Contemporary Indigenous Art exhibit coming soon!

In partnership with the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council, Gallery 1C03 is pleased to present the exhibition Contemporary Indigenous Art from The University of Winnipeg. The show features 15 works from the University's art and Anthropology Museum collections. It will be on display for free to the general public on weekday afternoons from 1:00 - 4:00 p.m. from July 19 - August 10 (although closed the afternoon of Monday, August 6). The exhibition will also be on display exclusively to visitors of the DOTC First Nations Folklorama Pavilion during the evenings of August 5 - 11. For more information about the exhibition please click here.

Image: Jackson Beardy, Sturgeon Clan, 1979, silkscreen (a/p) 54.7 x 71.2 cm. Collection of The University of Winnipeg. Photo: Larry Glawson.

Visitor from Ottawa

It was a pleasure to catch up with art collector Vernon MacKelvie today over lunch. Mr. MacKelvie, who grew up in Winnipeg and is an alumnus of United College (UofW's predecessor), donated his collection of Canadian art to the University of Winnipeg a couple of years ago. Last spring, we organized an exhibition of some of the works he gifted which you can read about here. Mr. MacKelvie has resided in Ottawa since the mid-1940s but he makes an annual pilgrimmage to our fair city each June. Next week, he'll be coming to campus to take another peek at some of the beloved pieces he donated to us, including those shown above. The works above were created by Clark Holmes McDougall and Jack Markell, two artists with whom Mr. MacKelvie became friends and corresponded for many years.

Top to bottom: Jack Markell, Birch Tree in Forest, acrylic on board, undated, 49 cm x 39 cm. Collection of The University of Winnipeg. Gift of Vernon MacKelvie.
Clark Holmes McDougall, St. James Church, 1978, silkscreen (12/200), 57 x 71 cm. Collection of The University of Winnipeg. Gift of Vernon MacKelvie.

Clark Holmes McDougall, Étude, 1950, oil on canvas, 80 x 70 cm. Collection of The University of Winnipeg. Gift of Vernon MacKelvie.

Gallery 1C03 publications

Did you know that Gallery 1C03 has produced more than a dozen publications on Canadian art over the last 20 years? Many of them are available for sale. They include our latest release, unSacred: Scott Benesiinaabandan (cover pictured above). Check out this publication and others here.

SLOW CRAFT opening in 2 days!

SLOW CRAFT

2012 Manitoba Craft Council Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Craft

Gallery 1C03

May 31 – June 30, 2012
Opening reception May 31, 7 pm
 
On encountering handmade goods, the first question most people ask is “How long did that take you to make?” A confession quickly follows: “I would never have the patience to do that!” 

There’s no denying it – craft takes time. In a culture endlessly obsessed with speed and increasingly aware of its downsides, craft in its many varied forms may be the antidote of choice. The Manitoba Craft Council takes this idea as the starting point for its most recent exhibition, SLOW CRAFT, slated to open at U of W’s Gallery 1C03 on May 31 at 7 pm. 

For most craft-based artists, slow is all in a day’s work. The processes associated with craft cannot be hurried, and the skills associated with craft take years to master. Most craft artists embrace the slowness of their craft, and many are using their work to question Western society’s addiction to speed, to shopping and consuming, to unsustainable environmental practices. Taking its cues from the broader Slow Movement, the SLOW CRAFT exhibition asks viewers to slow down, take a breath, and consider the implications of the work on display. 

As exhibition viewers will note, the works that make up SLOW CRAFT represent an array of craft media and techniques. Exhibiting artists are at varying stages in their lives and professional careers, and each offers a unique interpretation of the exhibition’s theme. SLOW CRAFT includes work in ceramics, textiles, metal, glass, and mixed media by Manitoba artists Kathleen Black, Pauline Braun, Teresa Burrows, Brook Drabot, Kami Goertz, Steve Grimmer, Takashi Iwasaki, Shawna Munro, Keith Oliver, Willow Rector, Melanie Riggs, Sonja Rosenberg, Elizabeth Roy, Peter Tittenberger, and Karen Wardle.

Jurors for SLOW CRAFT had the challenging task of narrowing the field from the 52 artists who made submissions down to the 15 represented in the show. Jurors included Dr. Sandra Alfoldy, curator and professor in Craft History at NSCAD University; Jennifer Gibson, curator at Gallery 1C03, University of Winnipeg; and Alan Lacovetsky, ceramic artist and educator.

Winners of the Marilyn Wolodarsky Levitt Prize for Functional Pottery and the Judith Ryan Memorial Award for Best in Show will be announced at SLOW CRAFT‘s opening reception on May 31, 7 pm.

Refreshments will be served. All are welcome and admission is free. The exhibition continues June 1-30, 2012. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Saturday, 12-4 pm.

The exhibition will also be on display from July 27 - September 2, 2012 at Wasagaming Community Arts in the town of Wasagaming, Riding Mountain National Park.

Image: Kami Goertz, prairie soil profile in plush (2012), mixed fiber plush embroidery, 45  x  24  x 17 cm, courtesy of the artist.

TOMORROW: DIY Will Never Die!

Don't miss Dr. Sandra Alfoldy's lecture tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. in E-G Hall! Here's the link for more info on DIY Will Never Die!

School visits to see art at UofW

Gallery 1C03 had a great visit yesterday from a cool group of grade 8 art students from Shaughnessy Park School! They got a last-chance look at Chris Reid's exhibition I like to believe I am telling the truth  before it gets packed up on Friday. Plus they toured the Anthropology Museum on campus and our New Iconographies show in the University Archives.

If you're a teacher and want to explore the art around UofW campus this spring, let us know and we can hook you up! Simply contact Gallery 1C03 Director/Curator Jennifer Gibson at j.gibson@uwinnipeg.ca.

New Iconographies: Selections from the Permanent Collection

Exhibit on display now!

Location: The University of Winnipeg Archives, 

5th floor of Centennial Hall at the UofW

New Iconographies is a modest exhibition curated by Emily Doucet that includes a selection of five works by Manitoba artists from The University of Winnipeg’s permanent art collection. The pieces were originally chosen to highlight recent gifts to the collection and in consideration of the pedagogical and collegial relationships between the artists, all of whom were students and/or teachers at the University of Manitoba’s School of Art. Bringing together diverse images and media, works by Sheila Butler, Rosemary Kowalsky, Tom Lovatt and Ivan Eyre are displayed in The University of Winnipeg Archives. The juxtaposition of these works, created between 1977 and 2007, reveals the artists’ shared use of art historical themes.

Two pieces by Rosemary Kowalsky from the mid-1980s – one mixed media canvas and a second work on paper – employ the iconography of garden tools and floral imagery to reference the local sex trade. Kowalsky’s work is shown alongside Sheila Butler’s 1979 lithograph of Nike, the Greek goddess of victory. Both of these women artists touch upon issues of gender and power through the inclusion of canonical symbols or figures.

A recent oil painting by Tom Lovatt finds its focal point in the oft-depicted religious narrative of Christ’s descent from the cross which is contrasted with an etching of a wrapped figure created by Lovatt’s former teacher Ivan Eyre some thirty years prior. As with Lovatt’s Deposition, Eyre’s portrait explores visual traditions of Western painting and drawing in a contemporary manner. By employing art historical themes and iconography in their art, Eyre and Lovatt have resisted the allure of figurative and non-figurative abstraction used by so many artists working in the latter half of the twentieth century. The current exhibition of these five works is indicative of the ways in which these four artists have forged new iconographies throughout their respective practices.

Admission to exhibition is free and open to everyone. The University of Winnipeg Archives is located in the University’s Library which can be accessed on the 4^th floor of Centennial Hall.

Exhibition Hours: Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Image: Rosemary Kowalsky, Fleur du Mal, 1988, Mixed Media, 195x 76.5 cm.