Olga Livshin – Jewish Independent

Rootman’s night scenes

Jack Rootman, in front of his painting “Homage to Degas.” (photo by Olga Livshin)

Jack Rootman’s new solo show, Scene at Night, opens tomorrow, June 1, at the Visual Space Gallery on Dunbar Street. As the name implies, the exhibition is dedicated to Rootman’s paintings of urban night scenes.

“There are several reasons I’m interested in painting the night,” he said in an interview with the Independent. “First, I wanted to show human activity as it is spotlighted at night. People move from one light source to another, from the indoor balcony to the moving lights of cars. You don’t see it so focused during the day. When you look in the daytime, there is a panorama in front of you, your attention wanders; there is too much to see. But, at night, you see activity encapsulated. Someone drinks coffee. Someone crosses a street. Someone is sad or crying or laughing. Your attention is drawn to a spot of light.”

The second reason for his fascination with the nocturnal setting has to do with the constantly changing colours and contrasts. “There are many light sources wherever you are at night – streetlights, lights from the windows, moonlight – and each combination gives off different colour nuances and shadows, depending on where you stand, on the angle of your view,” he explained.

Rootman thinks an element of colour always exists, even at night, when there is a “dynamic blackness. If you look at my paintings,” he said, “there is red black and purple black, blue black and green black.”

Night’s more limited spectrum of colours intrigues and challenges the artist. “Of course, it is more difficult to paint night, to see colours in the darkness,” he said. “Sometimes, I have to use Photoshop to analyze what colours appear in a photograph, before I transfer the image to an oil painting.”

Rootman started painting night scenes years ago, although the bulk of the 22 paintings in the current exhibit have been created in the past five years. During his travels, he took many photographs at night in Paris, Venice, New York and Montreal. He also made sketches and recorded the colours as he saw them. But his paintings never follow the photos to the letter. One painting, a ribbon of light, might be an abstract representation of the night traffic along a boulevard, based on a photo taken from the balcony of his hotel room. Another might be a composition of images from different years and cities.

“My painting ‘Homage to Degas’ is one such a composition,” he said. “I saw this marijuana shop in Vancouver and it reminded me of a Degas painting. I included two of his paintings in this piece.”

In addition to the technical challenges of depicting a city scene at night, Rootman is interested in the loneliness that is most profound at night. “During the day,” he said, “we are at work, but the night brings isolation. It also brings possibilities – many people are lonely, and they go out during the night to meet others.”

photo - “Ice Cream,” by Jack Rootman, is among the works featured in his solo show, Scene at Night, which opens June 1 at the Visual Space Gallery — “Ice Cream,” by Jack Rootman, is among the works featured in his solo show, Scene at Night, which opens June 1 at the Visual Space Gallery.

Some of the paintings show this disconnection. Everyone is absorbed in what they are doing, alone in their own spots of light, talking on their cellphone or lost in thought, and darkness separates them from one another.

“The night is also traditionally associated with a sense of danger,” the artist mused. “Several paintings in this series are lanes, particularly lanes in downtown Vancouver. Anything could hide in such a lane, with insufficient light: from rats to human predators.”

While his lanes are bleak, despite the illumination of neon signs and streetlights, there is always hope in Rootman’s paintings. Perhaps his medical background brings that sense to the fore of everything he does, both in his professional field of eye surgery and in his art.

“My most comfortable mental state is when I’m doing something creative and visual,” he said. “It works for my art. It also worked for my job as a surgeon, before I retired. Surgery is very creative. Like art, surgery is a discovery. Nothing is ever as you expected.”

And, like in his medical practice, where every patient had a story, all of his paintings are stories, too, stories of danger and loneliness, separation and connection, all linked together by darkness and light.

“My work has a certain affiliation with music and poetry,” said Rootman. “That’s why I decided to have a music night and a poetry night as parts of this show.”

The music night with Amicus Ensemble will be held at the gallery on June 5, 6-8 p.m., and the poetry night the next evening, June 6, 6-8 p.m. Scene at Night is at the Visual Space Gallery until June 9.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Artistic tribute to Shoah survivors

The Schara Tzedeck Shoah Survivors Tribute Wall was created for the congregation by John Nutter. The sculpture, which includes the names of 230 survivors, was dedicated May 3. (photo from John Nutter)

Congregation Schara Tzedeck has a new art installation in its main sanctuary. The Schara Tzedeck Shoah Survivors Tribute Wall – a Tree of Life rendered in sandblasted glass – includes the names of 230 survivors. It was dedicated May 3.

Full of shared memories and friendship, the pre-Shabbat dedication ceremony featured several speakers: the synagogue’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt; its executive president, Howard Kallner; younger family members of the survivors; Ed Lewin, co-chair of the project with Hodie Kahn; and the man who started the entire project, Dr. Robert Krell, a child survivor.

“We wanted to honour the Holocaust survivors who found their way to Canada, before and after the war, and wound up as members of this shul,” Lewin told the Independent. “Most of them came here in 1948. Their names are all there, on the wall. My parents’ and grandparents’ names are among them.”

Explaining how the project started, Lewin said, “We had this empty space, and Krell suggested a tribute to Holocaust survivors. It was several years ago. It took us awhile to find the talented glass artist, John Nutter, who transformed our ideas into a sculpture.”

The synagogue is publishing a commemorative book about the installation, as well. While the Tribute Wall features survivors’ names only, the book also contains photographs of the survivors; there are family and group photo pages. Together, the book and the wall serve as a memorial to those who not only survived the Shoah but contributed greatly to Schara Tzedeck and to the development of Greater Vancouver and the province over the past seven decades.

One page of the book is dedicated to Nutter, who has created numerous art installations for churches and synagogues, mostly in New York. His works decorate many institutions in the United States and Canada: hotels, museums, hospitals. He collaborated with local artist Bill Reid on a glass sculpture at the Vancouver International Airport. A few years ago, Glass Magazine named Nutter one of the top three architectural glass artists in the country.

About how he came to design the Tribute Wall, Nutter said, “A few years ago, I did a small glass sculpture for the Louis Brier Home, a collaboration with a wonderful artist and friend, Diana Zoe Coop. Camille Wenner, Diana’s daughter, works for Schara Tzedeck. I’ve known Camille since she was a young child. She contacted me about this project and, of course, I said, yes.”

He explained his work process. “They knew exactly what they wanted – a Tree of Life, made like a Vancouver cherry tree in bloom. Usually, I start with a small draft, show it to my clients, make changes until they’re satisfied, before I transfer the design to glass. But the people from Schara Tzedeck were very nice. They approved my first draft of the design.”

The first step in making the sculpture was creating a life-size drawing out of the small-scale draft. “I hire a company for that,” said Nutter, “give them my small drawing, and they blow it up to the size I want.”

Once he has the full-size paper draft, he starts working on the glass. For this sculpture, he used nine separate glass panels. The three bottom panels are roots. “The words ‘Schara Tzedeck’ are carved among the roots, to symbolize the Jews who had set their roots with the congregation,” Nutter explained.

The middle panel is the trunk, and the five panels around it are carved with leaves and flowers. “I sandblasted each petal of each flower individually,” Nutter said. “It gives more depth to the sculpture.”

The work is made of 15-millimetre laminated glass; two layers joined together. The carving is on the back, and the names of the survivors are written on the front, in black, which adds to the visual depth.

Nutter has been working with architectural glass for decades. “I started as an architecture student at the University of Manitoba,” he recalled. “A couple years into my studies, I took a summer job with a stained glass company. I loved it so much, I left my schooling and stayed with the company for several years, before I founded my own company. I never finished my architectural degree, but I taught stained glass making at the same faculty years later.”

He loves architecture, and most of his works are large-scale glass. “Sometimes,” he said, “my background in architecture helps me to win the contracts. I often build small-scale models of my proposed installations when I bid for a job. I like the details and hardware used in the models. I learned that during my years of architectural studies.”

Frequently, Nutter’s sculptures and windows tell a story, like the one he created for Schara Tzedeck. “In the past, when artists made glass installations in churches and other religious institutions, it was always to tell a story, as most of the population were illiterate,” he said. “Now, people can read, so the art became more decorative, but it still tells a story.”

To learn more about the artist, visit johnnutterglassstudio.com or visit his studio on Granville Island. For those interested in purchasing the hardcover, full-colour commemorative book ($54), visit scharatzedeck.com/event/-shoah-survivors-tribute-book-order.html; the order deadline is June 30.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

A mind-blowing exhibit

“Sunflowers” by Jocelyne Hallé.

The new show at Zack Gallery, #SeasonsAtZack features Instagram artists. A fundraiser for the gallery, the exhibit is extremely eclectic.

“The theme of the show is based on the theme of Festival Ha’Rikud, ‘Seasons of Israel,’” said Daniel Wajsman, marketing coordinator at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. “Every year, the gallery has a group show to coincide with the festival and the artists submit their paintings to the gallery. This year, we thought: why don’t we do social media instead? These days, everyone has a camera…. We all take pictures with our phones and share them with friends and family. This is one step further. Why can’t we share our photos with everyone? That’s what Instagram does – it is a site where we share our images with the world. That’s what we aimed for in this show at the Zack. We wanted to change the concept of what art is.”

The gallery started with the idea that only artists who have an Instagram account would be featured in the exhibit, but later opened the submission process to everyone, said Wajsman. All of the images from the show will be on the JCC’s Instagram page and prints will be available for purchase in different sizes and formats.

About a third of the photos in the exhibit come from a select group of people: staff members of several Jewish organizations, who went to Israel in April for a professional seminar. The organizations participating in the seminar were the JCC, Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, Jewish Family Services, Louis Brier Home and Hospital, Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre and Nava Creative Kosher Cuisine.

“We work closely together, but we don’t all know each other,” said Wajsman. “Some of us are Jewish, and some are not. The seminar had a double goal: to teach us about Israel and Jewish history and to connect us with each other.”

Regular visitors to the Zack Gallery will be familiar with many of the photographers in the exhibit. Some of the photos are by artists who have exhibited previously at the gallery – like Lauren Morris, Michael Abelman and others – and submitted photographs of their paintings for the show.

Another set of participants includes local masters of photography, such as Jocelyne Hallé, Judy Angel and Ivor Levin. Each one has more than one of their images on display.

Halle’s “Sunflowers” photo was taken recently. The bright sunny heads of the large flowers contrast sharply with the heavy stormy clouds overhead, and the juxtaposition evokes strong emotions. “It wasn’t Photoshopped at all,” said Hallé. “It’s just the way I took it.”

In contrast, Angel’s airy images glow and shimmer with transparent sunlight. They are so light, they seem translucent, able to fly off the wall like magical butterflies.

photo - “Umbrellas” by Ivor Levin — “Umbrellas” by Ivor Levin.

Beside them, Levin’s photos look like drawings, their colour schemes and compositions inspired by the rains and umbrellas of the autumn season in Vancouver.

New artists also have a strong presence in this show. For them, having their names under their art on the gallery walls is a fascinating experience. One of this crowd is Linda Lando, the Zack Gallery director. “I’m not an artist,” she said. “I’ve never displayed anything before.”

One of her photos, the colourful “Ein Gedi Night,” was taken on her trip to Israel, as a member of the seminar. “We visited Kibbutz Ein Gedi late at night,” she said. “It is a beautiful floral oasis in the desert. They have amazing flowers, and this blooming tree was near the entrance.”

Robert Johnson, also part of the seminar and a longtime JCC employee, has a couple of his photos in the show. One of them is particularly memorable: a photo of a camel with a sad expression, lying under a tree. The title of the photograph is “This is Not a Camel.”

“He talked to me,” Johnson said with a smile. “People were riding him all day, and he didn’t want to be a riding camel anymore.”

The variety of the images in the show is mind-blowing: from Israeli landscapes to mud bathers on the shore of the Dead Sea to abstract composition. #SeasonsAtZack continues until June 9.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Responding to the landscape

“ReView 2” by Ian Penn.

Ian Penn is not a new name for regular visitors to the Zack Gallery, which has exhibited his work before. “I like this gallery,” Penn told the Independent. “It’s like a public marketplace. It’s transparent and open. Children come in. Older people. People on the way from their lunch or the gym. The gallery is accessible, the way art should be. I could show at a traditional gallery, but I don’t want to.”

Penn makes one exception to this statement – for his homeland, Australia. “I have a gallery in Australia that represents me, and I exhibit there frequently, once or twice a year,” he said. “Last year, I was an artist-in-residence at that gallery. I gave artistic workshops to high school children. It was fun.”

His current exhibition at the Zack, From the Deck: View and ReView, is dedicated to landscapes, specifically the scenery he sees from the deck of his house: trees and mountains, water and clouds. Penn has painted these landmarks in different lights and different seasons. “I tried to capture different moods,” he said. “Some are grand, panoramic. Others are smaller, more intimate.”

He explained his idea behind the show. “View and re-view are two parts of the process. I look at the view from my house deck, have been looking at it for years. I enjoy the landscape from a single view. I take photographs. I sketch it multiple times. It’s my immediate response to the landscape. I’m part of it. I’m mapping it. This is ‘View,’ but it is not the territory, just a map. It is my understanding of the place.”

Penn’s View paintings are more abstract, sometimes just splashes of colour. What is important to the artist is that every element appears in the right size and shape in relation to the other elements. “I measure all the distances at this stage and mark the proportions. How far is this treetop from that ship passing through? How large are these bushes compared to that shoreline? I make lots of drawings.”

The second part of the process, the review, is done in the studio, later. “This is the second part of my response,” he explained. “I’d think: what is important in that idea? A ‘ReView’ is my emotional and physical answer to the ‘View’ and the landscape. It’s all about the place itself, the place and the painting. At this stage, I’m recreating the territory.”

photo - Ian Penn at the opening of his latest solo exhibition at the Zack Gallery, which runs until April 28 — Ian Penn at the opening of his latest solo exhibition at the Zack Gallery, which runs until April 28. *(photo by Olga Livshin)*

Unlike the bold brush strokes of his Views, most of his ReViews are more detailed, while still exploring the same landscape. And the ratio of abstract versus figurative slants towards the figurative. “I’m interested where representation and abstraction interact,” he admitted.

In his ReViews, a tree becomes a more detailed tree, not just a blob of yellow, even while maintaining its impressionistic abstract profile. A ship becomes more identifiable as a ship, not simply a dark squiggle. And a cloud can’t be mistaken for anything else.

In fact, clouds play a huge role in most of the paintings on display: light and fluffy in one image, heavy and menacing in another. “Clouds change constantly; that’s why they interest me. I’m fascinated by change, by periods of transition,” said Penn. “That’s why most of these paintings are done in spring or autumn. Those are the seasons of change. In summer, the landscape is full and the sky is clear, but, with autumn, comes change. The colours of the leaves change. When the leaves fall, the shapes of the trees change. The bones of the landscapes are transformed. The weather changes. Same in spring. By exploring those changes, I’m addressing the changes in our lives.”

By the juxtaposition of constant change within the same view – from one location – Penn follows in the footsteps of one of his favourite artists, Paul Cezanne. “I studied Cezanne. He painted Mont Sainte-Victoire countless times, all different,” Penn said. “He changed the landscape genre forever, took it apart and re-created it.”

Penn’s investigation of the landscape as an art form goes further. “A traditional landscape is horizontal, with certain set dimensions,” he explained. “I’m challenging those dimensions, trying landscapes of different formats. A portrait shape. A diptych, which is much wider than a traditional landscape. I’m playing with different geometry. What if the two parts of a diptych are of different widths: one square, another a wider rectangle? What if both parts are off-squares?”

Penn’s experiments with the shapes of his paintings, with the changing of weather and seasons, makes the show diverse. The exhibition demonstrates the richness of landscape as an art form.

“Landscape as we know it is relatively new in the modern Western art,” he said. “Before the Renaissance, landscape was mostly a background for figures in the composition. It only became a separate art form in the 16th and 17th centuries, after the paint tubes became small enough that artists could take them out of the studios, to paint on locations. That was what the Group of Seven did. That is what I do.”

Penn’s show runs until April 28 at the Zack. For more information about his work, visit ianpenn.com.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected]

Tapestry up for raffle

Barbara Heller (photo by Olga Livshin)

Temple Sholom’s Dreamers and Builders gala is not only a time to celebrate, but to raise funds for the synagogue. In addition to honouring Jack Lutsky and Susan Mendelson, this year’s sold-out event on May 5 will include a silent art auction at the dinner and a raffle, the bidding for which has already started.

“We have art donations for the silent auction from members of the synagogue, Ian Penn and Ivan Gasoi, as well as from Dina Goldstein and Gordon Smith, and a tapestry by Barbara Heller for the raffle,” said Karen Gelmon, gala co-chair, in an interview with the Independent. “Barbara is a member of Temple Sholom and an internationally known tapestry artist. Her works are very valuable, unique and truly remarkable.”

Gelmon noted that the synagogue has several tapestries by Heller on its walls. “There are two magnificent pieces that are on either side of the ark at the front of the sanctuary,” she said. “They are wonderful and loved by the congregation. She has donated two other works that are in another room and are also very appreciated. All these pieces have been there for more than 20 years and are fixtures at the synagogue.”

The raffle features the tapestry “Stones 22 – Stonefall,” the 22nd in Heller’s Stonefall series.

“I have been weaving these tapestries of stone walls and stones on the ground every few years for decades, between more difficult pieces,” Heller told the Independent. “I love these stone walls, built by man without mortar or cutting the stones to fit. If these walls fell down, the stones would return to the earth and no one would be the wiser. Yet, I see the spirits of the people who built the walls. Their energy remains in the stones.”

Heller also likes that the tapestries are abstract. “I get to immerse myself in the act of weaving as I transform them from stone into wool,” she explained. “I play with the handspun and hand-dyed yarns, the textures and the colours, without worrying about the underlying message.”

photo - Fabric artist Barbara Heller has donated her work “Stones 22 – Stonefall” to Temple Sholom’s Dreamers and Builders fundraiser — Fabric artist Barbara Heller has donated her work “Stones 22 – Stonefall” to Temple Sholom’s Dreamers and Builders fundraiser.

“Stones 22” was woven in 2013. “It was based on the photos I took in Caesarea on the Mediterranean in Israel,” said Heller. “The site has been home to invader after invader for millennia. It has been an archeological dig since a farmer plowing the meagre soil first uncovered a large stone block and called the scientists. Here, there are definitely ghosts of the people who came before.”

About why she chose to offer one of her artworks for the raffle, she said, “When I was asked to donate a tapestry by Susan [Mendelson] and the organizing committee for Dreamers and Builders, I was happy to say yes. Susan and Jack have supported my art and own a few tapestries. Temple Sholom is my synagogue and has also supported me. It has several of my tapestries, some as donations and two on loan. The bimah is flanked by two of my tapestries that were commissioned at the time of my son’s bar mitzvah, and the library has a tapestry that my mother willed to the Temple on her death. Now, it was my turn to support them.”

The decision of which tapestry to donate was a practical one. “I felt it had to be mid-size, large enough to have a presence but not so large that it would not find a new home in a modern condo,” she said. “And the reference to Israel was also important to me.”

As an artist who makes a living by her art, Heller has given much thought over the years to the concept of donating work.

“It has been awhile since I donated artwork,” she shared. “There was a time a few years ago when art auctions were all the rage for fundraising, to the detriment of the artists. The fundraisers always stressed that the auctions would be good publicity for the artists, but I don’t think so. People always wanted a bargain when they bid at auctions, and I don’t think that the fundraisers were aware of the lost income for the artists.”

An artist must look at a donation as just that, said Heller, as a donation to raise funds for a charity they believe in. “I now do it only on occasion. I am reminded of what my friend, a pianist, does. When approached to play for free, she says, ‘You pay me what my normal fee would be, and then I will decide how much to give back to you as my donation.’ This makes the fundraisers aware of what they are actually asking.”

Gelmon and the organizing committee were well aware of what they were asking. “I think different artists may have different motivations to donate their art,” said Gelmon. “For Barbara, I think she saw this as a worthy cause. It is raising money for her synagogue, where she and her family have been members for years, and it probably gives her great pleasure to contribute.”

To take part in the raffle, visit templesholom.ca/dreamers-builders-2019-raffle.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Exhibit starts with friendship

Linda MacCannell’s photograph of John T’Seleie. (photo from Drew Ann Wake)

The new show at the Zack Gallery, Crossed Paths – which explores the connection between the Jewish and the Dene peoples – has its roots in the federal Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry.

“In the 1970s, I was a CBC reporter in the Northwest Territories,” show curator Drew Ann Wake told the Independent. “When the government proposed a pipeline through the area, they sent Justice Thomas Berger to investigate the impact of the proposed pipeline [in 1974]. He talked to over 30 native communities to get their input. When he was finished, he issued a report recommending the government settle all the claims on land that the pipeline would pass through before construction started…. They are still settling those claims. The pipeline hasn’t been built yet.”

As a journalist, Wake accompanied Berger and his team on that historic trip. She taped numerous interviews with the local people participating in the inquiry.

“Ten years ago, I found those old tapes,” she recalled. “Only audio tapes; it was so long ago. I thought it would be interesting to go back and talk to all of them again. And let their children and grandchildren listen to their elders’ voices.”

photo - Linda MacCannell’s photograph of Michael Jackson — Linda MacCannell’s photograph of Michael Jackson. *(photo from Drew Ann Wake)*

She invited a friend, photographer Linda MacCannell, to create portraits of some of the participants of the Mackenzie Valley negotiations. Over several years, they traveled to the villages Wake had visited with Berger. MacCannell took photos and Wake filmed her interviews. “We created a show of Linda’s portraits and the stories I collected and went on the road. By now, we’ve exhibited this show in 50 galleries across North America,” said Wake.

MacCannell’s large-scale portraits of various members of the Dene First Nations, who live along the Mackenzie River, constitute the heart of the exhibit at the Zack.

“Two years ago, we gave a presentation at the grunt gallery, an artist-run centre in Vancouver,” Wake explained. “We showed the films. After the presentation, a man approached me. He introduced himself as Michael Shumiatcher, a local artist and educator. He said he knew Justice Berger at the time of the inquiry. Michael was a high school student then, and Berger was his best friend’s father.”

Shumiatcher suggested they work together and present the exhibit to schools around the province. Wake liked the idea, and invited him to join her on her next trip north. Also joining the summer 2018 trip were artist Melenie Fleischer and her husband, cellist Eric Wilson, as well as composer Daniel Séguin.

“Daniel saw the video I made of the drummers the previous year,” Wake explained. “He wanted to write new music to incorporate the traditional drums.”

The group traveled to Fort Simpson, N.W.T., to study the drumming culture of the Dene in more depth.

“Séguin wrote a piece of music, called Dehcho, for cello and the drums,” Wake said. “That is how the local nations call the Mackenzie River – Dehcho. Wilson performed it at the local gallery presentation of our show. The gallery was packed. People sat in the hall and stood on the stairs. He had to repeat his performance for all who wanted to hear it.”

As well, Fleischer and Shumiatcher produced several paintings.

One of Fleischer’s, a herd of bison, is suffused with wild, tumultuous energy. “They were huge,” she said of the animals. “They looked up casually and continued grazing and drinking water in the shallow puddles. We were cautious and maybe even scared as we huddled close in the van to take our photographs. Thrilled at our first encounter with the ancestors of the ancient bison depicted on the cave walls of Altamira, Lascaux and others, I knew then that I was going to paint bison.”

A painting by Shumiatcher depicts Wilson blowing a shofar on the shore of the Mackenzie River. Fleischer and Wilson brought the shofar on the trip as a gift.

“Once we got our invitation from Chief Gerry Antoine to come to Fort Simpson and collaborate with Liidlii Kue First Nation on our cultural exploration of music – cello and drums – we were very excited. We were in New York at the time, and I wanted to bring Chief Antoine something special,” said Fleischer. “All I could think of was that our nation was thousands of years old, as were the indigenous people. With that in mind, we went looking for a ram’s horn from Israel, a shofar.”

They visited several Judaica stores in New York. “It was funny,” said Fleischer, “my husband Eric blowing shofars outside the stores, on the sidewalk. He is a cellist and very particular about sound.”

The next step for the group was to approach the Zack Gallery for a joint show. The Jewish artists’ paintings complement MacCannell’s photography, showing another facet of the northern experience. Just as power and serenity dominate the portraits and the photographer’s triptych of the river landscape, the paintings add a touch of awe at nature and its symbiotic relationship with humankind.

The Zack exhibit also includes traditional clothing made by several Dene artists. “Last year, we won a grant from the Canada Council [for the Arts] to commission northern artists,” Wake said. Of the pieces on display, each has a story. In some cases, the stories are real; they happened to the artists’ family members. For others, the stories are purely imaginary or are based on local folklore. Regardless, every story has a link to the tapes Wake collected in the 1970s and the people she interviewed.

Linda Wolki, known for her needlework, created a traditional yellow coat after she listened to the recording of her mother telling Wake how she hunted seals when she was young. “The woman’s story was amazing,” Wake said. “She was out hunting in the snow and cold, and four polar bears decided to chase her. She laughed.”

A pair of embroidered moccasins, made by Agnes Mitchell, is displayed in a plexiglass case next to the pair her father wore for years. The embroidery on the old moccasins – made by Mitchell’s mother – and the new ones is equally elaborate.

“One story I asked an artist to illustrate was an ancient northern legend about an abandoned woman,” Wake said. “The tribe abandoned that woman in the forest because of her sharp tongue. She only had a few coals for her fire, but she survived. She made herself two cloaks – one of raven feathers and another of rabbit fur – and many more objects.”

Artist Jeneen Frei Njootli has brought the cloaks to life. Her creations, a black cloak of raven feathers and another of white rabbit fur, hang in a corner of the Zack, one above another, as a tribute to her people’s tenacity and their drive to survive in the harshest conditions.

photo - Raven cloak made by Jeneen Frei Njootli — Raven cloak made by Jeneen Frei Njootli. *(photo from Drew Ann Wake)*

“We were very proud to learn that recently Jeneen Frei Njootli was chosen as one of the five finalists for the Sobey Art Award, an annual prize given to the most promising Canadian artist under 40,” said Wake, who then pointed to a blue coat on display. Smiling, she said, “And that coat belongs to Michael Jackson. But not the Michael Jackson of pop music. Our own Michael Jackson, a Vancouver lawyer who, in the 1970s, was part of Justice Berger’s team.”

When Wake started working on this show, one of the new interviews she conducted was with Jackson. “He worked with many First Nation people,” she said, “and I asked him how come he was so empathetic to their plight. He said it was because he was Jewish. When he grew up in London, England, he experienced antisemitism. He knew hunger as a child in post-World War Two Britain. It made him sensitive to others suffering from discrimination. Made him want to help.”

During the Berger inquiry, Jackson befriended one of the local men, John T’Seleie, who organized his community to meet with the inquiry’s lawyers.

“Their friendship has lasted for decades. They’re still friends,” Wake said. “As a child, T’Seleie was a student at a residential school. Like many others at residential schools, he suffered. As an adult, he became an advocate for his people.”

The portraits of these two friends hang side by side on the gallery walls, and the film Wake made of her interviews with them is also part of the exhibit.

“That’s how our entire show started, so many years ago,” she said, “with those two and their friendship: a Jew and a Dene.”

Crossed Paths is at the Zack until April 7.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Mixing abstract, nature

Sidi Schaffer’s current exhibit, In Partnership with Nature, is at the Zack Gallery until March 3. (photo by Olga Livshin)

Sidi Schaffer’s art has gone through several different incarnations. At the beginning of her career, in postwar Romania, she adhered to a realistic approach. “For several years, the central images of my work were people,” she said in an interview with the Independent.

After her family immigrated to Israel, she continued her studies and received her art education degree. “At that time, I fell in love with the Impressionists, especially Cezanne, and started painting more landscape and still life,” she said. “I tried to catch the essence, the light and beauty of my surroundings. Even my palette changed.”

The next stage in her artistic development came after she immigrated to Canada in 1975. It was as if every country triggered a twist in her artistic road. “I needed to establish new roots and master new challenges,” she recalled. “In 1980, I went back to school to study printmaking at the University of Alberta. They told me: ‘Paint abstract, throw away realism.’ I followed my teachers’ good advice … and totally immersed myself in abstraction. I simplified my work; my focus became my inner world, my feelings and my emotions. The art-making process became a sacred ritual.”

But pure abstraction didn’t hold her interest for long. Her abstract compositions acquired random elements of realism. “I tried to make my works integrated, bring together abstract and figurative,” she said. “I tried to express the concept of unity between the internal and the external, between the spiritual and the physical.”

Her current show, In Partnership with Nature, which opened at the Zack Gallery on Jan. 31, combines her inclination towards abstraction, her love of nature and her ability to bridge the realistic and the spiritual in her paintings. It also highlights her innate optimism. The show is airy, uplifting and charming, the works prompting a quiet gladness in viewers.

It’s about flowers, but in an oblique, complex way. “I love flowers,” said Schaffer. “Nature is my biggest inspiration. When it surrounds me, I feel alive, free, and in awe of all its beauty and miracles.”

For years, she has been drying flowers between pages of books. “I have piles of those books in my house,” she said. “I always wanted to preserve the flowers’ beauty, even after the original bloom. I have been doing it since I was a young girl…. In autumn, I also dry leaves with their amazing colours and abstract designs. Nothing is more beautiful. Sometimes, I pick a flower just to remind me of a place and time.”

A few years ago, Schaffer decided to try and incorporate those dried flowers and leaves into her art. “I wanted to make them the subject matter,” she said. “Every picture in this show, except one, has one or more dry flowers or leaves in them.”

photo - “Grace into Focus 1” by Sidi Schaffer is part 1 of a triptych — “Grace into Focus 1” by Sidi Schaffer is part 1 of a triptych. *(photo from Sidi Schaffer)*

All of the images in the exhibit are mixed media. She experimented with acrylic and oil paint, with old prints and new drawings, with collage. The dried leaves or flowers form the heart of the compositions.

“I wanted to give them importance,” she explained. “Some of the landscapes in this show look fantastic, because dry leaves play the part of trees. Some abstract collages were like memory boxes for me, with layers. There are dry petals there, and lettering and musical notes.”

Schaffer’s collaboration with the elements of nature tends towards whimsical. Flower petals float on the visual breeze. Mundane dandelions turn into exotic palm trees. Waves of musical notation sparkle with rainbow colours.

“I played with the images,” said the artist. “I didn’t take myself seriously when I prepared this show.”

Schaffer said every image in the exhibit started with an idea. “But I never knew how it would come out,” she said. “It’s a process, a discussion between me and the flowers. Sometimes, it is a struggle. I look at the flowers and they supply more ideas. This one flower I had, I put it on the painting and the petals came off. I left them off, incorporated into the image.… From a flash of excitement to the end result, each image reflects my emotional journey. By the time I finish a painting, it seldom resembles my original starting point. What is important for me is the visual poetry, the relationship of form, space, colour and light.”

Schaffer’s exploration into creative possibilities is nourished by her rich inner life. Before her retirement, she taught art and painted commissions, but never, for example, something made specifically to harmonize with anyone’s living room décor.

“I paint what is inside of me,” she said. “I don’t paint for anyone’s sofa. I enjoy the hours I spend in front of my canvas. It is an intense emotional outlet and, when I’m finished, I feel happy, but, at the same time, drained and vulnerable.”

In Partnership with Nature is at the Zack until March 3.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Run to reduce poverty

Esther Edel (right) has participated in the Run 4 Afikim twice. (photo from Esther Edel)

The annual Run 4 Afikim supports Afikim, a nonprofit organization in Israel that addresses child poverty. One of the participants in the run – for two consecutive years now – has been former Vancouverite Esther Edel.

Jerusalem-based Afikim was founded in 2008 by Israeli educator and child services administrator Moshe Lefkowitz. At the moment, Afikim staff helps 528 impoverished children in 14 learning centres throughout Israel, mainly in Jerusalem.

Afikim’s approach is to help parents as well, providing family counseling, while the children receive hot meals, tutoring, life skills training and emotional support. Currently, Afikim cannot keep up with the demand for its services, and Lefkowitz would like to see the number of students Afikim accepts increase by 80 this year.

One of the ways Afikim raises funds is the Run 4 Afikim. The website describes the event as a non-competitive relay from Jerusalem to Eilat, totaling 370 kilometres in 36 hours. Participants run in groups of three. Each group completes one leg of nine to 14 kilometres at a time and each runner ends up running multiple legs over the 36 hours. Participants must raise a minimum of $2,000 each to take part.

This year, the Run 4 Afikim began on Jan. 9 and ended on Jan. 11. The event raised more than $265,000, exceeding its goal of $250,000. One of the participants was Edel, who made aliyah in 1997.

“I had a strong religious Zionist education, which contributed to my moving to Israel.… My parents and sister still live in Vancouver. Unfortunately, I do not visit them as often as I would like,” shared Edel in an email interview with the Independent.

While Edel first participated in Run 4 Afikim last year, it wasn’t her first long-distance run.

“I’ve always been active, since I was little. Non-competitive sports and any outdoor activity are parts of my day-to-day life. I’ve participated in numerous 10-kilometre runs over the years. Most of them have been in Jerusalem, as parts of the annual Jerusalem Marathon, generally as fundraisers for different organizations.”

She was introduced to Afikim, she said, “via a good friend, Ruchie Schwartz, who already participated in the run. She had posted on Facebook the recap/promo video of the previous year’s run. When I watched it, I was moved by the passion of the participants and, even more so, by the cause that was driving them to raise funds and awareness for the Afikim Family Enrichment programs.”

The weekly programs include music, sports and other extracurricular activities. “While these types of pursuits are easily available for children from more privileged backgrounds,” explains the website, “Afikim’s children would have no access to them without this program. Like all facets of Afikim, extracurricular activities help close the achievement gap between disadvantaged children and those from higher socioeconomic backgrounds.”

Edel wanted to participate in the Run 4 Afikim but had some doubts. “I was slightly hesitant, as I had taken a break from running for a bit and wasn’t sure if I would get back into it,” she said.

photo - Esther Edel at this year’s run — Esther Edel at this year’s run. *(photo from Esther Edel)*

But those doubts were easily overcome. “I added a few runs to my weekly workout schedule, which I had not consistently been doing before I decided to participate,” she said.

To meet the $2,000 financial contribution requirement, she fundraised using email, connected with people on Facebook, contacted friends by other means and benefited from word of mouth.

“This year, there were eight groups and 32 segments divided between the groups,” she said about the run. “My team ran five segments, which approximately totaled 48 kilometres over 36 hours. Due to the timing of the segments, all the groups were functioning on very little sleep throughout the run. It’s mainly 36 hours where adrenaline and endurance get you through.”

Edel’s team schedule included, on the Wednesday evening, one run from the Jerusalem starting point, and three running segments on the Thursday, the first starting at 5:30 a.m., the second at 2:30 p.m. and the third at 10:45 p.m. “Friday morning, we started at 6 a.m. and most of the participants completed the final few kilometres to Eilat,” she said.

Edel added, “It’s important to note that it is purely volunteer-based, with the maximum effort to keep the overhead as low as possible.… Throughout the run, there are always one or two escorts, including trained paramedics, who also volunteer their time each year to drive the roadside escort.”

Edel also mentioned the lunch on the Thursday, which was “an organized activity, with all the runners and some of the Afikim children. This allowed us to connect with the Afikim kids and see firsthand how this run and fundraising affect these children.”

To learn more about Afikim’s work, visit afikim.org.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Community show at Zack

“Open Doors” by Marcie Levitt-Cooper. (photo by Daniel Wajsman)

The group show Community Longing and Belonging, which opened Jan. 15 at the Zack Gallery, marks Jewish Disability Awareness and Inclusion Month (JDAIM).

“I heard about community art shows in celebration of JDAIM in other communities,” said Leamore Cohen, inclusion services coordinator at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver, who was the driving force behind the local exhibit.

“I thought an unjuried exhibit would be a fabulous way to honour our community-wide commitment to remove barriers, to celebrate our community members’ creative capacities,” she said.

The main idea was to open up participation to everyone – professional artists and amateurs, people of different skill levels, abilities, perspectives, faiths and socioeconomic status.

“To make participation truly inclusive,” said Cohen, “we provided each artist with a 12-by-16 wood panel. We have also been taking direction from Kickstart Disability Arts and Culture and its artistic director, Yuri Arajs, as we wanted to ensure that this event is fully accessible.”

The JDAIM inclusion initiative and month of advocacy began throughout North America in 2009, explained Cohen. The idea for the art exhibit started to take form last spring, when Cohen approached Zack Gallery director Linda Lando.

“Linda was really receptive to the idea of the show.… Once I had the green light from her, the support and use of the gallery,” said Cohen, “I began to focus more on the theme.”

The theme of community and inclusion prompted her next steps. She reached out to many different organizations and communities and invited artists from all over the Lower Mainland to participate. The call for submissions went out in late September, and the response was remarkable. Fifty-two artists are included in the show.

“We have artists from Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond, North Vancouver, and even as far out as Cloverdale,” said Cohen. “I’ve had the good fortune to meet all these new and amazingly creative people, welcome them to our community centre, and make new friends along the way. It’s been a joy. It broke my heart that I had to turn many away because of the limited space in the gallery. I have artists who want to sign up for the next year. There is so much excitement and so much more to say on this issue.”

photo - “Embrace” by Evelyn Fichmann — “Embrace” by Evelyn Fichmann. *(photo by Daniel Wajsman)*

To frame this exhibit, Cohen posed two questions, which are being used in its promotional materials: “How do we make meaning of the concept of community, the real and the imagined spaces we inhabit? What does community longing look like and what are the possibilities for belonging in an ever-changing world?”

“This show was a challenge and an invitation to look at social problems creatively and critically,” Cohen told the Independent. “It was also an opportunity for artists living with diverse needs to exhibit their work in a professional venue and to receive exposure.

“I don’t think we are going to resolve the problems of longing and belonging, or longing for belonging, any time soon. I think we’ll always have people who are better situated and people whose social networks are more tenuous. We should just keep having the conversations and build up those connections. We create new platforms and new access points, new opportunities for people to engage and tell their stories, whatever they look like and from whatever lens, whether it be through mental health, sexual identity, ability or socioeconomic status. We all have a story to tell.”

Cohen shared one example of how the show’s theme relates to her own life.

“The ‘longing’ part of the theme resonates with a lot of people,” she said. “It resonates with me as well. It emerges from my own story of disconnection from the Jewish community during my youth and young adulthood. Fortunately, so, too, does the ‘belonging’ part of this show. The JCC is a wonderful place, a place for belonging.”

photo - “Veselye u Selu” by Daniel Malenica — “Veselye u Selu” by Daniel Malenica. (photo by Daniel Wajsman)

The theme allowed for a number of different approaches, and the skill of the various participating artists varies widely, but the utter diversity becomes its main attraction. Although the size and shape of the canvases – the wooden boards provided by the organizers – are universal, the content is anything but, and so is the media. Some pieces are oils, others acrylic; still others, mixed media. There are abstracts and figurative compositions. Some have narratives. Others evoke emotions. Some have Jewish connotations. Others don’t. Some artists participated solo, while others enrolled as a family group.

Marcie Levitt-Cooper represents one such family. Her painting “Open Doors” depicts a colony of colourful birdhouses. Every door of every birdhouse is open, creating a welcoming avian village, a festive metaphor that makes you smile. No birds appear in the image, but you can almost hear them sing. The artist’s three daughters – Rebecca Wosk, Teddie Wosk and Margaux Wosk – also exhibit in the show.

Another family of artists is mother Elizabeth Snigurowicz and son Matthew Tom Wing. “They regularly come to the Jewish Community Centre inclusion services Art Hive drop-in program, a low-barrier, free art program,” said Cohen.

Daniel Malenica doesn’t have a family in the show, but her charming, pastel-toned piece is a jubilation of the artist’s Croatian roots and her LGBTQ+ community. Two girls embrace each other in the painting, both wear Slavic costumes. The title, “Veselye u Selu,” is the English phonetic spelling of a phrase in the artist’s mother tongue, meaning “Celebration at the Village.”

In Evelyn Fichmann’s painting “Embrace,” the artist, a recent immigrant from Brazil, has incorporated words in English and Hebrew. “Encourage,” “include,” “educate,” “respect,” “engage” and “support” surround the image, all fitting descriptors of what we should strive to do in our communities.

Community Longing and Belonging runs until Jan 27.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

Whisper Across Time

Olga Campbell (seated) takes a break from signing books at the opening of her exhibit A Whisper Across Time, which also served as a launch of her book by the same name. (photo by Gordon E. McCaw)

The impacts of the Holocaust continue to reverberate. Even though most of the first-generation survivors have passed away, the next generations, the survivors’ children and grandchildren, remember.

Local artist Olga Campbell belongs to the second generation. Her parents survived the Holocaust, but her mother’s entire family was murdered by the Nazis. The need to give those family members a voice was Campbell’s driving force in writing her new book, A Whisper Across Time: My Family’s Story of the Holocaust Told Through Art and Poetry. Her solo exhibit with the same name, co-presented with the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival, opened at the Zack Gallery on Nov. 15. The night also served as a book launch.

“The art in this show are mostly prints from the book,” she said in an interview with the Independent. “There are also some pieces that are offshoots on the same theme, even though they aren’t in the book.”

Campbell has always known that her mother’s family didn’t survive the war, but the emotional impact of their deaths built slowly over the years. It took decades for this book to emerge.

“In 1997,” she said, “I heard a program on the radio about the second-generation survivors. Their words about the trauma being passed between generations resonated with me.”

She embarked on an artistic journey, and she is still following a path of exploration. Her art reflects her emotional upheaval. Her paintings and statues are fragmented, with broken lines and distorted figures, evoking feelings of loss and anguish. One look at her paintings and a disquiet tension washes over the viewer. It is apparent that a huge tragedy inspired her work.

In 2005, Campbell had a show at the Zack, called Whispers Across Time. “Even then,” she said, “I knew I had to write about my family. The art show was not enough. I had to say more, but, at that time, I couldn’t. I was too raw, too emotional. But my family kept tugging at me. I needed to tell their story. I was compelled to write this book.”

Unfortunately, she knew only the bare bones of her mother’s life. So she plunged into a deep and long research period, surfed the internet, contacted Yad Vashem and other sources. After several years, the book crystallized.

“My book is a tribute to my family, the family I never knew,” she said.

“Of course, it is only one family of the millions of families killed during the Holocaust.”

Campbell spoke of the relevance of her book in today’s political climate. “Our world is a chaotic place right now, somewhat reminiscent of the period before the war,” she said. “There are over 68 million people around the world that are refugees or displaced. My book is not only about my family. It is a cautionary tale. It is about intergenerational trauma and its repercussions across time.”

image - artwork by Olga Campbell — *(artwork by Olga Campbell)*

She created new art for the book, wrote poetry to supplement the imagery, and also included an essay on her family members and their lives, destroyed by the war. The paintings in the book and on the gallery walls are powerful but melancholy, even distressing.

“My work always had this darkness, the sadness, but also a bit of hope,” she said. “I never know what will happen when I start a piece. I’m very intuitive. I would throw some paint on an empty canvas and let my emotions and the art itself guide me through the process. I use photos in my works and digital collages. My finished pieces always surprise me.”

When the book was ready, Campbell applied for another show at the Zack, to coincide with the book launch.

“I wanted to give it the same name as the previous show, Whispers Across Time,” she said, “but I checked the internet, and there are a couple other books already published with the same title. I decided to change it.” The book and the show are called A Whisper Across Time. “I feel a lot lighter now, after the book is finished and published,” she said.

A Whisper Across Time is Campbell’s second publication. In 2009, she published Graffiti Alphabet. She has been doing art for more than 30 years, but that is not how she started her professional career. She was a social worker until, in 1986, she took her first art class. That year changed her life.

“It was such fun. I loved it,” she said. “I went back to work afterwards but it didn’t feel as much fun. I decided to get an art education. I enrolled in Emily Carr when I was 44.”

Campbell finished the art program, continued working part-time as a social worker, and dedicated the rest of her time to painting, sculpture and photography.

“I’ve been a member of the Eastside Culture Crawl for 22 years, since its beginning,” she said. “I participated in the Artists in Our Midst for many years, too. At first, when people asked me, I would say I do art. Now, I say, I’m an artist. I must be. That’s what I do. I’m retired now, but I did art when I was working, too, and it was always very healing and rewarding – still is…. If, for some reason, I don’t paint for awhile, I feel as if something is missing.”

The A Whisper Across Time exhibit continues until Dec. 9. For more about her work and books, visit olgacampbell.com.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].