This week's a big one for art grad shows in Toronto. OCAD has its massive, college-wide grad show May 6 to 9, while students in its newish grad program are showing at 205 Richmond. Ryerson U image arts students are taking advantage of Contact by doing a related multi venue show that started yesterday. The Sheridan open house is this Saturday, May 1, and York University grads have been doing ongoing shows in a variety of locations. The University of Toronto has been doing ongoing shows too, including shows curated by students in its newish masters of visual studies program.
This this week's NOW, I review one of the latter shows, Natural History at the Barnicke.
Though I didn't get to talk about it much in the article, I enjoyed the Barnicke's spiffy new reno. Looks good! Also enjoyed the works that master's student Jennifer Rudder brought together for this show, though I felt a little more work was needed to bring in the human-treated-as-animal themes. For some reason I was just (naively, maybe?) struck by the beauty of the animals—Trevor Gould's giraffe, and Mircea Cantor's wolf and deer.
To read the review, click here. And if you know of any other grad shows that need noting, please advise me in the comments.
Image of Trevor Gould's Model of Nubian Giraffe with Landscape (After Jacques-Laurent Agasse, 1827), 1997-98 from NOW, courtesy of the MBNAQ
Friday, April 30, 2010
Out now: Review of Natural History @ Barnicke
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Barbara Kruger Q&A Out Today
Barbara Kruger has taken over the AGO facade for the Contact Festival. My interview with her about the work--and her longer 30 year legacy of incisive artmaking--is out today in the National Post. Here's an excerpt:
Q: How else has the power of images changed?
A: Well, I've been interested for a long time in the way pictures tell us who we are and who we want to be -- and who we can never be, too. But time online has changed people in incredible ways. I really see a difference in the attention spans that people have, particularly young people, who I teach at a university. Just look who goes to movies - a lot of people go to "event movies," but other kinds of narrative don't hold them. I think sustained narrative is in a real crisis. Sometimes I ask my students, "Do you ever think you'd be interested in going to a movie that's not about you?" They'd rather go on Twitter and talk about what they're doing. I don't say that judgmentally. It's just a way cultures have changed.
Q: Speaking of cultures, do you find working in Canada different than the States?
A: There's a phrase I've used before: "Belief plus doubt equals sanity." One without the other is sort of strange. For a while, doubt seemed like it was grounds for arrest in America. I'm sure Canadian politics has some of the same baggage. But maybe I'm wrong. I feel like Canada and the States share a particular situation, a geographical adjacency that spills over into various cultural and linguistic forms -- and now medical forms! And of course, where would American comedy, which is so important to me, be without Canada?
Image of Kruger's classic I Shop Therefore I Am 1987 from the National Post, Courtesy Mary Boone Gallery
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Shocking News! Some Newspapers Actually Expanding Art Coverage!
The issue of how, exactly journalism should cover art in (a) the digital age and (b) the traditional-media-outlet-profit-plunge age has been a topic of some discussion recently in Toronto. Last week, I attended a panel on this topic sponsored by the Canadian Journalism Foundation that I'd posted on here previously.
In the wake of the panel, various reports have been posted. JSource posted a fairly cut and dried summary that reminded me of how questions of box office-vs-critic value had gotten caught up in the digital discussion. View on Canadian Art also posted some notes that reflected, again, the fairly wide ranging nature of the dicussion, all the way from "do critics matter?" to "does anybody make money blogging?" Mondoville brought the pointed (and at times deserved) megasnark, while Socialite (who pointed out to the panel in person that Ebert is a great example of a mainstreamer gone respectedly digital) found the panel basically old-folks/non-networkedy.
For my part, I did find it regrettable that most of the panel members didn't seem to have much substantive experience online, and it showed in their questions and comments. Of course, they all brought many years of experience in print and traditional broadcast TV, which is great--that's what a lot of younger online writers can't bring to such a panel, and perhaps it reflects the experience of many members of old-guard (or as they called it, "legacy") journalism.
In any case, one thing I had hoped the panel might touch on (but didn't) are some of the few initiatives where newspapers are (against all logic, some might say) expanding their arts coverage online and elsewhere. The New York Observer's expansion online looks like this and does have a bit of a bloggy feel, linking out to other media stories as well as providing original reviews and reportage (most old-school media tend to hit a wall with the aggregation thing).
Also of interest on this front (albeit not, perhaps, as critical as writers like myself might like) is the Washington Post's Real Art DC project. In this project, artists are invited to upload their work to the Post's Real Art DC site. Then, from May to October, the Post's critics will choose ten artists to receive a studio visit writeup online. Readers will then vote for best artist, who will receive a profile in print and online.
In a way, the Post's contest reinforces the old "print is best" value dynamic, but uses some of the free content of artists to achieve its ends (and inch up pageviews). I don't think this initiative is necessarily the answer to arts journalism's woes online--as did come out at the panel, much of those woes are financial, whether in print or elsewhere--but it would have been nice if the panel had sought examples like it out.
On related fronts, could you convince a newspaper to expand its art coverage online or in print? If so, how?
Image of old-timey papers from Bernar McFadden
Saturday, April 24, 2010
401 Richmond Reviews: Monica Tap, Stephanie Cormier, Wendelien van Oldenborg

Today in my National Post At the Galleries column, I focus on three shows at 401 Richmond (the rooftop garden is such a nice escape there at this time of year...) Here's an excerpt:
Monica Tap at Wynick/Tuck Gallery, Suite 128
Monica Tap is known for paintings that translate blurred, split-second, speeding-train-window scenes into large, carefully produced canvases. Her new paintings continue to work on fleeting glimpses, but use vibrant colours and longer timespans. Polka is particularly eye-catching, using bright yellows, oranges and whites to depict a landscape that Tap might previously have rendered in brown, green and grey. Between Summer and Winter uses seasons, rather than seconds, as a frame; its pinks recall sunsets cast on snowbanks, while yellows conjure sunrises on leafy branches. While the complexity of these canvases is often pleasing, there are awkward bits -- boundaries that seem sharper than they should be, for instance. Nonetheless, Tap's delight in colour and paint shines through, as well as her desire to record time's speeding nature. This latter sense is heightened by the showing, in an adjoining room, of monochromatic works by the late painter Gerald Ferguson. (Tap studied under Ferguson.) This side-by-side presence evokes creative lineages and generational eras, while also reminding us of the sometimes bright, sometimes dark remnants that mark our rapid passage through this world. To May 1.
On a related note, I really enjoyed Monica Tap's remembrance of Ferguson that she wrote for the Winter issue of C Magazine. Also, after I sent the review in, I got notice from the gallery that there will be a panel on Gerald Ferguson at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery in Oshawa on Saturday May 29. Tap will present along with Kelly Mark, Peter Dykhuis and Sue Gibson Garvey.
Image of Monica Tap's Polka from Wynick/Tuck Gallery
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Tiny happy people: Q&A with Toni Hafkenscheid
Toni Hafkenscheid is a well-known Toronto photographer, one of those people whose images I've seen a lot but of whom I often wondered "how do they interpret or think about their own work?"
With shows currently on in Vancouver and Toronto, Hafkenscheid indulged my questions about his practice, which uses a lot of tilt-shift technique. The results are in today's National Post Q&A. An excerpt:
Q Does it bother you that a lot of people these days do tilt-shift on a computer, rather than in a camera?
A Not really. Sure, tilt-shift's pretty easy to do in Photoshop. But to me, it's all about driving the whole day and getting excited about sunlight hitting a scene at a certain angle. It's all about following the light. The tilt-shift is just my comfort level now. Granted, two months ago I threw out my home darkroom. You just can't get the chemicals for it anymore. But I still shoot analog, then scan to digital.
Q A lot of artists hire you to photograph their artwork. Do you ever think you'd like to work in another art form?
A No. I really just want to be a photographer. Realizing I was good at photography when I was 24 was, like, my saviour. I enjoy looking at other kinds of art, but the only time I feel I can say anything about art is when it's photography. One of the other jobs I sometimes get is shooting high-end interiors. Like a fancy model suite at Bay and Cumberland-- there's all this gorgeous furniture and a beautiful view. It's still kind of in a dream world, like my other work.
Image of Toni Hafkenscheid's Hell's Gate from Gallery Jones
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Panel Pétanque: Toronto Knocks Itself Out Discussing Idea of Hogtown Biennial
Seeing as how I posted about the April 17 Toronto Biennial forum a few weeks back, I thought I’d follow up with some of my thoughts on the event—y’know, now that it’s actually happened and all.
I attended the full day of presentations and took notes throughout, which adds up to a sore writing hand and too much material for a quickly produced blog post. Also, the entire proceedings were videotaped, hopefully to be posted online at some future date along with a summary by Peggy Gale. So what follows instead are five of the spectrums (spectri?) of discussion that were most interesting to me overall.
1. Town Hall vs. Nothing at All
OK, so the main thing I got out of this whole event was that museums and other public art institutions should do “town hall” style public meetings more often.
During the course of the day, it was incredibly evident that people from many different parts of the arts community really wanted to provide feedback the big kahunae and to each other, that people wanted a forum to express their loves and loathes about the Toronto scene, as well as suggestions or critiques for making it better. The feedback didn’t just address the idea of a biennial, though that was the ostensible jumping off point. It also touched on wider issues in arts funding, local history, and current institutional choices—things that people do want to talk about in a setting that’s a bit wider than beers with friends from time to time.
Of course, I understand that many public museums and galleries feel like they already stretched to the limit just trying to meet programming and budgetary goals. Extra events and associated logistics? No thank you. But honestly, if the president of the United States can make time for public town halls, maybe our museum directors can too. Just sayin’. I really believe it would be to everyone’s benefit in the long run. (And to be fair, if you don't want to wait for this next town hall to be organized, Matthew Teitelbaum said during the forum that he's welcomes feedback at matthew_teitelbaum@ago.net.)
2. Nasty vs. Nice
One of the most engaging moments of the forum’s morning session came when panelist Philip Monk, speaking on a panel titled “Histories and Opportunities,” held up two pieces of paper to the audience. “Would you like Nasty or Nice?” he asked. The audience’s energetic response, to my relief, was “Nasty!” And so Monk went on to provide a helpful counterpoint to the typical (though often practical) tradition of Canadian niceness.
One question Monk raised (from what I understood… Monk and others are very welcome to correct me in the comments section) was whether the forum was truly collaborative or whether there was an agenda (ie. a biennial plan) already at hand. He also took issue with the format of the sessions, with morning being “histories/past,” the afternoon being “supposed visionaries” of the future and “the big boys” stepping up at finish the day.
Monk also noted that the press release for the event said it was about “bringing” a biennial to Toronto, and that he wanted to critique a persistent idea that Toronto needed to have stuff “brought to it” rather than “building on what’s here.”
He also pointed out the latecomer nature of this Hogtown biennial discussion. “Why is Toronto always belated? What does that say about our city and its elite?”
Referring to an Olympics model of the way big events force cities and countries to prove they can “get it together” for the world, Monk asked “Can Toronto get it together? Does Toronto have a history of getting it together?” Riffing on this question, he stated, “Toronto is a sick scene, a dysfunctional scene. Will a biennial be a part of this sickness or will it be a way to health?”
And lest anyone be left out of this enjoyable nastiness, there was also something for the critics! Monk said “When it comes to criticism, this discourse in Toronto is at a juvenile level—Toronto has no art critical understanding. It is confused and regressive, with no knowledge of what is at stake.” (I take no issue with this, really—I feel confused much of the time, art crit being a field with few standards or performance-measurement mechanisms.) (UPDATE - In an April 30 comment on this post, Monk writes that his comment wasn't directed at published criticism. He says his original panel comment was: "When it comes to criticism—and I mean not what is published but what purports to be a public discourse, that is, as what takes place in public—frankly, this critical discourse in Toronto today is at a juvenile level. Ju-ven-ile! It’s embarrassing." I suspect the panel documentation will bear him out on this, but I also doubt I'm the only one who took his comments as being directed to published criticism in the moment. For more details, please see the comments.)
To sum up, Monk said “I’m always distressed by a lack of generosity in this art community… I can imagine a biennial that might be a love-in for Toronto or public group therapy for the art community. But we can’t have an international biennial until we change our attitude to being here.”
Cue resounding applause, which is what Monk got.
I reproduce Monk’s comments, or my notes of them, at length because I feel there is a considerable and consistent tension in the art community (and during the daylong forum) with “how to couch this or that criticism so that it produces the change I want to see without being emotionally inflammatory?”
In a way, this is an advantageous approach to conflict, wanting to maintain relationships rather than burn bridges while making desired things happen. But it is also feels like a drawback in terms of vitality, honesty and robustness. There were many other people during the forum who had compelling feedback along the nice to nasty spectrum, and I actually have to say I was impressed with the way people spoke to longstanding, difficult or frustrating issues in mostly “positive” ways. In any case, I think the point now is to keep the conversation, whatever its nature, going. (Possibly peppered with a bit of nasty to keep people awake.)
3. Festivals vs. Institutions
Another point that became clear from the day of talks was that any future art festival in Toronto, biennial or not, will have a hella lot of pressure put on it to represent local or regional artists. To my mind, this is due to the fact that our institutions have not committed to consistent programming of Toronto or Ontario artists, have not committed to reflecting the strong creative production of our region back to the public. So when the idea of a biennial comes up, and associated questions of local vs. international focus comes up (as it must) the pressure is huge to finally do the local justice.
The problem, to my mind, is that we really need our institutions to step up and do some of that regional research and presentation. It really can’t all be shoved on a festival. It needs to be something more consistent, and more persistent, like regular solo shows of local artists, large ones at that for those with significant careers already under their belts. Matthew Teitelbaum of the AGO did say there was more Toronto-artist programming coming in the future, which is great to hear, but it must be evaluated as it is produced. (aka I sure as hell hope that not all the installations in the AGO’s new “Toronto Now” space will double as an extension of the gallery restaurant—I know it works for Dean Baldwin’s current show, but I confess I have my think-the-worst fears.)
4. Toronto vs. Vancouver/Rest of World
Holy man, I did not expect to hear as much about Vancouver during the morning of this forum than I actually did. Some panelists, though joking in tone, were actually saying things like “it’s sad for a lot of people in the arts community to see planes flying over Toronto; we so often picture an international curator in there, jetting direct from Europe to Vancouver.” Which was kind of funny but also kind of freaking-well sad.
Later, the anxiety around Vancouver widened, as it does, to basically include the rest of the world. “Why doesn’t the rest of the world recognize our scene?” the plea seems to go. “Why are we a second or third tier country at Venice?” (A consequence of this widening anxiety also sometimes conflates “Toronto” as “Canada,” another weird and unfortunate psychogeographical leap.)
Overall, though I think it was therapeutic for people to air some of these fears and frustrations about feeling overlooked, I do believe that you have to value your own scene before you can expect other people to value it. (Haema Sivanesan of SAVAC had a great anecdote about immigrating to Toronto from Australia and finding the scene difficult to perceive—great behind the scenes but not visible in public spaces, I think it what she was referring to. This is the kind of valuation that’s needed, and relates to that point on institutions I mentioned earlier.)
You also have to be realistic; Canada may be a wonderful country (I certainly like to think so) but it is also a rather small one in terms of population. I don’t think it’s very realistic to aim for more than (or lament being) “a second or third tier country” at Venice. Sometimes all you can do is do your best, be a pro, market the hell out of it, and appreciate the coverage you get—which I’d bet is actually a fairly high proportion relative to Canada’s population size.
Then again, maybe I’m missing some data. What is this other country that people think Canada should be “equal to” artistically? Or a city that people think Toronto should be thought of in the same league with (other than Vancouver, people!). If you have ideas beyond the usual unreachably-megalopolis suspects (NYC, London, Paris) please share in the comments. Is it that Sydney and Auckland are outshining TO? What’s a reasonable point of comparison?
5. Artist-run vs. Mega-org
The last, but certainly not least, thread of discussion that intrigued me had to do with tensions between artist-run centre approaches and priorities and mega-arts-organization approaches and priorities—or at least some of the perceived differences between these sectors’ priorities.
Panellist Heather Haynes of Toronto Free Gallery (and Fuse Magazine) actually put me on the spot a bit when she referred to my original post about this forum and my complaint that there wasn’t enough artist-run centre representation in the official proceedings. She said that had prompted her to consult informally with some artist run centre staff and compile a list of their recommendations for any proposed Toronto Biennial.
According to my notes, these artist-run centre feedback points—which were well received and referred to again in the rest of the proceedings—were:
- Financial concerns and desire to participate in the planning process
- Wondering whether this is a good time for starting a project like this with provincial funding commitments already being cut to large infrastructure projects in Toronto like Transit City
- Worry about top-down Olympic effect, of funding orgs going over festival budget and of long-term operational budgets for centres and galleries being cut as a result
- Concern over whether a biennial type event would result in overworked and underpaid labor
- A desire for something other than “high-profile prosecco parties,” for something that lasts longer than a day or a week
- Looking for a strong balance between international and Canadian programmers
- Noting a need for strong representation of aboriginal communities in the planning stages and racialized communities as well
- Interest in seeing a biennial that will go beyond the international art stars and that will present emerging artists along with established ones
- Documenta was often used as a frame of reference, for example in the way it creates a website and publications that live on beyond the event
- There was also a feeling the biennial should not appear in one location and should be held throughout the city
- A lot of people were interested in events that are not just VIP oriented, that go morning to evening
- Also interested in a biennial that challenges what happens in traditional art centres
- Questions of how to make this a non-Toronto initiative, to bring in other Canadian centres
In a way, that’s a false battle (one I admittedly might have constructed in my own mind through misinterpretation) because most ARCs realize that they don’t have the public reach of an OCAD or an AGO. Yet the fact remains, as SAVAC’s Haema Sivanesan noted, that many smaller galleries in Toronto do “biennial-quality” exhibitions, which is to say show strong art—some of it stronger and more internationally robust than what the big guys show.
So… this concludes my main threads of interest from the panel pétanque on Saturday. Apparently, the AGO has agreed to host any followup panel in association with one of my freelance clients, the Canadian Art Foundation. Will it happen for reals though? I certainly hope so. There’s a lot of people, I think, who still want to step up to the mic.
And in that spirit, what did you think of the event? Would you go to the next one? Why or why not? How would you make it better? And most importantly, what did I get wrong?
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Janson & Janson–Loving Kids Save Art History: Slides at 11
Well, I'm happy to report that the Janson & Janson loving kids I blogged about earlier this year have won their impassioned battle to save McMaster's Art History program.
As reported April 18 in the Hamilton Spectator, the decision to cut the art history program was reversed by the university senate after clearing three levels of bureaucratic approval:
Art history is the smallest freestanding program in the faculty of humanities, with just 37.5 full-time equivalent students in all years of their degrees, giving it about one-tenth the population of larger humanities programs such as history and English.
The possibility of closure had raised broader concerns about the university's commitment to the liberal arts, and specific concerns about the program, since an art history degree is considered a prerequisite for a career in art curation.
The proposal to end the program gave birth to considerable protest from inside and outside the faculty and even from beyond the university. The spectators' seats at the senate meeting were filled with supporters of the program, who clapped after the vote.
Of particular note is this letter a former McMaster professor wrote, which points out that the McMaster Museum of Art may have the art history department to thank for the strength of its collections:
Because of the excellence of its [art history] instructors in the past, and the stimulating quality of courses which he attended, Dr. Herman Levy wished to give to the then-department a bequest which would enrich the art history and art students' experience by allowing them the privilege of having artworks of outstandingly high quality from which to learn.
His bequest of $16 million, an extraordinarily generous gesture of confidence toward the historical and practical study of art at McMaster, incidentally raised the stature of the McMaster Museum of Art, making it recognizably one of the finest university art collections in Canada.
That reputation, also, has encouraged other benefactors to donate private collections to the museum.
The university has benefitted hugely from this generosity, which would not have occurred had it not been for the excellence, and commitment, of the art history faculty in the past.
The artistic reputation of McMaster University has grown in proportion to the financial support given to the art history and art programs which generated that reputation.
Levy's bequest was given on the assumption that his generosity would advance the study of art into the future. As respect to his memory and wishes, and the wishes of others in the future, it is imperative that the Honours Art History Degree Program at McMaster continue, and be given enhanced support.
The university does not seem to appreciate the extraordinary benefit, relative to its modest cost, which art and art history have brought to McMaster, and the wider Hamilton community.
While the challenge at some American universities has been hanging onto art historical collections, it's interesting here that the challenge was hanging onto the art history program. In any case, congrats to the students and supporters for their passionate stand. Let the reading (and rereading) begin!