Dear Friends of VISA,

I've been a fan of Springsteen's music since the early 1980's so in many ways I feel I have grown up with the Boss. His music, and in particular the lyrics, covers every human emotion from joy and delight to grief and despair. If someone were to ask what lingers on in my mind about the experience of last Monday's concert in Vancouver it would be Springsteen's ability to create a sense of intimacy in a crowd of 18,000. This is no small feat. Whether it is by holding the mic in front of somebody so their individual voice gets heard or when he crowd surfs relying totally on strangers to get him back to the stage or or the shift from a boisterous dynamic song to a quiet ballad, he strives to create intimacy in a public situation that seems in every way to deny this possibility. This got me thinking about how intimacy can be created in a visual work of art. The day after the Springsteen concert, I spent a fair amount of time at the Vancouver Art Gallery looking at the work of Ian Wallace. Included in this expansive exhibition, is a series of his studio and hotel rooms. These works are very personal and intimate despite the often largeness of their scale. Other examples of a subtle kind of intimacy are Wallace's street scene photos where an isolated individual is on a street corner and you find yourself wondering, friend or stranger? Somehow we connect to these people in the photographs. We feel like we know them. Another artist who successfully creates intimacy on a large scale vis Agnes Martin whose paintings are often six foot squares filled with delicate hand drawn and painted lines. In an video interview by the curator of the Ian Wallace exhibition, Wallace talks about how his work has the ability to connect because you are aware that it is made by an individual (one of the reasons he adds painted strips on his photographs is that it gives the work the touch of the hand). While Springsteen is backed up by an entourage of musicians, assistants, body guards, you still feel his vulnerability as a human. This sense of the vulnerable is also revealed in Wallace's photos and Martin's delicate pencil marks. With the rapidly expanding growth in world population, and our technology-driven and technology-obsessed culture, the desire to express our vulnerability and need to connect seems to be increasing accordingly. I think that we will never tire of discovering the human connections we can experience through our own voice or hand or eye. This song expresses it all for me right now: Drive All Night.

Wendy

 

In collaboration with Open Space this past year, Peter Morin, Shona Collison, and Leslie McGarry have collaborated on a series of two-evening exhibitions. The exhibition are small, only fourteen artworks. There are no labels connected to artworks. The curators are present to tell stories about the art, about the artists. This exhibition is about communicating the history of the artwork, and the history of the urban aboriginal community.

The curatorial team have had the opportunity to work with a unique archive of art and stories from the urban aboriginal community. Collison, McGarry, and Morin designed and sequenced the exhibitions to acknowledge the artistic practices of the three island nations: Coast Salish, Nuu-chah-nulth, and Kwakwaka'wakw. The exhibition series called Witnessing of 40 years of Urban Aboriginal Art will complete its final installment on November 23, from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at the Victoria Native Friendship Centre's Annual Open House at 231 Regina Avenue.

We have added some new Winter Courses such as a 12-week Creative Writing course as well as Understanding Colour I, Introductory Painting and a Saturday morning Introductory Drawing  to our schedule. Our Winter & Spring Workshops have many new additions including two new printmaking workshops on three consecutive Thursday afternoons. Click on links above for updated schedules!

For more information or to register: