emperors and Jewels: Treasures of the Indian Court from the Al-Sabah Collection in Kuwait”, is a temporary exhibit at the Aga Khan Museum featuring artworks and historical objects from the treasuries of Mughal emperors. The Mughal Empire ruled most of present day Pakistan and India in the 16th and 17th centuries. The Mughals were Muslim but the majority of the population were Hindu.
below: Part of a larger picture depicting a hunting scene, reproduced and enlarged especially for the exhibit.
below: Three glass bottles
below: Two fish joined to make a circle, a standard. From India, late 18th century. Made from silver. There are many myths and symbols that feature fish. In Hindu tradition, the fish was associated with Brahma and Manu, a progenitor of mankind. In addition, one myth is that a fish was believed to hold up the globe.
below: A portrait of Nawab Bairam Khan, painted around 1710-40, watercolour and gold on paper. He is pictured in profile, sitting alone in his peaceful garden.
below: Knife with jade handle carved in the shape of a horse head and neck.
A day of photography, in three parts – World Press
Posted: October 5, 2018 in galleriesTags: Anna Boyiazis, Carla Kogelman, exhibit, Galleria, garbage, Kadir van Lohuizen, Kevin Frayer, Luca Locatelli, penguins, people, photography, photos, rubbis, swimmers, Thomas P. Peschak, trash, Wasteland
The annual World Press Photo Exhibit is on at the Alan Lambert Galleria once again.
below: Finding Freedom in the Water by Anna Boyiazis, 2nd place, People stories.
below: Walking past four photos by Luca Locatelli about the environment, 2nd prize stories. These were taken in the Netherlands, a country that is the world’s second largest exporter of food (by value, after the USA).
below: On the right is “Jump”, by Thomas P. Peschak featuring a group of Rockhopper Penguins on Marion Island. Second prize, nature singles.
below: ‘Rohingya Refugees Flee into Bangladesh’, by Kevin Frayer. General news, 2nd prize stories.
below: “Wasteland” by Kadir van Lohuizen. A look at garbage in different countries. First prize, environment stories.
below: First prize winner in Long Term Projects, stories, “Ich Bin Waldviertel ” by Carla Kogelman – The life of two rural Austrian girls since 2012.
dots and lights, infinite souls
Posted: April 23, 2018 in galleriesTags: AGO, art, Art Gallery of Ontario, colours, dots, exhibit, infinite, infinity, LED, lights, mirrors, obliteration, paintings, patterns, reflections, staircase, Yayoi Kusama
Dots, dots, dots. Millions of dots? Dots and lights worth waiting for.
‘Infinity Mirrors’, Yayoi Kusama, AGO
Kusama’s polka-dot paintings were based on visual hallucinations she has experienced throughout her life, often based on “a miserable childhood as an unwanted child born of unloving parents.” These hallucinations often involve repeating patterns that engulf her field of vision, a process she refers to as “obliteration”. Painting has helped to keep her demons at bay, to obliterate her anxieties.
In 1968 she returned to Japan. In 1977 she checked herself into the Tokyo mental hospital where she has lived ever since. She has a studio where she works during the day but she returns to the hospital at night.
below: In an effort to keep the waiting times down, the AGO is letting three people at a time into the rooms. I’m not sure who the man is, but he seemed to put up with Joanne and I and our cameras! This was the first room in the exhibit and it was a bit of a let down – it was the only one that wasn’t impressive. Minor gripe – why not a mirror on the ceiling?
below: 30 seconds per visit. All timed – note the stopwatch!
below: Stars and planets into infinite. Small specks in the vastness of the universe. Obliteration of the self as we become just a very tiny, minuscule dot in the infinite of space. This exhibit is “The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away” and is made with hundreds of hanging LED lights.
below: The words on the wall say, “The souls of millions of light years away”. This is the line-up for the room above. It was one of the shorter lines.
Kusama was born in Japan in 1929 and trained originally in traditional Japanese painting. One of the only American painters that she knew of was Georgia O’Keefe, having seen her work in an art book. She wrote to Georgia O’Keefe asking for advice on how to break into the New York art world. In 1958 she moved to New York City where she became part of the avant-garde art scene. She was into pop art and hippie counterculture. She organized a series of anti-war public performances featuring naked people who were painted with brightly colored polka dots.
below: This room was fun especially since I got to spend a few seconds alone in it. Dancing with pink balls.
below: Looking into “Love Forever” – a small hexagonal box with some mirrors on the outside and two small windows (peepholes!) as seen from the outside. This structure/exhibit was first shown in 1966.
below: Looking in the window…. It’s amazing what can be done with mirrors and lights in a small space. Mirrors combined with the technology of LED lights that can change colours with computer controlled programs made for an impressive display. An endless repetition of patterns.
below: Same room, different colours
below: Obliteration Room – multicoloured stickers that people have added to an all white room with all white furniture and accessories like wine glasses and dog dishes. As more people pass through, the more colourful the room becomes. The dots make it difficult to see the details in the room. Can you tell what is on the table?
Kusama also paints and makes sculptures.
Thanks to Joanne of My Live Lived Full for playing with me!
U of T, art and the Polish Army
Posted: February 20, 2018 in galleries, history, intersectionsTags: Allen Ginsberg, art, art gallery, artefacts, books, dream catcher, exhibit, figures of sleep, Hart House, library, Lillian Malcove, Malcove collection, painting, photography, plaque, Polish Army, religious, Robarts library, selfies, sleep, street, the Beats, Thomas Fisher Rare book library, University of Toronto, vidoes
A morning exploring some of the art galleries at the University of Toronto.
below: Robarts Library, a large concrete building, is part of the University of Toronto and is their main humanities and social sciences library. It opened in 1973 and has been called Fort Book ever since.
I have walked past this library many times but I have never gone inside. What I didn’t know about this building is that it is also home to the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library. It is named after a Thomas Fisher (1792-1874), who came from Yorkshire to Upper Canada in 1821 and settled by the Humber River. In 1973, his grandsons, Sidney and Charles Fisher, donated many books to U of T . Since then, the library has grown to approximately 740,000 volumes including hundreds of versions of Alice in Wonderland in many different languages. They also collect manuscripts, photographs, and other rare materials. You can search their holdings online.
below: The view from the 4th floor observation deck.
At the moment, the Thomas Fisher Library has an exhibition called “Fleeting Moments, Floating Worlds, and the Beat Generation: The Photography of Allen Ginsberg”. Ginsberg (1926-1997) is known for his poetry but he also took pictures. The Thomas Fisher library has the largest collection of Ginsberg prints in the world.
below: Mr. Ginsberg took bathroom mirror selfies. I wonder what he’d think of instagram?
Ginsberg became friends with William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, and the trio later established themselves as the main players in the Beat Movement with their unconventional writing and wild (for the times) lifestyles. Ginsberg’s first published work was “Howl” in 1956. It was called “an angry, sexually explicit poem”. The San Francisco Police Department declared it to be obscene and arrested the publisher. The court ruled that it was not obscene. I can see it being “ahead of its time” in 1956 but today it’s fairly tame.
The opening lines:
“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of
cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,”
below: Three books about The Beats.
The Ginsberg exhibit continues until the 27th of April.
A short walk through part of the St. George campus….did I mention that it was snowing at the time?… to another art gallery on campus.
below: We passed a moose standing in the snow.
The second gallery was the Art Museum at Hart House. One of the exhibits showing there is “Figures of Sleep”. Straight from the gallery website is this description of the exhibit: ” [it]…considers the cultural anxieties manifest in the popular and critical imagination around the collapsing biological function of sleep under economic, social and technological transformation”. What it is is a collection of videos, photographs, and artwork depicting sleep, i.e. people sleeping by a number of different artists. This exhibit ends on 3rd March.
below: Watching videos of people sleeping
below: She’s very life like. She’s also much smaller than life sized but even so, she was a bit creepy. “Untitled (old woman in bed)”, 2000-2002, by Ron Mueck.
below: “Dream Catcher” by Rebecca Belmore, 2014 . This wall hanging is quite large.
below: The Malcove Collection is in the same gallery. The collection includes about 500 pieces, not all of which are on display at the moment. Dr. Lillian Malcove (1902-1981) was born in Russia just before her parents emigrated to Canada and settling in Winnipeg. She graduated from the University of Manitoba with an M.D. and then spent most of her adult life as a Freudian psychoanalyst in New York City. Over her life time she amassed a collection of art that she bequeathed to U of T.
below: From the Malcove collection, ‘Male Dedicant’, made of limestone, Coptic, late 4th century or early 5th century
below: Detail from “The Burning Bush”, 19th century.
below: Last but not least, and having nothing to do with art, is this plaque on a wall near the art gallery at Hart House. It commemorates the relationship between the Canadian and Polish Armies during WW1. A transcription of it appears below.
In the early months of 1917, twenty three Polish probationary officers were trained here by the staff of the Canadian School of Infantry in Toronto. They were the forerunners of more than 20,000 North American volunteers of Polish descent who were trained in Canada (mostly at Niagara on the Lake) to serve in the French Army, ultimately commanded by Joseph Haller. The existence of this Polish Army in France went far to assure the presence of Poland at the Peace Conference at the end of the war and played a significant role in the reconstitution of a reunited and independent Poland after 123 years of partition.
The Canadian Polish Congress has placed this tablet to commemorate the ardent Polish patriotism of so many Polish volunteers from the United States and Canada. The Congress also wishes to honour the Canadian officers who trained the volunteers, including notably Lieutenant Colonel A.D. Lepan of the staff of this university and his principal subordinates, all from this university as well as Major C.R. Young, Major H.H. Madill, Major W.F. Kirk and Major F.B. Kenrick. A.D. 1990
More information about:
Allen Ginsberg exhibition
Figures of Sleep, and others, at Hart House Art Museum
Illustrations of the holdings of the Malcove Collection
Christian Dior at the ROM
Posted: December 7, 2017 in galleriesTags: beads, buttons, Christian Dior, clothing, design, display, dresses, dupion, embroidery, exhibit, fabric, jewelry, leaves, lily of the valley, necklace, ROM, Royal Ontario Museum, silk, velvet, weave
I went on a whim. No one has ever called me ‘fashionable’ when it comes to clothing!
I went not knowing what to expect and was very pleasantly surprised at what I encountered. The majority of the exhibit consists of dresses designed by Christian Dior from 1947 to 1957.
Christian Dior was born in a seaside town in northern France in 1905. He began his career in fashion by selling fashion sketches in the early 1930’s after a failed attempt to run an art gallery. This led to a job as a design assistant with Paris couturier Robert Piguet. His career took off after WW2 when he started his own business, House of Dior (Maison Dior), in 1947.
below: This simple but classy two piece dress with black cummerbund is from Dior’s 1948 autumn-winter collection. It is made with black velvet with iridescent bead work. The bottom part is a mid-calf length skirt with the same beading. Actually, the words simple and classy describe most of the dresses here.
below: Embroidery with beads and stacked sequins in intricate designs.
below: The fabulous colours of fabric samples – this is only a small part of the display of fabrics with “a silk warp and a dupion weft”. Warp and weft are weaving terms – warp refers to the threads that run lengthwise down the fabric while weft refers to the crosswise threads. Dupion is similar to silk but it is thicker and more uneven.
below: This dress is made from the silk fabric described above.
Christian Dior’s success as a designer and a businessman continued until 1957 when he died while on vacation in Italy. Yves Saint Laurent spent a few years as the Artistic Director immediately after Dior’s death although he was only 21. There have been countless designers and many changes since then but the the company still exists as part of LVMH. I was surprised to learn that the full name of the company is LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE. I also hadn’t realized that many of the luxury brands that we recognize the names of are actually controlled/owned by 3 companies: LVMH, Kering, and Richemont. If you have a few minutes, take a cruise through wikipedia.
below: There was a small display of jewelry, including this necklace by Maison Gripoix. It is a string of lily of the valley flowers made from green and white handmade glass paste. Glass paste, or pâte de verre, is made by mixing finely ground glass, binding agents, and colour. The resulting ‘paste; is molded and then kiln fired. Apparently the lily of the valley was Christian Dior’s “lucky flower”.
The exhibit is presented by Holt Renfrew and you can find it on the 4th floor of the ROM…. until 18 March 2018. In the meantime, you can find more information on the ROM website.
#ROMDIOR
And Things I Loved
Posted: November 12, 2017 in galleriesTags: AGO, American, art, Art Gallery of Ontario, exhibit, Florine Stettheimer, gallery, looking, maquette, new york, painter, paintings, people, poems, poetry, portraits, Stetties
Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry,
an exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario
Florine Stettheimer (1871-1944) was the 4th child of five, daughter of Joseph and Rosetta. Joseph, a banker, abandoned the family early on and was never mentioned again. Older siblings Walter and Stella married and moved out while the younger three girls, Ettie, Florine and Carrie remained in the same household with their mother until their deaths. They became known as “the Stetties”. They hosted salons in Manhattan and lived a life of leisure and artistic pleasure.
below: Family Portrait II, 1933, This painting has flowers, New York City references, and Florine Stettheimer’s immediate family portrayed in a theatrical setting/arrangement. These are themes that occur over and over again in Stettheimer’s work. Here Ettie is reading, Rosetta is playing cards, Florine is painting, and Carrie is playing hostess.
The Stettheimer children were born in Rochester NY. Between 1906 and 1914 Florine and her mother and sisters lived in Europe before settling in Manhattan.
A portion of the exhibit features a collection of designs for costumes for a ballet that Florine wrote while she was in Paris in 1912. ‘Orphee of the Quat-z-Arts’ (or ‘Revellers of the Four Arts Ball’) was based on a costume parade organized by Parisian art students and in it the main character, Georgette, encounters the ancient Greek minstrel Orpheus and a parade of mythical creatures, as she and her father walk down the Champs Elysee. The ballet was never performed.
below: One of 42 sketches and 9 relief maquettes, Georgette.
below: People, both men and women, were painted with elongated willowy shaped bodies.
Florine also wrote poetry and she liked to send her poems to her friends. In 1949 her sister Ettie published a book of Florine’s poems titled ‘Crystal Flowers’. This is one of the poems:
And Things I Loved
a poem by Florine Stettheimer
Mother in a low-cut dress
Her neck like alabaster
A laced up bodice of Veronese green
A skirt all puffs of deeper shades
With flounces of point lace
Shawls of Blonde and Chantilly
Fichues of Honeton and Point d’Espirit
A silk jewel box painted with morning glories
Filled with ropes of Roman pearls
Mother playing the Beautiful Blue Danube
We children dancing to her tunes
Embroidered dresses of White Marseilles
Adored sashes of pale watered silk
Ribbons with gay Roman stripes
A carpet strewn with flower bouquets
Sevres vases and gilt console tables
When sick in bed with childhood ills –
All loved and unforgettable thrills.
below: The painting in the foreground of this picture is ‘Self-Portrait with Palette (Painter and Faun)’, 1910s. According to the words that accompany the painting, the faun behind her symbolizes a memory inspired by Russian ballet star Vaslav Nijinsky whom she saw perform in Paris in 1912. After the performance, Florine wrote: “Nijinsky the faun was marvelous. He seemed to be truly half beast… He knew not civilization – he was archaic – so were the nymphs. He is the most wonderful male dancer I have seen”.
below: Self-portrait, 1933
“For a long time
I gave myself
To the arrested moment
To the unfulfilled moment
To the moment of quiet expectation
I painted the trance moment
The promise moment
The moment in the balance
In mellow golden tones…
Then I saw
Time
Noise
Color
Outside me
Around me
Knocking me
Jarring me
Hurting me
Rousing me
Smiling
Singing
Forcing me in joy to paint them…”
This exhibit continues at the AGO until 28 January 2018
mystic smiles
Posted: October 23, 2017 in galleriesTags: AGO, Art Gallery of Ontario, banner, Christopher Butterfield, circles, colours, contemporary art, exhibit, gallery, interactive, mobile, music, paintings, room, Room for mystics, Sandra Miegs, speakers, yellow
‘Room for Mystics’
An exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario by Sandra Meigs and Christopher Butterfield.
Scattered around the room are bright coloured, simple paintings that are displayed back to back. Banners with concentric yellow circles hang on the walls. The solid colour boxes beside the paintings hide speakers.
A large red mobile hangs from the ceiling, happiness with closed eyes. Happiness and joy are two of the emotions that this room evokes. Walking through the room is definitely a positive experience! You can’t help but smile.
The paintings and mobile are the work of Sandra Meigs, a Canadian artist based in British Columbia. Accompanying the exhibit is a ‘sound installation’ composed by Christopher Butterfield.
The exhibit continues until 14 January 2018
making peace, on display
Posted: May 31, 2017 in events, locations, public artTags: art, Canary district, corktown commons, disarmament, display, environment, exhibit, images, International Peace Bureau, IPB, justice, Kamajor, Making Peace, memorial, Nelson Mandela, outdoor, Pankhurst, peace, photos, suffragette, trees, voting rights, women, words
‘Making Peace’ is a traveling exhibit that is being shown in Toronto at the moment. It was produced by the International Peace Bureau (IPB) and was first shown in in 2010 as a celebration of the 100th anniversary of the 1910 Nobel Peace Prize that was awarded to IPB. It’s purpose is to promote peace as well as educate and inform.
It can be seen until the end of June on Front Street East in the Canary District (by Corktown Commons, east of the Distillery District). In Toronto, the exhibit involves short four-sided pillars that line the sidewalk and each side of every pillar has a photo with a description or a quote from a famous person. There is also a temporary gallery in an indoor space ‘loaned’ to the exhibit by one of the developers in the Canary District.
below: A painting in progress by Ford Medina showing Nelson Mandela in five colours. These colours carry over into the outdoor exhibit and each colour represents the five main elements that IPB considers necessary for peace:
1. disarmament and nonviolence (purple)
2. conflict prevention and resolution (red)
3. economic and social justice (orange)
4. human rights, law and democracy (blue)
5. environment and sustainable development (green)
below: The display extends into Corktown Commons. Here the pillars are green as this is the section for the fifth element named above, the environment.
below: Photo by Ribeiro Antonio. The words that accompany this photo are: ” On 25 September 2015, the 193 countries of the UN agreed to an historic plan of action, entitled ‘Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’. This plan contains 17 goals with 169 targets covering a broad range of sustainable development issues. These include ending poverty and hunger, improving health education, making cities more sustainable, combating climate change, and protecting oceans and forests.” If you are interested in this, there is more information on the UN website.
below: Blue is for human rights, law, and democracy and here you have an old black and white photograph of Sylvia Pankhurst (1882-1960), a British campaigner, apparently taken when she was in Australia speaking out on behalf of woman’s rights as part of the Suffragette movement. The Suffragettes (or Women’s Social and Political Union or WSPU) was founded by a small group of women in 1903, including Sylvia, but during WW1 Sylvia was expelled from the WSPU because of her pacifist views and anti-war actions. Her sister Adela shared similar views – she immigrated to Australia where campaigned against the First World War.
below: Two photos. The one on the right, of the woman holding the flower in front of the armed soldiers, was taken at a Peace March against the Vietnam War in Washington DC in 1967. The photo on the left was taken in 2001 and is the back of a Kamajor fighter in Sierra Leone. They played a role in the civil war that occurred in that country between 1991 and 2002.
below: A couple of the red pillars on Front Street with the blue sculpture, “The Water Guardians ” behind them. The images on the closest pillar are of inside the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem as well as UN peacekeepers in Bosnia.
below: Closer to home, this pillar celebrates the work of the Toronto Parks and Trees Foundation. Working with the city as well as with community groups, businesses, and individuals, they help to increase Toronto’s tree cover.
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.” Gandhi
below: Homeless migrant worker, China
The exhibit continues until mid-September.
