Canadian Contemporary Art Blogs

With the increasing popularity of blogs and Twitter as ways to reach audiences, there are more ways now to get your Canadian contemporary art fix. I list these blogs in my Blogroll on the right hand side of this page but thought I'd give them a special mention in a blog post for those who are looking for online publications on Canadian contemporary art. This is by no means an exhaustive list, rather I'm sharing with you the few I read regularly.

Things of Desire
Things of Desire is a blog that updates every Thursday with news on gallery exhibitions from across Canada. What I like about this blog is that it is not Toronto-centric so you can discover lesser-known artists from around the country. I also love that the editor, Mike Landry, describes himself as "a schmuck with little to no knowledge in art history, and way too much knowledge in journalism".

View on Canadian Art
VoCA is one of the longer running contemporary art blogs in Canada and bills itself as "Your Cultural Concierge". What I like about VoCA is that in addition to reviewing gallery shows, it features regular articles on current topics such as arts funding, art criticism, the role of commercial art galleries, etc...and the posts are thought provoking, good fuel for debate. Writer Andrea Carson is also on Twitter under the handle @carzoo

UnEdit My Heart
Writer Leah Sandals is a well published art critic in Canada, writing for most major publications including the National Post, Globe and Mail, Canadian Art magazine, NOW magazine and more. What I love about Leah is her ability to offer art criticism without the snob factor. Whether you are a newbie or an experienced collector, you can read her articles as though they were written with you in mind. Her writing style is conversational yet intelligent, making it a great read. Leah Sandals is also on Twitter under the handle @leahsandals

Those are my picks for favourite Canadian Art blogs - what are yours?

Youthful Old Masters

A friend of mine remarked today that when she turned 25, she noticed she couldn't party so hard any more. I'm at an age where friends are having babies and buying houses and complaining about losing their youth. There are moments where I fall into the same trap, but more often than not, I find myself a little puzzled by this notion of youth.

I was lucky to grow up in a household where childlike curiosity and appetite for adventure was encouraged. My elderly father does more in a month than many people do in a year or two of their life - traveling to Japan for an ice festival, viewing the Masters tennis tournament in Shanghai, attending the Toronto International Film Festival.

So I smiled today when I read an article in one of my favourite art blogs, written by Jonathan Jones of The Guardian. He writes about the current exhibition of works by Cy Twombly at the Gagosian Gallery in London. I was introduced to Cy Twombly only 10 years back, by my then-painting instructor, Brigid Watson, who has since become one of tinku gallery's artists. Twombly was and still is, one of her favourite artists and has since become one of mine.

There is something so energetic and youthful about his work, despite him being old enough to be my grandfather! His drips, smudges and markings exhibit a free spirit that seems impossible in someone who has lived a long life full of its inevitable challenges and scars and constraints. Jones writes "No young artist uses paint more subversively than Twombly. No one is further from the staid definitions of 'proper art' that conservative critics cling to. But if Twombly is wild he is also supremely adept"

I have always had friends of all ages - even now, some of most subversive and interesting friends are in their 50s & 60s, while people in my peer group are living a rather ordinary existence. I love people who push the envelope of what is considered to be proper for a particular age. I hope that when I am 80, I am living as passionate, adventurous and brave a life as I am today. Here's to us all being Youthful Old Masters!

Image: The Rose (IV), Cy Twombly. Photograph: Mike Bruce/PR

National Post review: tinku gallery

Toronto art writer Leah Sandals has a great reputation for visiting new galleries in the city as part of her arts coverage for Canada's leading publications.  She recently visited tinku gallery and reviewed the current Colour Studies group show for the National Post, one of Canada's national newspapers.  She writes:

At the other end of the space spectrum is Tinku Gallery, a tidy and tiny gallery housed in a newish condo development just off Dundas West. Titled after owner Amrita Chandra's childhood nickname, Tinku opened last year showing often-overlooked local artists in solo shows. Now the group show Colour Studies combines them. Torontonian Nasco Pelev's small abstract oil studies are the standout, packing tons of evocative colour and brushwork into a few square inches. Boston resident John Guthrie's vibrant acrylics are so evenly rendered, in contrast, that they seem at first like digital prints. But the stripy, controlled works -- two of the four paintings here -- are actually created using a drip process that Guthrie has evidently mastered to a T. Another Toronto artist, Orlin Mantchev, rounds out the show with more restrained-palette gouaches, which are fun for being both scratchy-line raw and delicate-colour fragile at the same time.

It's great that this neighbourhood is getting more recognition as an arts destination in the city and it's flattering to be in the same article as one of the country's best known commercial art galleries.  You can read the full article here or pick up today's paper which includes an image of Guthrie's work.  For more on Leah Sandals, visit her art blog Unedit My Heart.

Sko! at Brayham Contemporary Art

Svava Thordis Juliusson, Svona,svona 2008

Are you looking for an art outing in Toronto this weekend?  There's an exhibition opening at Brayham Contemporary Art featuring new work by Icelandic born, Toronto based artist Svava Thordis Juliusson. I first visited the gallery soon after it opened about 18 months ago and I have since come to know the owner, Angela Brayham. Her gallery is a hidden gem in the Leslieville area of town. 

Angela Brayham writes: Juliusson's work is deeply personal and reflective, but at the same time responds to current events and the daily activities of life around her. While Juliusson uses non-traditional materials, her work is strongly rooted in traditional sculptural techniques. Both her sculptural works and the drawings they inspire have a sense of beauty, fragility and elegance that are juxtaposed against the industrial and construction materials from which they are created.

Svava Thordis Juliusson was born in Iceland and moved to Canada as a child. I visited Iceland a few years ago.  I flew into Reykjavik for a just a couple of nights over the Christmas holidays, en route to our family celebration in Switzerland.  Driving from the airport into the city, the landscape reminded me of some rural communities in Nfld.  There is something about island life that is very particular, especially islands like Newfoundland and Iceland that are relatively isolated.  I am curious to hear whether Juliusson's work was shaped at all by her childhood experiences or whether it has had little influence on her as an artist.

For more information on the show, contact:
Brayham Contemporary Art
1318 Queen St East Toronto, ON M4L 1C5
647.435.7367
info@brayhamcontemporaryart.com
www.brayhamcontemporaryart.com
Gallery Hours: Friday 2 - 7, Saturday and Sunday 12 - 4 or by appointment

Image courtesy of Brayham Contemporary Art

You Want a Piece of Me?

The artists that I represent approach their paintings or photographs from different perspectives.  Some use their art to explore an intellectual concept, while others are more expressive of their emotions.  For the ones that expose this very personal and emotional side of themselves, I have a lot of empathy.  Imagine pouring your heart onto a canvas, only to have someone dismiss it or reject it.  On the other hand, to not make their art that way would be to not be themselves, like bottling up their very essence.  I've seen it happen and the results show in the work - it ends up being bland and superficial.

The closest thing I can relate to the experience of these artists is in the small degree of exposure I receive through this blog and the gallery itself.  Before opening the gallery, I thought carefully about how I wanted to represent myself.  Businesses tend to reach out to their customers in a very neutral manner, speaking of themselves as a faceless entity.  But it always struck me that businesses are made up of people, and our clients are people too.  Why should I be any different as a gallery, than I am as a person?

I've often thought that if we as consumers were more mindful of what it is we are buying, and from whom, there would be less waste and more consideration of the greater impact this purchase has. How? I think of the example of buying my fruits and vegetables.  How often do we load up our shopping cart with food, only to have it rot in the fridge to be tossed away?  If you were buying from a local farmer and knew how he toiled to bring that apple to you, would it make you feel different?  

I am as guilty of doing this as any of you reading this post are.  In fact a recent move made me see how much junk I had cluttering up my life, and I could only conclude that much of it was because of my mindless purchases.  Since then I've been much more careful of what it is that I'm buying, how it was made, who I am buying it from and why I need to buy it.  I go back to the same mechanic, cafe, clothing designer, because we've formed a relationship of trust, good service and personal connection.

Which brings me back to my gallery.  MY gallery.  The little corner of the world that represents people I believe in, in a manner true to me.  And being true to myself means being personal, as though someone has walked into an extension of my home.  The gallery is more than the art I carry.  It's a piece of the bigger picture that is my life story.  The only "shareholder" I have to answer to is myself.  Which means I can take risks to do things that may turn people away, and reap rewards that have resulted from my approach to my business.

In the past I got advice from a few to not reveal so much about myself, make the gallery and this blog just about the art.  Sometimes the advice was critical, and I admit it occasionally made me flinch.  But a funny thing happened.  I noticed that the less I spoke about tinku gallery intertwined with personal stories, the less people came to read the blog and the fewer people came to the gallery.  When I went back to putting a human face to what I'm doing, revealing the person behind tinku, the more emails I receive, the more people read this blog and the more people come to visit and to purchase art. 

I really appreciate those of you who leave comments, send emails, drop in for visits, to share your own stories and suggestions, and hope you will be a little patient in waiting for me to respond, as there are many more of you now than there were a few months ago!  Thank you for being here, for wanting a little piece of me...I am happy to share myself with you and look forward to including the new members of the tinku gallery family in this blog and at the gallery.

A Changing Art World

Every city has its own arts establishment, Toronto being no exception. Here, there is the OCAD mafia, or the old Yorkville guard, all of whom contribute to our rich arts scene and many who have paved the path for new galleries like mine to open. And while I tip my hat to those that have come before me, I find it refreshing to hear that the old guard is changing and that newer approaches to exhibiting fine art are becoming more mainstream.

I thought of this when I read this recent New York Times' article on Nicola Vassell, the new Gallery Director of Dietch Gallery. Slowly, little cracks are being formed in what's considered to be de rigeur for galleries.

Even established artists are considering alternative spaces to house their exhibitions, places that they may have turned their nose up to before. Not everyone will be happy about this, but I for one think evolution is good and necessary and why should the art scene be immune to that?

Relating this back to tinku gallery, I thought I'd experiment with the Colour Studies show by hosting a tea party instead of a traditional opening. I only kept 10 spots aside, so it would be easier for people to have conversations, and I had 10 people book in less than 3 hours of posting about it!

What do you think about all this? Do you like going to traditional gallery openings? What would like to see change in the gallery scene? I'm all ears!

New show: Colour Studies

Winter in Canada.  Grey, freezing, slushy, depressing at times.  So it's not a coincidence that I decided to liven things up at the gallery with a group show this month titled Colour Studies.

This show came together quite organically, as I viewed some of Nasco Pelev's miniature oil paintings in his studio and thought they would make for a good series to exhibit.  Combined with John Guthrie's striking drip paintings that I had in our drawers and some new works by Orlin Mantchev, this show has come together unexpectedly yet beautifully.  Like the colour studies themselves, you could say.

Many famous artists like Rothko & Kandinsky were known for their colour studies, and what I like about the pieces in our current show is that they can be viewed both superficially, by responding immediately to the emotions the colours evoke, or contemplatively, looking deeper into the brushstrokes, layers and pattern each artist has used.  Guthrie, Pelev & Mantchev each use different mediums (acrylic, oil, & tempera, respectively) with very different end results reflecting their own approach.  You can love them because they match your couch or you can love them because of what they express and reference.

If you are a new collector looking to start buying art, this show is a great starting point not only because it is accessible visually, but the works are at recession-friendly price points.  We will be hosting a tea party on Monday, Feb 16th (Family Day holiday in Ontario), for people to come and view the show in an informal, intimate environment.  No questions are too silly, and you will meet other art lovers while enjoying good tea and finger foods.

tinku's tea party is limited to the first 10 guests who register.  To RSVP, please email frontdoor@tinkugallery.com, call 647.430.9195 or send us a Twitter messsage @tinkugallery.

Colour Studies is showing at tinku gallery February 1st - 28th, 2009.

Image: Magic Mountain, John Guthrie, 30"x22", acrylic on paper