A Sports Swarm in Contains Animal Byproducts!

Artwork at left: "Red Football Helmet" by Aganetha Dyck. Photo: Peter Dyck.

Contains Animal Byproducts! Pet Food for the Brain, Curated by Daina Warren

Connect with CODE Screen 2010 >>>

Contains Animal Byproducts! is a multi-media, group exhibition that investigates the animated side of art - literally and figuratively. All the visual artworks incorporate various references that include animal as shaman, animal for consumption or the natural environment as well as projects and images that are connected to politically charged notions such as the link between the protection of wildlife and Canadian identities. These diverse projects hold various interpretations due to the incongruity of aesthetic materials and objects paired with animal depictions.

Daina Warren is of the Montana Cree Nation in Alberta. She received her BFA in 2003 at Emily Carr University, and is currently enrolled in her MA in critical and curatorial studies at UBC, graduating in 2010. Warren has curated for the New Forms Media Arts Festivals (2004,2005), the Earth Village for the World Urban Forum (2006) and as an associate curator with grunt gallery and the LIVE Biennale of Performance Art from 1999-2009.

Contains Animal Byproducts! Pet Food for the Brain is lead by Governor General's Award for Visual and Media Arts winner Aganetha Dyck with Mary Anne Barkhouse, BGL, Marianne Corless, Susan Detwiler, David Diviney and Bill Burns.

Enjoy! (Did we mention that Aganetha Dyck will be in our upcoming LATERAL LEARNING exhibition-in-print curated by Paul Butler????)

Vantage Art Projects Uses PITCH ENGINE for SOCIAL MEDIA PRESS RELEASES

Vantage Art Projects launches Social Media Releases with PITCH ENGINE as the primary method of news wire and press release distribution

Vantage director Jennifer Mawby says that " the real-time and multi-media capabilities of Social Media Releases surpasses the ability to engage people in arts and culture activities over traditional text and image only press releases. With a S.M.R. sound bites for tweets and links to other social media portals like Facebook are included in the release for one-click re-posting. The ability to embed You-Tube video and multiple images into the release add to it's dynamic features we feel are right for Vantage's unique art projects. We are excited about the potential with Pitch Engine."

See the GATEKEEPERS S.M.R here!

Curator Dave Dyment Watches Iain Baxter on Television - CODE Screen 2010 Exhibition 6

Old Televisions and Super 8 Film Stock inspires Dave Dyment, CODE Screen 2010 Curator.

(Artwork at left by Iain Baxter). As a countdown to the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver, CODE Screen 2010 will animate your screen and captivate your imagination. By the end of the Games, CODE Screen 2010 will have showcased the work of more than 100 of Canada's finest creators, including recipients of the Governor General's Award for Visual and Media Arts.

Enjoy the works of artists including Alex Janvier, Michael Snow, Aganetha Dyck and Kenneth Lochhead in 14 exhibitions curated by Kate Armstrong, Dave Dyment, Donna Wawzonek, Nathalie deBlois, Milena Placentile and Daina Warren.

The best way to experience CODE Screen 2010 is to install the application putting you one click away from all the content. You'll receive an automatic prompt whenever a new exhibit is launched. Or come back to vancouver2010.com/code whenever you need an art break.

http://www.vancouver2010.com/more-2010-information/cultural-festivals-and-events/code-connect-create-collaborate/code-screen-2010/

Catch Exhibition 6 to the end of November. Test Pattern curated by Dave Dyment featuring Governor General Award Winner Iain Baxter, with Collin Zipp, Kelly Mark, Janet Morton, Aaron Carpenter, Germaine Koh and Sara Angelucci.

"Canary" by James Whitman - FRESH PICK Volume 1 Edition 24

The wild bird, endemic to Macaronesia, is gregarious and builds cup-shaped nests while often fiercely defending it's territory. It feasts in flocks while foraging on the ground, and cannot survive without gravity. James Whitman's "Canary" is a wild bird of a different feather.

"Canary" comes from the figures and creatures in the artists "Some Kings" series. Whitman tells us the 'kings' are caricatured alien or ‘other’ subjects generated from a formal play with the construction of face, countenance, and the kinds of social space these can generate. They are purposely deadpan and low affect. They acknowledge us and present themselves, but they don’t elicit our attention or social engagement, and beyond holding our eye, they make no social display. As with wild animals, we don’t share their society and they are indifferent to us.

The kings’ social world, social relations, the state of the land they inhabit and its economics have been bracketed off, left open. We are not presented with the depiction of an imaginary or allegorical society and its functions and relations, but with difference, with our world become different. The point isn’t so much the specifics of that difference, but to depict the absence of our society, the world without our administration. These drawings both depict a certain semi-developed state of the not-wilderness of British Columbia, and shift this familiar mundane land of overgrown logging roads, abandoned fridges, and ten year old spruce over into a fantasy of an unpeopled world. They imagine a world that exists quite sufficiently without any of the very particular forms of meaning peculiar to our species. A world without our presence as witnesses.

James Whitman has an honours BFA from UVic 1998 and is currently represented by the LES Gallery in Vancouver. He is artist, curator, collaborator and has sat on board of the Vancouver Access Artist Run Centre and the ‘536’ curatorial society “with a focus on exhibitions in unusual situations”. He has completed residencies in Leipzig Germany and Dawson City, Yukon. He is a member of the Vancouver-based drawing collective Lions Pile. You can find more work by the artist at LES Gallery, Outbuildings and Livestock and Lions Pile.

Buy "Canary" now from $45+!

"Sweet Smell of Success" by Matthew Sweig - FRESH PICK Volume 1 Edition 23

Welcome to "The Sweet Smell of Success". This series is a fragmented self-portrait made up of the little physical evidence of the artist’s ancestral past. Further to past works dealing with urban debris and the memory of objects, this work strives to illustrate the many ways in which one views themselves. The people are distant maternal relatives captured from old photographs. The screen printed pattern is extracted from monetary notes from Czar ruled Poland from the early twentieth century where Sweig’s paternal family was at the time the photographs were taken in Canada.

Matthew Sweig is educated in the field of Landscape Architecture and practices in Toronto, Canada. Gary Michael Dault of the Globe and Mail’s review of Sweig’s “Reconstruction of a Demolition” exhibit from 2005 could equally describe this piece. “A glance at the picture reproduced here - or even a prolonged study of it - will probably not serve to identify it as a painting rather than a photograph. But a painting it assuredly is, a vastly labour-intensive, black-and-white acrylic on canvas...” More information on the artist’s original works can be found at www.matthewsweig.com. He is represented by the XEXE Gallery in Toronto, www.xexegallery.com.

Buy "The Sweet Smell of Success I" now from $45+!

PAUL BUTLER EXHIBITION-IN-PRINT - Artists to be published

The artists who responded to our open call for submission, and who have been selected for publication in our Paul Butler exhibition-in-print project are now announced. The full press release and list of artists can be found on our website. Thank you for "Submitting to Paul Butler"!

Full press release can be found here: http://www.vantageartprojects.com/Current_Submissions.html

Please find below the list of artists whose work was selected for publication in the upcoming Exhibition-in-print book curated by Paul Butler. The full list to be published in at the end of this message and includes 40+ individuals. We would like to stress that in keeping with the process outlined, Paul blind-juried the work of all submitting artists. Further to the open submissions, Paul was invited to ask a small number of artists to contribute along with his own work. These artists also paid a submission fee. 

The quality of the submissions were high and came in from all corners of the globe making the final decision of what works to publish difficult. The selections were made very carefully based on the best fit with our curatorial theme and guided by the critical essays to be published with the artwork.

ARTISTS TO BE PUBLISHED - VP1_PB1

Artists in “Lateral Learning” featuring Paul Butler, Mark Clintberg and Dr. Jeanne Randolph with: Amarie Bergman, Lisa Birke, Melissa Brown, Lydia Burggraaf, John Campbell, Robert Caspary, Lucia Cipriano, Jennifer Delos Reyes, Rebecca Donald, Christopher Donnelly, Aganetha Dyck, Richard Dyck, Sarah Fuller, Julie Gendron, Lori Gordon, Sheila Heti, Robin Lambert, Marissa Largo, Henry Mah, Ashley Neese, Christian Nicolay, Jennifer O'Leary, Richard Palanuk, Mitzi Pederson, Perry Rath, Kerri Reid, Scott Rogers, Jesse Sherburne, Julia Sherman, Jonny Silver, Eric Steen, Derek Sullivan, Aislinn Thomas, Julie Thomson, Margaux Williamson, Sascha Yamashita, Weakhand , The Make It Collective (Gabe Baribeau, Ian Fitzgerald, Rachel Fleming, Aimee Burnett, Sean Walsh, Todd Guthrie, Pat Bodnar, Meghan Hunter, Nick Edwards, Emily Vesigny, Emily Rayner and Bailey Holmes), The 26 Collective (Melanie Rocan, Cyrus Smith, David Wityk, Fred Thomas, Shaun Morin, Ian August, Michael Topf), The Reverse Pedagogy Team (Venice 2009). All artist submissions were blind-juried based on an international open call.

V.A.P. is committed to offering inclusive opportunities for artists. As a part of our programming, V.A.P. provides open call, blind juried opportunities for artists via exhibitions and art publications.

"Man Trap" by Dana Holst - FRESH PICK Volume 1 Edition 22

Man Trap” by Dana Holst is from a new series "Prey" which explores from a psychological perspective the human/animal instinct to stalk other beings - sometimes for survival but mostly for fun. It is a look at the need to act out upon and keep in touch with primal urges, filtered through a sanitized world of industrial and computer prowess where human hunters use technology against lowly beasts, often to unfair advantage. In the drawing “Man Trap” a young woman in silk tights and a frilly can-can costume lifts her skirt up, concealing her face and exposing her legs and panties, setting her trap. Playfully humorous, drawn with delicate and bold marks in black oil paint on pink paper, “Man Trap” uses feminine wiles alone, with the viewer being the stalked prey. "Prey"evokes fairy tale darkness, surreal charm and wry wit, all commenting on human ignorance and our oblivious desire for fun.

Award-winning artist, Dana Holst was born in Kitchener, Ontario in 1972. She graduated from the University of Waterloo with a BA in Fine Arts in 1995. Post graduation, she received the Don Phillips Scholarship resulting in a year long printmaking residency at Open Studio in Toronto.

Her work has been exhibited across Canada and is in private collections throughout North America. Public collections include:The Glenbow Museum in Calgary, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre in Kingston; Carleton University Art Gallery in Ottawa; the Alberta Foundation for the Arts in Edmonton; the Art Bank ; the Colart Collection in Montreal and Ernst & Young in Toronto. Original works are available at Latitude 53 Contemporary Visual Culture, Edmonton, Katharine Mulherin, Toronto and Galerie St. Laurent + Hill, Ottawa. Her 2010 exhibition schedule includes the Odd Gallery, Dawson City Yukon and the White Water Gallery in North Bay Ontaro. Her personal web site is www.DanaHolst.com.

Buy "Man Trap" by Dana Holst here starting at $45+!

"Green Crocodile Hermes" by Biliana Velkova - FRESH PICK Edition 21

Shop 'Till You Drop!

And do so in style with "Green Crocodile Hermes" by Biliana Velkova whose work examines consumerism by exploring motifs of glamour, brand names and celebrity culture. Velkova searches for ways to fit these references into her everyday reality, incorporating photography, drawing, performance and social interventions into her art practice. As a teen, Velkova immigrated with her family from Bulgaria to Canada, basically transplanted from a Communist, childhood upbringing directly into Western, youth culture. Such profound culture shock provides an unique perception and fascination with consumerism, in both its shallow and far-ranging, socio-cultural effects.

Biliana Velkova has her BFA from Concordia and is a MFA candidate at the University of Saskatchewan, 2010. She is currently working on using performance and multi-media to blend the line between art, advertising and commodity to another level; producing a body of work that utilizes tools actually used in marketing campaigns, including video ads, poster campaigns, and “product launch” performances. Reminiscent of celebrity marketing campaigns that use a popular icon to create a brand name, this work challenges this phenomenon with the creation of “media-hype” around an unknown persona that is devoid of any famous trademark. This project questions how and when a common person becomes a brand, thus blurring the lines of art, commodity, and social identity. Biliana Velkova is represented in Vancouver by the Jeffrey Boone Gallery, www.jeffreyboonegallery.com.

OLIO FESTIVAL - "The Shoe Show" opening at Grace Gallery, Friday Aug. 14/09

VANTAGE ART PROJECTS supports Olio Festival and the arts events and showings around Vancouver. Check out the artists showing at each venue and "The Shoe Show" at Grace Gallery, 1898 Main Street. Opening party Friday, August 14th at 8pm.

[oh-lee-oh] -noun, plural olios.

1. a medley, as of musical or literary selections; miscellany.
2. a mixture of heterogeneous elements; hodgepodge.
3. a dish of many ingredients.

MISSION STATEMENT

Olio Festival is a not-for-profit Vancouver based cultural expose focused on bringing together taste-making music, comedy, design, art, and film to Vancouver, from across Canada, and around the world. As a reflection of the diversity of both the artists and the city, Olio festival moves through the neighborhoods of Vancouver creating exposure for businesses across the city.

http://www.oliofestival.com/

"Nail Gun" by Mark Mushet - FRESH PICKS V1E20

Nail Gun by Mark Mushet is from a series attempting to wrest some beauty from a typical worksite at one of the area’s many beige condo developments. Rather than focusing on the endless opportunities for “abject landscape” images the artist went for the macro view of the tops of a coiled string of partly oxidized, blued nail-tops. Intrigued by the idea of a casual spray of nails holding together countless square miles of beige stuccoed wall, Mushet likes to imagine the area’s future when only the nails are left on the concrete footing. This image is old-school film photography treated with cross-processing film developing techniques.

Born in North Vancouver in 1963, Mark Mushet has created images in many forms since 1985. He first trained in film and video, producing arts documentaries and shorts for television. In the late '80s he began work in still photography (self-taught) merging macro photography with contemporary music for a series of live slide-projection performances at galleries such as the Western Front and Helen Pitt.

By 1995, Mushet had established a career in editorial and design photography. He has contributed award-winning portraits of cultural, entertainment, business and sports figures to a variety of Canadian publications including Elm Street, The Globe & Mail, The Georgia Straight, Western Living, Vancouver, BC Business and Vancouver Review. He has also contributed to the British new music magazine WIRE and the US publication Fretboard Journal.

He was nominated for a Juno award for photography in the “Best Album Design: Photography” category in 2003 and has received 12 nominations and one win for “Best Photograph” at the Western Magazine Awards and nominations for “Best Portrait” at the National Magazine awards. He continues to produce images for contemporary-music packaging providing CD cover art for pianist/composers Wayne Horvitz and Robin Holcomb, composers Paul Dolden, Dennis Smalley, John Young, Bradshaw Pack, Sergio Barroso, Stephane Roy , Darren Copeland, David Berezan, Forrest Fang and many others.

He is currently co-publisher and Creative Director of Vancouver Review magazine www.vancouverreview.com and is curating its Centrefold visual arts section. His latest photography commission is a set of large format B&W portraits for the Museum of Vancouver’s Velo-City exhibit.

"Best of the Wurst" by Michael Swaney - FRESH PICKS V1 E19

With summer barbeque season in full swing, Michael Swaney's collage and gouache on paper artwork "Best of the Wurst" whets our appetite.

The artwork is a first for the artist in the way in which he created his reference material. Michael built a desk-top installation in his studio, photographed it and then used the photo as the reference material for the resulting collage. This process is a new movement in Michael's work, one where he is investigating the idea of documenting an ongoing performance through illustrating residual elements of the stage set or backdrop upon which a performance may have just taken place.

Michael Swaney was born in Kimberly, BC and has studied both fine arts and graphic design. He was a founding member of the Vancouver Art Collective "Human Five" (2001-2008) and now lives and works in Barcelona, Spain. He has recently published a book with Stickit called "The Performances". Other book projects include "Artifacts of Finland" with Le Dilly and an upcoming project with Picnic Editorial. He has an upcoming solo show in September in Barcelona with Iguapop Gallery.

Although now based in Europe, Michael has kept up his North American connections. Last year he attended the Fountainhead Residency in Miami during which he prepared and installation shown at Miami's Locust Projects during the December art fair mayhem. Additionally, Michael is working with Katharine Mulherin in Toronto and has upcoming projects with Trepanier Baer Gallery in Calgary.

Click here to buy "Best of the Wurst" starting at $45+ !

STONE SOUP - GRACE GALLERY - Photo Documentation on Flickr

Photographs from all three weeks of the Stone Soup Exhibition and the progress of the artworks are now available for your viewing pleasure Vantage Art Projects Flickr account.

Browse and enjoy!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/37046356@N06/collections/72157620785735514

"Sugar Rush" by Anna Wood - FRESH PICKS V1E18

"A-B-C, Easy as 1-2-3"

As June comes to a close, Anna Wood takes us back to our childhood games of hopscotch and alphabet with her untitled collage, nick-named by us "Sugar Rush".

This candy-coated artwork comes from a now venerable tradition. Collage, formally coined by Braque and Picasso in the last century, is as familiar in the playschool as it is in modern art. Images and text edited from other sources, glued together in an assemblage to create something new. Anna Wood draws from childhood memories of board games with her brother in this work. She has literally deconstructed the games of her youth to express her concerns of today. Anna is a Vancouver-based visual artist who has grown up around art and sculpture - her father is well-known BC-artist Alan Wood.

Anna's playful, colourful works on paper are musings of the artist's mind, a mix of nostalgia with a strong sense of moving forward albeit in a purposely discursive, adventitious, inquisitive way. The topographical map elements in this collage also hint at the adrenaline rush associated with a good old fashioned land-grab.

Buy "Sugar Rush" now and see if you get to slide on a Winegum, get stuck in a Toffee Pudding or go directly to a Sherbert Jet Fountain! (Dice not included. Not recommended for boring adults.)

Buy "Sugar Rush" starting at $45+!

June 26th Stone Soup Opening at Grace-Gallery Pix on Lindsay's Diet

Thank You Lindsay!

Look for yourself and be happy at: http://www.lindsaysdiet.com/photosnineteen/june2609/gallery.html

Rachel Zottenberg Director, Grace-Gallery and DJ Dani Vachon pictured at left.

LifeLids Gala Auction a Success for the BC Children's Hospital Foundation

Gallery attendees viewing the lots at the LifeLids Auction in support of the BC Children's Hospital Foundation, Saturday June 27/09 at Winsor Gallery, Vancouver BC. The first-time auction was a great success!

Our event photos are with the Vantage Art Projects Flickr Photo Collections: http://www.flickr.com/photos/37046356@N06/collections/72157620647833847/

For additional photos please see Urban Mixer on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/urbanmixer/3667159757/in/photostream/

A 10 artwork limited edition portfolio (11" x 14") is available at www.vantageartprojects.com/BCCH_catalog.html. Editions start at $68 + packaging, shipping & handling. Click here to view and purchase these artworks: BCCH Fundraising Art Portfolio Catalog.

All proceeds in benefit of the BC Children's Hospital Foundation. Framing specifications and further donation to the foundation sponsored by Larson-Juh, premier framing supplier.

Artwork at left by Mark Mizgala.

LifeLids Gala at Winsor Gallery - Friday June 26th, Vancouver BC

Join Vantage Art Projects and Chip's Not Dead Yet and our 10 fantastic local artists for the LifeLids Gala and Auction at Winsor Gallery in Vancouver BC this Saturday night.

Vantage has produced a limited-edition print portfolio as a fundraising program for the Foundation. Prints start at $68 + taxes, shipping & handling. Artists are: Jane Brookes, Gabreyl Harrison, Nora Borden, Graeme Bergelund, Sascha Yamashita, Mark Mizhgala, The Dark, Stephanie Kewistep, Joe Gigliano and Rebecca Chaperon. http://www.lifelidgala.com/

The print portfolio is available starting at $68+ for each print at www.vantageartprojects.com/BCCH_catalog.html

Stone Soup on Uncle Paulie's World - Art & Culture Blog

Uncle Paulie's World Covers "Stone Soup" Exhibition at Grace-Gallery in Vancouver

Uncle Paulie's World is "a blog about anything and everything related to art, my niece, life as a gay man in New York City, cool people and places".

Final Stone Soup Opening June 26th/09, Grace-Gallery Vancouver BC

Image on Uncle Paulie's World blog article by Stone Soup artist, Rebecca Donald.

http://unclepauliesworld.blogspot.com/2009/06/luxurious-liquid-diet-vantage-art.html

Stone Soup Opening - Week 3 - Christian Nicolay & Rebecca Donald

Featured Artists: Christian Nicolay and Rebecca Donald. See Photos from Week Three of Stone Soup in the Vantage Art Projects Flickr Collections:

"Mysterious Escapades" by Rebecca Chaperon - FRESH PICKS Volume 1 Edition 17

In "Mysterious Escapades" a girl hides in the shadow of a tree beside a moonlit lake. A fox treads nearby while across the lake a figure looks out of the second story window of a pristine white building. The feral fox and the imposing architecture seem to accompany the spirit of adventure and childish anarchy.

"Mysterious Escapades" is part of a series of paintings from Rebecca Chaperon’s 2009 called "Catholic School Girls Rule". These works attempt to evoke a sense of the collective consciousness. Some of the work in this series touches upon the group mentality gained by donning a uniform and assembling with others of one’s age and stature. Conversely, other paintings in this series, such as "Mysterious Escapades", emit moments of heightened, self-aware solitude and independent agency.

Drawing from the misadventures of various heroines of Victorian literature, Rebecca Chaperon’s paintings often portray a female protagonist within a surreal landscape. Her work aspires to entertain the mind with possible narratives, while suggesting a separate haunting emotive undercurrent.

Born in England in 1978, Rebecca settled in Toronto, Ontario at age 8. She attended Emily Carr University where she studied fine arts until graduation in 2002. She has exhibited her work across Canada and has been featured in several Canadian publications. She currently lives in Vancouver, British Columbia. For more information on the artist and original work, see www.thechaperon.ca.

Stone Soup Opening - Week 2- Weakhand & Christopher Donnelly

Featured artists: Weakhand and Christopher Donnelly. See Photos from Week Two of Stone Soup in the Vantage Art Projects Flickr Collections:

Stone Soup Exhibition Information on ECAUD Alumni News

Emily Carr Alums Lisa Birke (98), Christopher Donnelly (07) and Sascha Yamashita (00) , and Rebecca Donald (sessional faculty) are participating in this collaborative exhibition and particpating in Stone Soup, a progressive and collaborative art exhibition at Grace-Gallery, June 2009.

Link to the listing on the Alumni Page: http://www.ecuad.ca/node/3296

SUPPORT SYSTEM SCULPTURAL INSTALLATION - SASCHA YAMASHITA

Sascha Yamashita –FAILED DRAWINGS

Sascha appears courtesy of Gallery Atsui, where he is both a co-founder and a director.

His installation FAILED DRAWINGS (working title) suspends slightly over-scaled, crumpled drawings from an upper corner of the gallery wall. The crumpled forms seem to have been collected from either an oversized toddlers playroom floor, or from a writers typewriter-side wastepaper basket – evidence of the effort to try over and over again to get the opening lines just right. This illusion to writing, literature and therefore narrative plays off of the highly narrative content in Lisa's work. Furthermore, the crumpled paper forms suspended from the wall seem as if they have floated over on the billowing clouds from the mural, connecting the two works in both a conceptual and a formal manner. Ironically, given the illusion in this artwork to artistic failure, Sascha is known by his peers for (amongst other things) having very good drawing skills.

This work is in keeping with Sascha's minimal aesthetic and his work with repetition, everyday materials and the accumulation of simple materials. In this installation, the 2-dimensional discarded drawings have been given second life, repurposed and re-contextualized as a sculptural installation - the forms elevated from the floor or the wastepaper basket to floating ephemeral clouds of inspiration.

Sascha's work in it's current form will be on view until Monday, June 15th, 7:00 p.m. The next artist to work on the installation is Christopher Donnelly who will be working over top of and around Sascha's work.

For more information on Gallery Atsui go to: www.galleryatsui.com.

STONE SOUP WALL MURAL - LISA BIRKE

Lisa Birke – BLIND LEADING THE BLIND

Lisa appears courtesy of Bau-Xi Gallery, Vancouver.

Lisa works in painting, installation and performance. The content of her work involves narrative about current social issues, and previous series of work have included animal/technology hybrids and musings on Canadian national identity. Her mural for our Stone Soup installation references Pieter Bruegel's “The Parable of the Blind Leading the Blind” and shows a line of people (mostly men in business suits) being led towards a large, prone figure who functions as a cornucopia. The cornucopia man has a large open toothed-mouth andwith a large hand is shovelling a pile to stone vegetables into his mouth. The pile of vegetables are literally made from stones – Lisa spent several days painting onions, bunches of carrots, cucumbers and mushrooms on stones taken from a nearby garden.

In the line of the condemned, a credit card (actually a cut-up Mastercard) is tucked into the right hand of the man at the front of the line. Mr. Credit Risk is miming a gun with his hands and “shooting” the person in front of him. To add to the element of pending doom, the characters wear cooking pots on their heads obscuring their vision and are holding onto a rope to find this futile path forward. Onimously, a costume for the next member of the chain gang awaits to the left of the mural - a business costume (shirt, tie and pants with long, turned-out empty pockets).

A cityscape with billowing smog and clouds looms about cornucopia setting the urban stage for the entire scene. One small element of hope remains – a bright red zeppelin emerges from the coiling clouds as perhaps an escape vehicle, or carrying a super hero with the 10,000 foot perspective, a vision of some potential solution.

The work on this mural was completed in 5 days and a stop-motion video of her progress can be found online on the Stone Soup Facebook event page. The video will also be posted to the Vantage Art Projects Blog.

Lisa's work in current form will be on view until Monday, June 15th 7:00 p.m. The next artist to work on the mural is Weakhand who will be working over top of and around Lisa's work.

For more information about Lisa please see her personal website at www.lisabirke.com or Bau-Xi Gallery.

Stone Soup Interview on "Things of Desire"

Stone Soup Interview with Jennifer Mawby on "Thing of Desire" by Mike Landry.

http://thingsofdesire.ca/2009/06/11/stone-soup-vancouver/

When Jennifer Mawby turned on the television last winter she was horrified. She had been without cable since moving into her studio a couple years ago, and apparently life as she knew it was coming to an end thanks to an economic crisis of epic proportions.

Overwhelmed by the onslaught of doom in the media, Mawby quickly came up with three ideas under the banner of “recession proof thinking.” The first project, Stone Soup is based on the stone soup fable where travelers trick a town into pooling its food into a giant soup. Six artists will be working together to pool their talents into two shifting works of art.

“Rather than curating shows where you just go around collecting things from the inventory various artists have and coming up with some statement to how philosophically it fits together, I’m actually interested in something that’s a little more performative where the work is created within the gallery so it’s something new and special,” says Mawby. “It’s in keeping with this overwhelming concern about how the current economic crisis is being sold to us almost as a form of theatre through the media.”

Mawby guest curated the show with the Rachel Zottenberg, director of Grace-Gallery, and co-produced it with her Vantage Art Projects partner Sherri Kajiwara. Running for the eight months now Vantage functions like a film production house, to create opportunities for artists and bring together the people who make art with the people who love art.

Drawing on her background in project management and theatre/dance, Mawby is drawn to collaboration and community. She put forward the Stone Soup as a sort of challenge. A chicken and the egg proposal, Mawby first had to find a gallery to host the on-site project before she had artists.

“It was really interesting when we launched vantage we were treated by some people as being really radical…[We're] pushing the business model of the traditional art world, because I find some things incredibly antiquated and backwards.”

Her build-it-and-they-will-come pitch worked, and the right artists came to the table. Three artists—Lisa Birke, Weakhand, Christian Nicolay—will create a mural in the gallery, while the others— Sascha Yamashita, Christopher Donnelly, Rebecca Donald—will work on a sculpture. It turned out the muralists were all friends, and the three sculptors were partial to using everyday, domestic materials—the kind being affected by the economy.

Mawby feels by having the work re-worked and eventually torn down she sets up an interesting challenge for the artists—one that speaks to the solutions to our economic woes. She hopes to show the sum is more important than the whole, the impermanence of things and the notion that this too will pass.

“Just as this work will come into being, exist in a certain format and then pass on to be re-worked, we will get through this current economic crisis and we will have affluent years once again. These very, very rich layers became apparent as I put the concept together.”

And while Mawby compares most exhibitions to a sort of Wizard of Oz theatre, she’s excited to have the art-making process revealed.

“In some ways maybe revealing the process is about revealing the vulnerability—the human aspect, the everyday. If you reveal the process of art-making, it isn’t a mystery. It’s something that happens everyday.”

Stone Soup will be on display from Fri June 12 - Mon June 29 at Grace Gallery in Vancouver. There will be three opening reception on consecutive Fridays during the show’s run: Sascha Yamashita & Lisa Birke June 12 with viewing June 13 - 15; Christopher Donnelly & Weakhand June 19 with viewing June 20 - 22; Rebecca Donald & Christian Nicolay June 26 with viewing June 27 - 29. Keep an eye for future Stone Soup exhibitions near you.

Stone Soup at Grace-Gallery, First Week Evite for June 12th, 2009

Featured Artists: Lisa Birke and Sascha Yamashita. See Photos from Week One of Stone Soup in the Vantage Art Projects Flickr Collections:

Stone Soup - New York Times Online, The Human Side of the Recession

Exhibition premise for Stone Soup as one of the Survival Strategies for "Living with Less" in the current economic recession:

http://projects.nytimes.com/survival-strategies/curating-an-art-exhibition-where

Stone Soup Exhibition at Grace-Gallery - First Opening Friday, June 12/09

Grace-Gallery is the blank canvas for the upcoming Stone Soup Exhibition. (Grace-Gallery @ 2nd and Main, Vancouver, BC). Two Progressive, Site Specific Artworks will be made in the Gallery over the course of the exhibition and reworked each week by a new set of artists.

Lisa Birke (mural) and Sascha Yamashita (installation) - Friday, June 12th (8pm til late)

Weakhand (mural) and Christopher Donnelly (installation) - Friday, June 19th (8pm til late)

Christian Nicolay (mural) and Rebecca Donald (installation) - Friday, June 26th (8pm til late)

Curated by Jennifer Mawby with Grace-Gallery Rachel Zottenberg and co-produced with Sherri Kajiwara.

The folk legend of the STONE SOUP has direct application for our current economic times. In the story, famine has hit a small village. Each villager believes that there is no food to eat in their own cupboards. Then, a savvy stranger rolls into town with a story that he will make a meal for them all from just a magic stone that he carries with him. By encouraging the villagers to each bring a little something to add to the stone soup (such as a carrot or a potato) the stranger is able to create a nurturing meal for all to share.

News media is announcing to viewers on a daily basis about how tough the current economic climate is for us. Stock values have plummeted, and companies are in a no-growth and down-sizing period. People are losing their jobs and it appears to be famine season. To combat the belief that times are too tough, the stone soup fable can be applied to create recession-proof thinking in both art-making and the general public zeitgeist.

The STONE SOUP exhibition is a model for socially interactive, sustainable, and fiscally responsible art production using a group of artists to collaboratively and incrementally create an exhibition that nourishes all. The transient nature of the artwork as it evolves also reminds us that nothing truly is permanent, and that “this too will pass”.

Click for Full Curatorial Proposal

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"Reconfigured Grid Painting No. 1" by Jeff Depner - FRESH PICKS V1E16

This month we have been happily driven back to abstraction with "Reconstructed Grid Painting No. 1" by Jeff Depner. This artwork is part of an ongoing discourse exploring compositional structure through the relationships between colours.

Concepts of math, science and colour relationship in art have been quite literally defined in the cubist works of Picasso or Braque, and etherically in the neoplasticism of Piet Mondrian and more currently in the mind-bending op art works of Bridget Riley. In an attempt to create something unique, artists cannot help but be influenced by previous art forms and the conversation of contemporary art cannot help but draw on past discussions. Historians like John Gage and Martin Kemp have added thorough text to the visual discussion, yet it never ceases to delight the eye when contemporary artists delve into the chat. Depner’s work suggests a digital cubism although entirely hand done with the energy of his brushwork evident in his original paintings. His obsession with the grid and colour balance or imbalance to flesh out meaning resonates with time and place. And while the grid is not new in art, Depner’s reconstructions pay homage to the ongoing discourse.

Using the grid as a framework, Depner's 'reconfigurations' use color, form and surface to address the visual, physical and psychological. The color harmonies are intuitive and are used in conjunction with pattern, rhythm and variation to invoke a sensory experience which hovers somewhere between language and the senses. Each color and form is linked inextricably to the next forming clusters of color chords. These chromatic relationships are used rhythmically to allow colors to travel across the picture plane vertically, horizontally and diagonally. As a whole, these units combine to create a sort of 'abstract sign,' operating separately from speech and writing patterns with the intention of seizing the viewer on an unconscious or automatic level.

Jeff Depner graduated from the Illustration and Design program at Capilano College in 1998 and is currently represented by the Jeffrey Boone Gallery in Vancouver BC Canada. For information on original paintings, please see www.jeffreyboonegallery.com.

Click here to buy "Reconfigured Grid Painting No. 1" from $45 + !

"Painting" by Margaux Williamson - FRESH PICKS V1E15

This artwork is part of a series of studies that Margaux made in oil paint on small prepared birch panels. The paintings in the series were all conceived at a cottage in Pigeon Lake, Ontario, in the fall of 2008. She was there with her friend, the writer Sheila Heti, whom she has worked along side of and collaborated with on various projects since 2006. During this trip, they were working separately but talking a great deal about paintings and books. The paintings in this series all reflect that specific time and were used as open and intuitive explorations to help Williamson think about a future project.

Margaux Williamson was born in Pittsburgh and has lived in Toronto since 2000. She has been recognized as one of Canada’s leading young painters by curators and critics including The Toronto Star which called her “one of the best painters of her generation.” Most recently, she exhibited a group of studies at LES Gallery in Vancouver. Her last solo show, Trophy Ghost, was exhibited at Fette’s Gallery in Los Angeles in 2008, and in 2007 she premiered The Girls show Dostoyevsky the new darkness at the Marvelli Gallery in New York. In 2008, she was highlighted in Canadian Art Magazine as a young artist to watch. In Fall 2008, her experimental art project and movie, Teenager Hamlet, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in their art section, Future Projections. The National Post helpfully wrote of the project, “Since the words ‘experimental feature’ can strike fear into most art viewers’ hearts, the watchability of this was indeed a pleasant surprise.” In early 2009, a video she compiled from videos of teenagers dancing in their basements, which she subsequently posted on YouTube, was called by the New York Times Magazine, “One of the best things to have seen on a screen in 2008.” She has worked with many other artists, including, most recently with the writer, Sheila Heti, on a story they worked on together for a McSweeny’s publication about a fictional town of Waterloo, based in reality, set in the future.

For more information on Margaux go to www.margauxwilliamson.com or www.lesgallery.ca.

Click here to buy "Painting" by Margaux Williamson starting at $45+!

"Bitter Ends" by Katie Bond Pretti - FRESH PICKS V1E14

“Loves me, loves me not, loves me, love me not, loves me, loves me not, loves me...”

Katie Bond Pretti illuminates intimacy in "Bitter Ends", a gently gestural abstract painting featured as Fresh Picks Vol.1 Edition 14.

Pretti says, "I'm not one to plan things out, exactly - I don't even keep a sketchbook. There is for me, however, a difference between making those broad strokes on a large canvas and holding a delicate sheet of paper on your lap to work on. Both of these have their value in my practice. Bitter Ends is a series in the smaller, intimate vein. In terms of treatment of negative versus positive space and colour harmony, it has influenced several larger pieces on paper as well as a canvas series which I plan to include in an upcoming show. This one piece is my favorite. I hope you like it.”

Freely scribbled calligraphic mark-making on solid fields of mostly neutral colours blur the line between drawing and painting combining “bare astringency and sensual indulgence”. This could easily describe Pretti’s work but rather, is an explanation of the work of American Abstract artist Cy Twombly both on Wikpedia and in a Retrospective tome by Kirk Varnedoe. There is also an uncanny synchronicity with Twombly’s favourite French poet, Mallarmé who directly inspired musical creations by Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel. Toronto based musician Jeremy Strachan, a key figure in indie rock and improvised music in Canada, created a woodwind solo in response to Pretti’s installation, The Heart of the Matter in 2007.

Katie Bond Pretti is a 2004 honours graduate of OCAD. Her work has been featured in Elle Canada, Fashion Magazine and Canadian House and Home. Her book - Sonority of Words - is in the collection of The National Gallery of Canada and she is in the 2008 Carte Blanche Vol. 2: Painting, The Magenta Foundation. She is represented by the LE Gallery in Toronto. For information on original works please see www.le-gallery.ca, www.femmart.com and www.katiebondpretti.com.

Vantage Private Collections - The Byron Aceman Collection

Vantage Art Projects is proud to announce the launch of the private luxury publication chronicling the private art collection of Mr. Aceman.

We recognize that a private collection is both a passion and a labour of love for the collector. We further believe that a collection of artwork is also a collection of stories; the stories about the individual artworks, the stories about the artists and the story about the collector. For this reason, author Lee Henderson was commissioned to write an interpretive essay about Mr. Aceman and his collection. Mr. Henderson's first novel, The Man Game, was recently launched with Penguin Books.

"Private Collections" is an exclusive suite of services for private, corporate and institutional art collector/collections. These services include: collection archiving, documentation, valuation for insurance purposes, restoration and cataloging. Additionally, Vantage Art Projects can also provide selection and implementation of collection management software, collection installation and storage solutions.

As the nature of each collection varies, so does the price for each project. Please contact Sherri for further details at sherri@vantageartprojects.com.

More information on Lee Henderson

More information on Vantage Art Projects PRIVATE COLLECTIONS service.

"Have Your Cake And Eat It Too" by Leah Rosenberg - FRESH PICKS V1E13

Have your cake and eat it too, says San Francisco-based artist Leah Rosenberg. Not prone to wordy explanations, she often bakes cake in lieu of writing an artist statement. Leah's work is part performance, part painting and part sculpture. Occasionally she enlists groups of people to make the elements of her art through "punching" parties.

"A cake to me is a work of art with the intention of generosity. It is beautiful, it is structural, it is an evocative work of color and balance. And then people eat it. They consume it. They find it too sweet or too sticky or too vanilla-y. And then they move on. This is the generosity of art. Create with intention and then, set it free."

Short, sweet and succinct. This month's FRESH PICK wants to you have it all...

Leah Rosenberg is a Canadian artist living and working in the US. She completed her Master of Fine Arts degree in 2008 at the California College of Art in San Francisco. For more information about Leah's artistic confectionery: www.leahrosenberg.org

CLICK HERE TO BUY "HAVE YOUR CAKE AND EAT IT TOO" STARTING AT $45+

"Tapatisserie" by Ruth Jones - FRESH PICKS V1E12

This months Fresh Pick is a blend of old and new, by master weaver and contemporary artist Ruth Jones. A strikingly contemporary portrait of a young girl holding a cake - the cake melding into the girl and the girl melding into the cake - rendered in the centuries old technique of discontinuous weave tapestry. A show-stopping piece at the recent exhibition at Gallery Atusi, Tapatisserie was completed especially for the "Let Them Eat Cake" exhibition.

Inspired by a pivotal scene in the 2006 Academy Award winning film Marie Antoinette by Sofia Coppola and contemplating the traditional historical creative outlets for women of so-called domestic arts, Let Them Eat Cake featured the work of three artists, in diverse mediums, who were asked to turn the entire concept on its ear. The modern world is driven by desire for sex, money and food, not necessarily in that order. Cake is a delicious metaphor for life. In response, Tap(àt)isserie by Ruth Jones was described by Jennifer Moss of the Vancouver Sun in a Feb. 2009 review as exquisitely crafted and slightly disturbing woven tapestry.....It features a woman holding out a melting pastry. The woman, with her hair piled on top of her head like some kind of elaborate St. Honoré cake, somehow channels Marie Antoinette, whose glib remark in the face of starving French peasants is the basis for the title of this show.

Tapestry has a special place in the annals of art history - it was the most important figurative form of European art in 16th Century Europe. The Metropolitan Museum in New York has an entire department devoted to tapestry arts. The "weaving enthusiasts" who know thing or two about tapestry were blow away by Ruth's virtuosity on the loom. This type of weaving is completed entirely side-ways from the back-side and the artist does not see the right-side until the piece is completed. (Not to mention that small to mid-sized original tapestries by Ruth are typically valued at the price of a small car). Those of us who just love good contemporary art were amazed at the psychological tension in the image and the layers of interpretation related to food, sugar, consumption and female adornment.

In her artist statement Ruth explained the following about "Tapatisserie": “In France where I learned to weave, the French for Tapestry and for Pastry is very close; so close that in fact you can turn one word into the other with one letter swap. I also notice that both art forms require care and are in the making and share a role as custom creations given to commemorate an event, arrival or passage. I played with spelling the two names out as one word, and liked it very much, because, in the saying of it, the meaning becomes “Your Pastry” which suits the gesture of offering that I intend.”

Ruth is a member of the American Tapestry Alliance, the Canadian Tapestry Network and of S.T.A.R.S., a British Columbia-based tapestry initiatives organization. Following degrees in Classical Studies from the University of British Columbia and in Fine Arts from the San Francisco Art Institute, she completed the graduate program in Tapestry Design and Production from the National School for Decorative Arts in Aubusson, France. Her work and her commissions are included in the collections of IBM Corporate Headquarters, New York, Canada Governor General Official Residence, Ottawa; Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver; Nesbitt-Burns BMO, Vancouver; Intrawest Squaw Valley; and Canada Morgage & Housing Corporation, Vancouver.

For more information on Ruth Jones: http://www.ruthjones.ca/

Click here to buy TAPATISSERIE starting from $45.00+

OPEN SUBMISSIONS FOR ONLINE CURATORIAL PROJECT

THE ARTERNATIVE CAREER BOARD is a Vocation Relocation Service part of the curatorial art project, Recession-proof Thinking. Let's use the current economic "crisis" as a way to create new and better opportunities for ourselves. The board is open for submissions to all who wish to throw a penny in the well. Curated by Jennifer Mawby and Luisa Santos. http://arternativeeconomycareerboard.blogspot.com/

Email the following information to mailto:recessionproofthinking@gmail.com with the headling "Vocation Relocation Services". The board will be open for 12 months. Be real, use your imagination, think big (and let's avoid the lewd and crude.)

Your Name (real or otherwise):
Job Title:
Responsibilities (>100 words):
Hours:Location:Benefits:
Salary per Annum:Perks:
Unique Skills & Talents:
Interested Parties Can Contact You At:
Photo (optional, you or otherwise):

THANK YOU FOR ALL THE FANTASTIC ARTWORK!

The artwork submitted to our Paul Butler book project is better than we could ever have expected!

Thank you artists! We 'Art' You!

...stay tuned for the annoucement of artists selected for publication...

LAST CALL FOR PAUL!

Hey Arties, submit to Paul Butler today! You know you wanna...
http://www.vantageartprojects.com

THE ARTIST CALL IS NOW CLOSED. For further information please email Jennifer at info@vantageartprojects.com.

Thanks!

Last Call - SUBMIT TO PAUL BUTLER!

THE ARTIST CALL IS NOW CLOSED.

OPEN CALL FOR ARTIST SUBMISSION CLOSES TOMORROW - midnight, Saturday March 21/09.

Get your masterpieces in now! Submit online at http://www.vantageartprojects.com/ and follow the instructions. Please note a $40 submission processing fee is required to enable our ability to develop this exhibition-in-print project.

SUBMIT TO PAUL BUTLER TODAY!

P.S. Congrats to our boy Paul, who was just long-list nominated for
the Sobey Art Award!

"Before/After" by Sascha Yamashita - FRESH PICKS V1E11

"Double, double toil and trouble,

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble".

Providing Shakespeare's witches with fuel for the fire must have been demanding work, and the wood-stoked pot over which they said their ritual incantation holds water for our new FRESH PICKS EDITION.

"Before/After" by Sascha Yamashita reminds us that an artist's work is thankfully never done. This stunning photograph from his "Before/After" Wood Pile installation references the following ancient Zen Buddhist proverb: “Before enlightenment - chop wood carry water. After enlightenment - chop wood, carry water.”

Through considering daily tasks and rituals in an artful manner, Sascha reminds us of the work ethic and repetitive hands-on-labour traditionally a very noble part of an artist's working life. This ritualizing of artmaking has a long tradition, including such conceptual trail blazers as Bruce Nauman and Mierle Laderman Ukeles. Nauman said of this own understanding of art work and repetition that if “I was an artist and I was in the studio, then whatever I was doing must be art” - suggesting his belief in the power of art to ritualize labour and mark it as important. In her 1970's "Maintenance Art Performances", Ukeles also turned repetitive “house work” into “art work” through performing domestic labour in a fine art context such as on the steps of a museum.

Wood Pile specifically considers repetitious and ritualized art practices through the allegory embedded in the work to question the “interwoven relationships of viewer/art object and process/result”. Finally, with "Wood Pile", there is the further suggestion that art practice approached in this fashion can lead to enlightenment, and that after enlightenment, there is still much more artwork to be made.

Sasha is a young conceptual artist who’s work draws from literature, art history, religion, philosophy, pop, Japanese and Canadian culture. Canadian-born to one Japanese and one Canadian parent, the conflation of culture plays a natural role in Sascha’s work. A year 2000 visual arts graduate of Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Sascha has shown his work in galleries across British Columbia and Washington State including: the Museum of Northern BC, Helen Pitt Gallery, Kamloops Art Gallery, Viking Union Gallery and the Back Gallery Project. In 2008 Sasha co-founded Vancouver’s Gallery Atsui and is currently an acting director. For more information go to: http://www.galleryatsui.com/.

BUY "WOOD PILE" NOW STARTING AT $45+

"Clutch" by Keer Tanchak - FRESH PICKS V1E10

At first glance, Fragonard seems an unusual inspiration for a contemporary artist, but Keer Tanchak derives the imagery for her paintings, which are exquisitely executed on thin sheets of aluminum, from 18th century Rococo sources; namely the French painters, Watteau, Fragonard, Boucher and Lancret.

Keer Tanchak notes, “Watteau used most of his figures as 'stock footage'~ a limited cast of characters appears continuously in his body of work, their slightly shifted poses and contexts made to seem endlessly unique. I continue to explore these pre-cinematic techniques and introduce a similar cast of characters into dramatically altered environments. Ultimately I have found a surrogate for my own life experiences. The 18th century fascination for decadence and romance, and the political implications of these obsessions, remains a relevant, ongoing cultural

narrative.

The smooth surface, neutral grey color and industrial aspect of the aluminum are very appealing to me; and my process of applying oil paint to such a surface has been predetermined by these qualities. Reflection, absorption and luminosity are all elements I use to enhance specific imagery.”

For Fresh Picks, Keer Tanchak has given us exclusive use of a painting titled “Clutch”. The figures are from Fragonard, overlayed with a colour stripe from a coveted Miu Miu clutch design. The pun of ‘clutch’ refers not only to the design of a designer handbag which the artist was particularly drawn to, but also to the original Fragonard image where the male figure is clutching the female figure.

Born in North Vancouver, BC, Keer Tanchak completed her undergraduate studies at Concordia in Montreal, QC and her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She currently lives and works in Chicago, IL.

Keer Tanchak’s work is widely exhibited and collected throughout North America. Works can be viewed this month in an exhibition called “Pleasure Paintings” at the Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, IL and at the Dean Project in New York in RoCoCoPoP which “explores ideas of lavishness, excess, desire and frivolity that characterized the Rococo movement in the 18th Century by examining how contemporary culture has adopted these qualities by means of consumerism, mass reproduction and celebrity-mass media.”

The artist is featured in Jean Pierre Cuzin and Dimitri Salmon's 2007 book on the sources and posterity of Fragonard in 'Fragonard, regards croisés' published by Edition Mengès.

"Clutch" by Keer Tanchank is available only from the Vantage Art Projects as a Fresh Picks limited edition.

More information on Keer Tanchak is available at www.keertanchak.com and original work may be found at Sandra Goldie Gallery, http://www.galeriegoldie.com/, Elissa Cristall Gallery, http://www.cristallgallery.com/ and Dean Project, http://www.cristallgallery.com/

Fresh Picks is Vantage Art Projects' series of affordable limited edition fine art prints. The series allows art lovers to own work that is current and representative of the contemporary artscape. It is an unprecedented way for artists to share their work with collectors and art lovers across the world. Released twice a month, the artist and work is first announced to our mailing list and is sold exclusively through the Vantage Art Projects website.

CLICK TO BUY "CLUTCH" NOW STARTING AT $45+!

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Liza Lee of "Artist Run" with suggestions for our Paul Butler-curated open call for submissions.

Liza Lee of "Artist Run" blog has some tips and suggestions for our current open call for submissions with artist/curator Paul Butler.

Check out her suggestions here: http://artistrun.org/blog/2009/01/28/call-for-submissions-to-artist-from-vantage-art-projects-vancouver/

Thanks Liza!

We look forward to seeing your masterpieces in our in-box very, very soon.

Submission deadline is March 21/09.

Click here to SUBMIT TO PAUL BUTLER!

"Height of Land" by David Pirrie - FRESH PICKS V1E9

"Climb every mountain, ford every stream. Follow every rainbow, 'til you find your dream."

David Pirrie has us deep in wanderlust this month with "Height of Land", his topography and outward-bound inspired drawing done just for Vantage Art projects.

David describes the artwork as "a bit of an experiment for me. I wanted to get in between the contours of our land. I’ve taken a section of the Waddington Range in BC and drawn it on mylar. Randomly selecting a contour line, I followed it with paint brush in hand. Having been in the area, I could actually visualize where my brush was taking me, leading me to some rather interesting ideas on mapping and the many metaphors one can associate with it."

A a result, this artwork encourages us layer by layer to strip away the contours, mapping out a wayward journey that ultimately leads to repose.

David Pirrie lives and works in Vancouver, BC and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Concordia University in 1991. Since 2001 he has exhibited in Turin Italy, New York, Seattle, Bologna Italy, Toronto, and in British Columbia at the Surrey Art Gallery, Simon Fraser University Gallery, the Kelowna Art Gallery and State Gallery. His most recent solo exhibition was Codified Topographies at the Douglas Udell Gallery in Vancouver.

One of the constant variables in David’s work over the years has been a close analysis and detailed study of his subject, be it mountain topography, the human body, or car crashes. David has also been an avid mountaineer for 20 years, and has climbed many of the mountains in his paintings. His new works continue an almost scientific inquiry of mountain topography in Western Canada. Like a form of cataloguing, the paintings and drawings are a type of meditation on nature, geography, technology, and mapping. Quoting from David, “codification plays to the core of seeking knowledge, ascribing meaning, value and ranking. These ideas also play to the core of my being an artist, however, where I depart from the science of objectivity is trying to relay the emotional and physical situations where our need for accurate definition is way beyond our grasp”.

To see more of David's work and to purchase additional art, go to:
David Pirrie Website
Douglas Udell Gallery
Headbones Gallery

CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE "HEIGHT OF LAND" BY DAVID PIRRIE STARTING AT $45.00