There’s an excellent article on former Montrealer, Habitat ’67 designer and increasingly world-famous architect Moshe Safdie in the Wall Street Journal.

Moshe Safdie’s Habitat 67. Image: 248am.com

He designed the National Gallery of Canada, you know. With Louise Bourgeois’s 35-foot tall bronze spider, Maman (1999) outside.

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1. Toronto’s CN Tower got an admirable facelift this summer, causing many residents to actually see the tower in years.

The CN Tower. Image: Vince Talotta/Toronto Star

Which reminds us of….

Andy Warhol, A Set of Six Self-Portraits, 1967. image: sfmoma.org

2. Will Kim Dorland win the RBC Painting Competition this year?

After being shortlisted in 2006, he has again made the list this year.
VoCA thinks his work is getting better every year.

The winner will be announced in September.

Kim Dorland, Green Blanket, 2007. Image: kimdorland.com

His surreal paintings are grounded in regional familiarity, small-town suburbia depicted using day-glo underpainting.

New work by the artist is on view at Skew Gallery, Calgary
from September 6 - 6 October.

Opening Reception: Tursday, Sept. 6, 6-9pm. The artist will be in attendance.

Kim Dorland, Crossing Elk, 2006. Image: kimdorland.com

Kim Dorland, Wolves of Chernobyl, 2006. Image: kimdorland.com

Kim Dorland is represented by Skew Gallery and also by Angell Gallery in Toronto.

Grand Gestures: An Exhibition in Three Parts by 640 480 video collective is showing at Gallery TPW, Trinity Square Video (TSV) and the public space in between.

September 6 – 13 October, 2007.

Each of the three projects uses the aesthetics of public memorials and museums to discuss the preservation of video and its inherent value system.

Beginning at TSV with an installation of hundreds of memorial pins made from VHS tape that recall Memento Mori, the visitor will then walk to Gallery TPW. Along the route ten “memorial” style bronze plaques have been installed, each containing a partial transcript from a personal video (sourced from Youtube). Finally, at Gallery TPW, these ‘throw-away’ memories are preserved into an everlasting state – as diamonds.

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New York’s Museum of Modern Art

2. Vancouver artist Scott McFarland has been chosen to participate in the Museum of Modern Art’s New Photography 2007.

September 30 - January 1, 2008.

The exhibition is the latest installment of its annual fall showcase of significant recent work in contemporary photography. McFarland has been chosen along with US artist Tanyth Berkeley and Berni Searle from South Africa.

More info on Berkeley HERE and Searle HERE

Scott McFarland, Torn Quilt with the Effects of Sunlight, 2003. Image: monteclarkgallery.com

“Scott McFarland - Scott McFarland digitally combines multiple negatives to create exquisitely detailed photographs that subtly record the passage of time. For Orchard View with the Effects of the Seasons (Variation #1) (2003-06), McFarland photographed the same view of an overgrown garden in Vancouver throughout the year as different plants bloomed and faded. He combined elements of these exposures to capture all four seasons within a single picture.

Scott McFarland was born in 1975 in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and lives in Vancouver. He studied at the University of British Columbia, completing his Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1997. Recent exhibitions include The Constructed Image: Photographic Culture, Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto (2007); Acting the Part: Photography as Theatre, Vancouver Art Gallery (2007); and Clickdoubleclick: The Documentary Factor, Haus der Kunst in Munich (2006).”

1. Artspeak, Vancouver presents Melvin Moti: No Show

September 8 - October 13, 2007

Opening Friday September 7, 8pm as part of SWARM (an annual celebration of artist-run culture)

Artist Talk Saturday September 8, 2pm

Still from Melvin Moti’s No Show, 2004. Image: artspeak.ca

“Rotterdam-based artist Melvin Moti’s 2004 No Show is a 24-minute film based on a guided tour given at the Hermitage Museum during the Second World War. Until 1944, the museum removed its collection of paintings and other artworks for safe-keeping, and its galleries were bare save for empty frames hanging on the walls. In 1943 a guide showed a group of soldiers through the vacant rooms, describing from memory the paintings in the Hermitage’s collection including works by Rembrandt and Fra Angelico. Moti presents this historic tour aurally, while the camera is trained on an empty gallery, a backdrop for the imagined works.

Moti’s film is a beautiful, spare work that evokes a complex subjective response. The film is accompanied by a small artist book of the same name that provides further research insights into the reconstructed event.”

1. Vancouver Art & Economies: edited by Melanie O’Brian

Read the review HERE

Find it HERE

2. Abstract Painting in Canada: by Roald Nasgaard

Find it at David Mirvish Books, Toronto HERE

or on Amazon.ca HERE

Michelangelo Buonarrotti, Pieta, 1499. Image: mulot.free.fr

This video is a must-see:

Click HERE to watch it.

“There is a danger that potential donors may send significant items or whole collections out of the country.”

Collectors have long donated works of art to galleries and museums, receiving a tax break on the appraised value of the work in return. This can be lucrative if the item has increased considerably in value, and in the U.S, enthusiastic philanthropy is a primary reason for the excellent quality of museum collections.

Here in Canada, there is more reluctance to give. While that does seem to be changing, this article in the Globe and Mail draws attention to the frustrations of valuing art in an ever-changing market.

The Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board is suffering from stagnancy and arbitrary appeals process that is discouraging collectors from donating.

“Donors say that the government wants it both ways: slashing funds for cultural institutions, urging them to go to the private sector - and then throwing obstacles in the way of potential donors.

Marc Mayer, (director of Montreal’s Musée d’art contemporain) says he was “taken aback by the process (in Canada).” In the States, the responsibility for appraisals and tax receipts lies with donors; the museum plays no part. He keeps a full-time staffer working on review-board applications. “She has to write long essays on people who are already known in the art world. And what’s the point of the ponderous third-party appraisal system if they’re going to be overturned? This is absurd.”

Read the full article HERE

Recently, a VoCA reader commented on a news item we posted on a Toronto collector donating this year’s Venice Biennale installation by David Altmejd to the Art Gallery of Ontario - a $300,000 gift. Our reader was questioning the acquisition policy of the Art Gallery of Ontario.

An installation by David Altmejd. Image: flashartonline

VoCA has heard grumblings from Toronto dealers about the lack of local artists in Toronto museum collections, so we asked AGO curator David Moos to comment. This is what he said:

VOCA READER: The (VoCA) story about the AGO and the Altmejd piece raises some interesting questions that VOCA might look into and write about. It concerns the acquisition policies of public Canadian galleries like the AGO and the National Gallery in Ottawa.

In this case private collectors footed the bill for a piece the AGO wanted. That’s fine. But the AGO has an acquisition budget of almost 1.3 million dollars a year (according to their most recent financial statement posted on the AGO web site - the National gallery has considerably more). The AGO could have bought the Altmejd piece on their own, but of course if someone wants to buy it for them then who is to argue? But would the AGO have paid for the piece if no one stepped forward with the cash?

DAVID MOOS: Yes, it is possible that the AGO could have acquired The Index, purchasing it from a newly created endowment fund that was a key component of the Transformation AGO fundraising campaign. Although the entire campaign is not fully completed, the Contemporary Art Acquisitions Endowment – with a goal of $5 million – has been successfully completed. This significantly enhances the AGO’s ability to purchase works of art.

In the recent past (before the endowment, which is just becoming active), the AGO did purchases works of art. Some examples of works by Canadian artists purchased since my arrival to the AGO in 2004 include works by Shary Boyle, Janieta Eyre, Luis Jacob, Nestor Kruger, Tim Lee, Mark Lewis, Scott McFarland, among others.

In today’s rapidly expanding international art, no art museum can have enough money for acquisitions. If in the past art museums were often confined to merely spend what money they had available in endowment funds, today there are many more ways that the museum actively engages the art community to participate in the shared project of building a great collection of contemporary art. The example set by George Hartman and Arlene Goldman is merely one of a number of acquisitions that have been made through the direct generosity of local patrons and collectors. Increasingly, the museum’s collection reflects the dialogue that is shared between curators and collectors. This is a healthy development.

VR: And the larger question is how does the AGO decide how to spend its acquisition budget? My understanding is that they are loath to spend any money on contemporary Canadian art (by living working artists), preferring instead to have this type of art donated. They generally spend the money on older art and foreign art. Which raises the question of whether public galleries should be spending money to acquire new Canadian art?

DM: I hope by the names listed above – of purchases with AGO funds – that I have addressed your misconception about being “loath” to acquire works by living (and even still emerging!) Canadian artists.

Today works by established international artists is increasingly expensive; perhaps Canadian art is good buy… (VoCA says Word to that!)

Julian Opie and Henry Moore at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Image: artmatters.ca

VR: I believe strongly that they should. It is nice that people donate art to galleries but sometimes a gallery should pay for good work that no one wants to donate. Perhaps VOCA could interview curators at these institutions to find out why they do what they do.

DM: Great idea !

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Bruce Mau. Image: guardian.co.uk

Designer Bruce Mau on CBC Radio’s This I Believe:

“It is art that sings to us and opens up our hearts to one another. It is art that gives meaning to things that would otherwise go unnoticed. It is art that connects us to our past. It is art that cracks a smile and laughs at our limitations, that speaks to us of the darkness we cannot say out loud. It is art that proves our worth, that demonstrates our capacity as inventors and lovers and wild untamed beings. And in the end it is art that allows us to understand and express science.

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1. iPotlach by Vancouver artist Sonny Assu runs August 30 - 13 October at the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba.

Sonny Assu, iPotlatch Ego, 2007. Image: sonnyassu.com

iPotlach brings together consumer items with Aboriginal symbolism in order to explore the definition of personal lineage, for this artist whose cultural roots include pop and Laich-kwil-tach heritage.

His screenprints, drums, paintings and textile work reflect a diversity of influences, from Spiderman to West Coast Regalia blankets.

The work recalls the sculpture of Canadian art-star Brian Jungen, who has wittily transformed Nike Air Jordans into First Nations masks, or plastic lawn chairs into a large-scale whalebone sculpture.

Brian Jungen, Prototype for New Understanding #16, 2004. Image: makezine.com

Brian Jungen is presently participating in the Lyon Biennale 2007, on through January 6, 2008. The Biennale, entitled 00s —The History Of A Decade That Has Not yet Been Named, is curated by Hans-Ulrich Obrist. The concept involves 49 international curators and art critics being asked the following question: “Who, in your opinion, is the artist who best represents this decade?”

Curator Trevor Smith chose Brian Jungen.

2. Mark your calendars for this not-to-be-missed exhibition, coming in October to Toronto.

Sculptures by Gertraud Möhwald at Toronto’s Gardiner Museum, from October 12, 2007 to January 20, 2008.

Although little is known of her work in North America, Gertraud Möhwald (1929-2002) is renowned for her contribution to ceramic art, both as an artist and teacher. Her work combines classical European sculptural traditions with her experiences as a young German, having survived the bombing of Dresden and lived in East Germany after its separation from the West.

Gertraud Mohwald, Bildnis R.M. II, 1990. Image: by Klaus E. Goltz, Halle, courtesy of Galerie b15.
Collection of the Möhwald Family, Germany.

There will be an exhibition symposium on October 14, which will feature German experts Gabi Dewald, Editor-in-chief of KeramikMagazin, and Möhwald’s University colleague and friend, Dr. Renate Luckner-Bien.

Moderated by the exhibition’s curator Susan Jefferies, the symposium will address Möhwald’s life and important influences on her work. Tickets are available on the museum’s website HERE.

Gertraud Mohwald, Head with Wire Curl, 2000. Image: by George Meister courtesy of Galerie b15
Collection of Renate and Bernd Wunderle, Germany.