Your Cultural Concierge! VoCA offers critical commentary on the Canadian art scene, with a focus on Toronto. Featuring exhibition previews, critics picks, interviews and in-depth articles on art in Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Ottawa and Halifax.
1. Prime Minister Stephen Harper ignores the arts. Consequently, art becomes a political issue across the country as Quebec gives Harper the hairy eyeball.
2. The new AGO opens – Frank Gehry’s renovation of Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario is deemed an unqualified success, perhaps partly due to the budgetary constraints he was under. It’s simple in material, but opulent in design.
3. Mark Mayer is named new director at the National Gallery in Ottawa. The youthful 52-year-old brings considerable experience and, hopefully, a flush of new energy to the National Gallery.
4. Feminist art in Vancouver. The WACK show at the VAG is a much-needed survey. As VoCA has long believed, and Holland Cotter observed recently in the NYT, “art emerging from early feminism was and is The Source.” Stay tuned for a comprehensive review of the show next week.
5. The National Portrait Gallery in…Calgary?. With major new public sculptures in the works and murmurs of the National Portrait Gallery moving there, the wealthiest province in Canada vies for cultural dominance.
6. Rumors circulate that Cambridge, Ontario will host the Venice Biennale in years to come, courtesy of R.I.M. (Both art and architecture, possibly…)
7. Mercer Union, Toronto’s oldest artist-run centre, moves into a new neighbourhood at Bloor and Lansdowne, signaling the death knell for the ‘art district’ of Queen Street West West.
8. David Hoffos is about to be discovered. The brilliant, under-the-radar Lethbridge artist prepares for his massive solo show at the National Gallery next fall. Scenes from a House Dream is his Cremaster Cycle.
9. The VAG announces move to larger premises. The Vancouver Art Gallery will move into a new building near the former Expo grounds in Vancouver and will double its size to 320,000 square feet. It’s expected to open in 2013.
10. The Yves Saint Laurent retrospective at the Musee d’art Contemporain in Montreal was the best-designed, most comprehensive and charming exhibition we have seen in a Canadian museum. Ever.
From the November 1 issue of the Globe and Mail, Jeremy Gerard writes from New York:
Barack Obama…is the first White House contender to include a far-reaching arts plank in his platform.
Barack Obama…looking good. Image: dcpox.com
The proposals range from increased support for arts education and the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to changing the U.S. federal tax code for artists. “It is unprecedented”, said Robert L. Lynch, president and chief executive officer of Americans for the Arts, a Washington-based arts advocacy group, explaining that no U.S. presidential candidate in recent times has addressed cultural issues in such detail.
Charles Pachter, The Painted Flag, 1981. Image: cpachter.com
Food for thought by Ms. Blatchford from a recent issue of the Globe and Mail…
“…Artists, while precious and important to the nation, are not fragile and ought not to be infantilized. They don’t need coddling and protection from government; they don’t need their work to be judged only kindly or only by their friends; they need not be constantly praised; and surely, it is not necessary that every aspect of their lives is subsidized by their countrymen.
On Torontoist.com, Johnnie Walker writes: “In retaliation against the positively terrifying notion of a Conservative majority government, groups like Vote For Environment and the Department of Culture have sprung up to take the battle to the blogs.”
Continue reading the article, and the comments…HERE.
Get involved! Join the Department of Culture - right HERE.
Learn how to vote strategically so as to ensure the Conservatives don’t get a majority - click on Vote for Environment HERE.
THANK GOODNESS. In a move that seems designed to respond to the brou-haha over the Conservative government cuts to the arts, particularly in Quebec where they are very - rightfully - angry, Prime Minister Harper’s Conservative Government has decided NOT to reintroduce Bill C-10, the bill that would eliminate tax credits to films deemed to be “contrary to public policy.”
Please, please read the full article that Ms. Atwood - the queen of Canada’s literary scene - wrote in yesterday’s Globe and Mail about the Conservative government’s cuts to the arts. Here’s an excerpt:
“Tuesday, (Prime Minister Stephen Harper) told us that some group called “ordinary people” didn’t care about something called “the arts.” His idea of “the arts” is a bunch of rich people gathering at galas whining about their grants.
Well, I can count the number of moderately rich writers who live in Canada on the fingers of one hand: I’m one of them, and I’m no Warren Buffett. I don’t whine about my grants because I don’t get any grants. I whine about other grants - grants for young people, that may help them to turn into me, and thus pay to the federal and provincial governments the kinds of taxes I pay, and cover off the salaries of such as Mr. Harper.”
Canadian national treasure, novelist Margaret Atwood. Image: imaginastore.com
Before we get to our Report from New York, we should mention the gala dinner that we attended last night in celebration of one of Canada’s most notable philanthropists and cultural supporters, Mr. Jim Fleck.
Jim Fleck. Image: rotman.utoronto.ca
Cultural bigwigs from Karen Kain to (VoCA favorite) the extraordinary cabaret star Patricia O’Callaghan came out to salute Mr. Fleck and perform, with actor Albert Shultz (of Toronto’s Soulpepper Theatre) holding court as Master of Ceremonies.
At a press conference in Toronto this morning, National Ballet artistic director Karen Kain, Sara Diamond of the Ontario College of Arts and Design, filmmaker Atom Egoyan, Joe Halstead of Caribana, film director Paul Gross and Jim Fleck of Business for the Arts each issued appeals for Canadians to care about the arts in this election:
Since VoCA was unable to attend, you can read the report on the press conference HERE.
From Wajdi Mouawad, Governor General Award-winning Canadian playwright; Knight of the Ordre National des Arts et des Lettres, France; Artistic Director of French Theatre, The National Arts Centre of Canada.
Originally published in the Montreal paper Le Devoir.
Monsieur le premier ministre,
We are neighbours. We work across the street from one another. You are Prime Minister of the Parliament of Canada and I, across the way, am a writer, theatre director and Artistic Director of the French Theatre at the National Arts Centre (NAC). So, like you, I am an employee of the state, working for the Federal Government; in other words, we are colleagues.
Let me take advantage of this unique position, as one functionary to another, to chat with you about the elimination of some federal grants in the field of culture, something that your government recently undertook. Indeed, having followed this matter closely, I have arrived at a few conclusions that I would like to publicly share with you since, as I’m sure you will agree, this debate has become one of public interest….
The OLD Canadian twenty dollar bill. Image: members.shaw.ca
Did you know that if you look at the NEW Canadian twenty dollar bill - you’ll need a magnifying glass - you will read the following quote by French-Canadian author Gabrielle Roy (1908 - 1983):
Could we ever know each other in the slightest without the arts?
Nous connaitrions-nous seulement un peu nous-memes, sans les arts?
At last night’s jam-packed town hall meeting, organized in response to the Stephen Harper’s Conservative government’s recent slashing of $62.06 million in Arts and Culture programs, there were several passionate speeches by Claire Hopkinson of the Toronto Arts Council, Susan Swan of the Writer’s Union and Lisa Fitzgibbons of the Documentary Organization of Canada, rising to a crescendo with a polished, fervent speech by writer and activist Naomi Klein.
Andrea Carson writes on contemporary art, architecture and design...