Winnipeg-born, Montreal-based visual and performance artist Daniel Barrow, winner of the 2010 Sobey Art Award, was recently awarded the coveted 2013 Glenfiddich Artist-in-Residence Prize, valued at over $20,000. VoCA contributor Catherine Toews had a chance to speak with Barrow via e-mail and he was kind enough to share his plans for the residency, insight into his creative process, and advice
Read more…
Among Leonardo da Vinci’s writing and journals, one note in particular reveals his genius: his desire to paint “Man, and the intention of his mind.” Da Vinci’s constant search for new ways to reveal the world through art defined the Renaissance and set an artistic standard for centuries to come. Ross King’s excellent examination of one of da Vinci’s undisputed
Read more…
Here’s another review from Victoria-based contributor Catherine Toews. Catherine is an artist, graphic designer, writer, and cultural sector worker. TRACES is on view at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria until April 21, 2013. Daniel Barrow, installation view, The Thief of Mirrors, 2012. Mixed media projection installation. Photo courtesy of the artist When I was an art student in Winnipeg,
Read more…
The DHC Art Foundation in Montreal is small, and wonderful. The exhibitions that I’ve seen there have been beautifully installed and it’s a lovely experience to see so few works at a time, curated as they are across four intimate floors and into a nearby space. Thomas Demand is well known in Europe as the photographer who meticulously recreates images
Read more…
I was reading an interesting essay had been recommended to me by Toronto artist Iris Haussler: The Way of the Shovel, by Dieter Roelstraete. In it, he discusses the fact that many artists are engaged in a “retrospective, historiographic mode—a methodological complex that includes the historical account, the archive, the document, the act of excavating and unearthing, the memorial, the
Read more…
Today I went to the Art Gallery of Ontario, just in time on the last day of the excellent exhibition by Chinese artist Zhang Huan: Ash Paintings and Memory Doors. I had been told it was an impressive show, and it really was. Not only were the enormous works strong in terms of technique, subject matter and concept, but they
Read more…
This was a fantastic show. The Pompidou is such a great venue – somehow even the crowds don’t take away from the experience. Having seen the documentary Gerhard Richter: Painting, I was aware of the process that he uses to make the squeegee painting – it involves a lot of thinking and waiting – it was wonderful to see many
Read more…
Now that I’m blogging less frequently (and tweeting more often) it feels like a small luxury to write a blog post. When I was in Paris recently, I was finally able to see the amazing studios of Romanian sculptor Constantin Brancusi, which have been recreated by architect Renzo Piano and installed, as a wonderful free museum, right next to the
Read more…
I came across the work of artist Julie Gladstone when I was perusing the aisles of the Artist Project for potential artists to showcase on Artbomb. Artist Julie Gladstone. All images: VoCA I immediately liked the unconventional colour in her work, lots of pale minty colours jolted alive with fluorescent spray paint and then brought together with strips of striped
Read more…
Over the past ten years, artist Max Dean has collected other people’s photo albums. He’s got about 500 of them, which are being used as part of his latest project at this year’s CONTACT Photo festival in Toronto. Artist Max Dean. All images (except Google map) by VoCA. The project is called Album, and it involves Dean loading up his
Read more…
Andrea Carson writes on contemporary art, architecture and design...