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February 21, 2013
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Vancouver Island School of Art Newsletter
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Dear Students and Friends of VISA,
What do you want from art? When you go to an exhibition, what kind of experience do you anticipate? To be inspired? To be surprised? To see something new? To see good craftsmanship? To experience beauty? To engage in intellectual inquiry? When you think about it, people do have a lot of expectations when they enter a gallery space. In a review of Rosemarie Trockel's exhibition, the Guardian's Adrian Searle describes his reaction to the work by saying "I am alarmed and puzzled at every turn". I can't help thinking that is an exciting way to go through an exhibition. Many critics have written about Trockel's recent work called 'Cosmos', including Laura Cummings in the Observer, Jason Farago in the Guardian, Roberta Smith in the New York Times, Zoe Pilger in The Independent and Daniel Marcus in Art and America. Now chances are you aren't going to want to read through all these reviews (they do make a good read however and there are a lot more on-line that I haven't included here). My point of posting several reviews is so you get a sense of what people might want from art viewing, and in the specific case of Trockel's work, you can see how some are getting what they want and others not so much. Trockel has juxtaposed her own work with work of other artists (including both known and outsider artists) and has also included what seems like random non-art objects. She not only blurs the boundaries between artist/curator, professional artist/outsider artist, art object/non-art objects, but she is also making us question ideas around what we consider beautiful, abject or ugly. While the idea of artist as curator is not a new one, Trockel seems to be taking this idea one step further by taking on the roles of art gallery curator and natural history museum curator by including art and non-art items. Looking at work in this context all kinds of things go through our mnds starting from 'is it art?', 'to what am I looking at' to 'why am I looking at this?'. While thinking about Trockel's work, I came across another article that made me wonder about what role does our brain play in terms of how we respond to art and design: Why We Love Beautiful Things. Here we learn, once again the power and impact of visual stimulus. Art in all its idiosyncratic, undefinable, confusing and overwhelming ways of presenting itself does make our human experience that much more interesting, if not infinitely better.
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TONIGHT AT VISA!!
ARTIST TALK:
BEN REEVES
Thursday, February 21 at 7pm
Ben Reeves is a Vancouver artist and teacher with a materially and conceptually based drawing and painting practice. His recent work focuses on the potential of the brushstroke for densely layered signification along with its simultaneous and implacable material immediacy. He has exhibited extensively in national venues as well as in the US, England and China. Reeves is represented by the Equinox Gallery in Vancouver and Jessica Bradley Gallery in Toronto. He is currently Associate Professor in the Faculty of Visual Art + Material Practice and the Faculty of Graduate Studies at Emily Carr University in Vancouver.
Talk is in Room 4, 2549 Quadra
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Slide Room Gallery opening Friday, February 22 at 7:30 pm
CONSTRUCTED GEOMETRIES
Kyler Clement, Linda Peters and Jennifer Smyly
The work in this exhibition addresses the use of geometric structures to reveal narratives embedded in abstract forms. Clement's collages are based on panoramic urban landscapes as remembered by her experiences of encountering 'the city' after hours of driving on the Mackenzie Highway. Geometry and gesture collide in Peter's paintings as veils of transparent and opaque stripes cover fragments of phrases written in cursive script. Smyly's enigmatic architectural drawings are based on her memories of a house she has lived in for the last 38 years.
Curator's talk: Friday, February 22 at 8pm
Exhibition continues until April 1
Slide Room Gallery is located on the lower level of VISA at 2549 Quadra Street
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Artist Talk: Rick Leong
Monday, February 25 at 2:30 pm
Camosun College, Lansdowne Campus, Fisher 100
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Artist Talk: Jennifer Pastor
Tuesday, February 26 at 8pm
University of Victoria, Visual Arts Building, Room A162
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PHOTOETCHING WORKSHOP
Feb 28-March 21 (four Thursdays)
1:00pm-5:30pm
This workshop is designed to explore numerous alternatives in image creation in both intaglio and relief print while using a photopolymer plate in conjunction with the sun rays, or a simple ultra-violet exposure system. Participants will create miniature works of art on paper using simple mark-making, altered imagery or memorabilia. The completed work is ideal as a 'stand alone' print or combined with mixed media works of art. Hand-created imagery is emphasized in this workshop. This process offers new possibilities where various images & materials are recreated in a whole new way. All levels of experience are welcome.
Instructor: Jenn Robins
Tuition: $225 (18 hours)
Material fee: $30 (all materials included)
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OPEN SPACE
Charles Campbell
Transporter
Opening and artist's talk Friday, March 1, at 7:30 pm
Charles Campbell packs complex references into artworks of unnerving, covert beauty. The Transporter project, inhabiting the interstices of artistic and political concerns, began initially as a visual investigation of the phenomenon of forced migration. Campbell discovered instead that his work sparked the desire to find a material form for his painterly motifs, which had been drawn from political imagery, and therein discovered a way to invoke the interplay between various aspirational futures and the present. Transporter revives the genre of history painting in a series of 3D paintings that combine Buckminster Fuller's utopian architecture with loaded political imagery and elements dispersed in the communities around Open Space. Exhibition continues to April 6.
Open Space is located at 510 Fort Street
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Opening reception
Friday, March 1, at 7:00 pm
The Heir (also read: The Hair) is a body of work that proposes objects born in the state of the "in-between"; these are works whose properties inherit characteristics from the two-dimensional media of painting and drawing and the three-dimensional media of sculpture. These are objects that jut into space but also rely on the wall for support. They are tactile and tangible and cast a shadow divorced from their system of display (ie. the square of the canvas and/or frame). They are objects that play with their own depiction, the "in-between", deflating and protruding as their true shadows dissolve into their new ones.
Xchanges is located at 2333 Government St
Gallery Hours: Saturdays and Sundays, 12 to 4 pm
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NEWS:
VISA and the University of Gloucestershire
We are pleased to announce that the Vancouver Island School of Art has finalized an articulation agreement with the University of Gloucestershire in the UK. This means that a student who completes a 3-year Diploma of Fine Arts at VISA can transfer into the 4th year of a Bachelor of Arts in Fine Arts at the University of Gloucestershire. Students will complete a Bachelor degree after eight months of study.
The university is two hours outside of London and will offer students a great opportunity to study at an institution with a dynamic contemporary art program while being in close proximity to all the art galleries and museums in London. For more information: University of Gloucestershire, Fine Arts
There will be an information session with a representative from the University of Gloucestershire on Thursday, March 7 at 3pm. Everybody is welcome.
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SLIDE ROOM GALLERY
LOOKING FOR BOARD MEMBERS
The Slide Room Gallery is a non-profit gallery in the lower level VISA that was established in 2006. It is run as an independent organization from the school with a separate Board of Directors. The Slide Room Gallery board is directly involved in the programming of the gallery and all board members are encouraged to present curatorial proposals for consideration as exhibitions in the gallery.
We are looking for board members who are artists or who are involved in the art community in Victoria in some capacity because the main role of Slide Room Gallery board members is to assist with the programming and curating of exhibitions. The board meets 2-3 times a year. For more information on the gallery: Slide Room Gallery Website
If you are interested in becoming involved with the Slide Room Gallery, please contact Slide Room Gallery.
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For more information about our courses or events contact
Linda or Jen at the office: 250-380-3500 or info@vancouverislandschoolart.com
Website
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