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"The Basketball Game" is a graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada animated short of the same name – intended for audiences aged 12 years and up. It's a poignant tale of the power of community as a means to rise above hatred and bigotry. In the end, as is recognized by the kids playing the basketball game, we're all in this together.

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Category: Visual Arts

Complexities of Berlin

Photographer Jason Langer’s perception of Germany and its capital, Berlin, is a complicated one, and his current exhibition at the Zack Gallery, Berlin: A Jewish Ode to the Metropolis, reflects those complexities. Organized in partnership with the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival, the exhibit is Langer’s first show in Canada.

photo - "Boys" by Jason Langer, from his book Berlin
“Boys”  (photo by Jason Langer)

Langer’s newly published book, Berlin, includes 135 black and white photographs. A selection of these images forms the exhibit at the Zack, which has an emotional sophistication of its own, even though the show is being promoted as a prologue for the book festival. Both the show and the book catalogue the artist’s several trips to Berlin and his explorations of the city. They also provide visually compelling commentary on Langer’s contradictory and evolving feelings for Germany.

photo - A Nazi uniform in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp museum in Berlin. (photo by Jason Langer)
A Nazi uniform in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp museum in Berlin.  (photo by Jason Langer)

As in life, the then-and-now overlap and, occasionally, the juxtaposition of the past and the present are jarring in Langer’s imagery. On the one hand, Germany is the country where the Holocaust originated, the country that erased its Jewish population almost entirely and spearheaded the destruction of the Jews of Europe. On the other hand, it is a modern country of laughing kids, hardworking people and beautiful architecture, a country that acknowledges its past actions and tries to make amends to the Jews. It is a country inspiring fear, hatred, respect and admiration in varying measures.

Langer writes in an essay about his relationship with Germany and its progression from total negativity to growing understanding. When he was 6 years old, his family moved from his native United States to Israel, where he spent his formative years, until age 11, on a kibbutz.

“Every year, each children’s house would visit the Holocaust memorial, located on the kibbutz property, during Yom Kippur…. We were asked to walk silently and led into a courtyard with one building and three short walls,” writes Langer. “I remember the walls were made of large, rectangular stones, grey in colour and a bit rough and oddly shaped. We learned about how the Jews had suffered, first as slaves in Egypt and then in the Holocaust by the Germans.”

Later, as an adult, he “vaguely remembered having heard fearful stories of German people from my mother and grandmother, though my mother also made jokes about Germans, putting on a comic fake accent. She died in 2003 and I inherited her books, among other things, including a kind of illustrated encyclopedia titled The Wonderful Story of the Jews, written by Jacob Gewirtz. It was published [in 1970], not long before our move to Israel. The text refers to the Germans’ ‘unspeakable crimes’ against the Jews, as well as the ‘unending ravages of war, persecution and tyranny’ they had faced. Some of the illustrations are quite scary, showing buildings on fire and Jewish people menaced by gun-wielding Nazis. The book presents Israel as a place of refuge, the kibbutzim as almost unique.”

After being exposed to such ideas during childhood, Langer’s predominant feeling towards Germany was aversion. But then, in 2008, when he was already an established photographer, one of his friends suggested he photograph Berlin.

“He thought the city would be a good match for my sensibilities but I met his suggestion with trepidation and fear,” Langer recalled. “I harboured many preconceived ideas about Germans and Germany. I imagined Berlin as a vast, cold, unfriendly, gritty place, but, at the same time, it seemed exciting and sexy somehow.

“I decided to see Berlin for myself, keen to challenge my existing ideas and also uncover reminders of the Jewish people who had lived there, until they fled or were hunted down and killed by the Nazis.”

photo - Photographer Jason Langer’s exhibit at the Zack Gallery runs to Feb. 16
Photographer Jason Langer’s exhibit at the Zack Gallery runs to Feb. 16. (photo from Jason Langer)

In the next five years, Langer visited Berlin frequently. “From 2009 to 2013,” he said, “I made five trips for two weeks at a time. I stayed in a flat with about six people. When they were going on vacation, they would let me know, and I would fly over and occupy their rooms. They would also give me advice on where to go.”

During those visits, he took multiple photographs and strived to form a new narrative regarding his feelings and associations regarding Germany and its people.

“This work is an attempt to remember, confront and unwind my attitudes about Germans, Germany, Berlin and my Jewish inheritance; these images are part discovery, part remembrance and part fantasy,” he explained. “They’re my attempt to stand where Jewish people were rounded up and deported, to remember but also reassess. They’re an effort to confront my internal attitudes and prejudices, to look into people’s eyes and find a continuation of kindness, to be open to the happiness of contemporary life in Berlin.”

Some photographs in the gallery are full of anguish and terrible beauty, like the Holocaust Memorial, consisting of 2711 concrete slabs (stelae) of  different heights, or an ornate door of the Stiftung Neue Synagogue, built in 1865, the only synagogue in Berlin to survive the war, though its interior was burnt.

The horror of the war is also reflected in the image of an old, dilapidated shed, the “goat house,” where one Jewish family, a mother and a daughter, hid for several years to survive the Nazis’ attempt to exterminate Jews. No water, no heat, no electricity, just the women’s indomitable spirits and relentless wish to live.

Every photo has a story to tell. Many a story of heroism and tragedy. But there are other pictures, too, reflecting modern Berlin, the city of now. Laughing boys, a tired-looking woman, an anti-fascist demonstration, various streets and buildings.

Langer writes: “It was a strange mix of death and life.… There was a sense of youth, freedom and joy I felt in Berlin.… Whenever I wandered, I took it as a gift of prolonged, uninterrupted time for reflection.”

The artist’s wanderings and reflections led to the creation of the photobook Berlin.

“This book is not a document,” said Langer. “It is a dream within a dream within another dream. Berlin is immense, there was no way I could cast a wide enough net to what it’s like. Instead, I have painted a picture of then and now, pain and pleasure, some people who died long ago and those who are living and young, all from my own perspective.”

Berlin: A Jewish Ode to the Metropolis opened on Jan. 6 and will continue at the Zack Gallery until Feb. 16. For more information, visit jasonlanger.com.

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

Posted on January 27, 2023January 26, 2023Author Olga LivshinCategories Books, Visual ArtsTags Berlin, Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival, Holocaust, Jason Langer, photography, social commentary, Zack Gallery
Reflecting on life of creativity

Reflecting on life of creativity

Earlier this year, Claire B. Cohen published a book of her 30-plus years as an artist. She made it for family and friends, as a record of her artistic legacy.

“Art is a powerful and a creative force of self-expression. To create art is to develop an ability to communicate visually what cannot be expressed in words.

“By creating the process of art, we change the way we see the world,” Claire B. Cohen told the Independent. “In understanding ourselves, we find areas where we feel limited. In understanding ourselves, we stand up for ourselves and can present ourselves authentically to others. An artist’s creation is unique and original to their work.”

Earlier this year, Cohen published a slim volume, mainly with images that burst from the pages, outlining her 30-plus years creating art. We glimpse the range of her work – landscapes, portraits, semi-abstracts, flowers, multimedia collages and a compartmental series, in which colourful abstract canvases were “connected sequentially in a zigzag for using piano hinges.” Flow and fun describe this series, her portraits – both colour and black and white – capture the personalities of her subjects, her landscapes and collages are bold and full of movement but also balance. The book touches on her work as an art therapist.

Originally from Israel, Cohen came to Canada in 1964. She studied fine arts at York University in Toronto and the University of Ottawa, and later earned her master’s in art therapy and counseling from U of O in 1987. She had many solo exhibits and group shows in Ottawa, and elsewhere, over the years. The book takes readers to 2006, with an exhibit list to 2009. She moved to Vancouver in 2012.

“I continued to paint after moving to Ottawa, but my move to Vancouver changed my focus, since joining my family had taken much of my time, being richly involved with newborn grandchildren,” said Cohen. “However, I still continued painting and showing new work in Vancouver galleries, as well as donating paintings to different organizations in Vancouver, such as hospitals, Louis Brier [Home and Hospital], friends, and creating more collages and multimedia-based work. I participated in group art shows and sold some to the public.”

Cohen said her reason for producing the book “was to create a place to keep all of my art as a legacy to leave to my family in remembrance of my story. COVID times were affecting my spirit, my mood was down and … the idea came about to focus on creating the book for my family and friends.”

During the pandemic, Cohen said she started to lose her connection to creativity. 

“Friends cut off from each other, as much as children and family,” she said. “I slowly lost my energy and interest, as well as the need I once had to be close to my easel. The paints, the brushes, the colours all lost their meaning and the need I had to paint slowly deteriorated.”

She began to look back at her past, which, she said, “led me to wake up from my dormancy and questions such as ‘what is my meaning of life?’ I discovered my paintings in storage and wanted to create a book.

“I reflected further on my body of work and questioned: why did I dedicate my years to painting? Was there any purpose to it? The answer eventually arrived – yes. There are many purposes to be alive, and work as an artist, investing my life in art. In my case, most of it was to leave a memory to my next generation.”

Cohen’s most recent exhibit and sale was at Britannia Community Centre in 2021. Art can be cathartic, whether one is making it or experiencing it.

“The process of creating art has a great intensity and full force of emotions that lead to a freedom and release when the piece is complete,” she explained. “Looking at these pieces that I created many years ago leads to a sense of nostalgia and a softening of that intensity. These pieces have followed me through many moves and lives, and have a story of their own that has evolved with the emotions that once created them. The language of art cannot be explained in words, the language of these emotions is form, line, colour and brush strokes.”

This language can help heal, as Cohen well knows from her art therapy practice.

“The more we know about ourselves, the more we learn to grow and develop our abilities to stand our ground,” she said.

Describing art as “a powerful and unique way to explore our creative forces,” she explained that people who participate in art therapy use the “materials to express the self and communicate visually,” composing stories. In a group setting, they “collaborate and share with others … connect and integrate parts of his/her inner self, gain confidence and reduce stress in a supportive environment, with the aid of the instructor.”

It was both a dream and a need for Cohen to do art therapy and counseling.

“I realized that art is not just for selling and decorating homes, rather it was a way to find myself, to grow and see who I am, and to help others with their healing.”

To see Cohen’s body of work, go to clairebcohen.wixsite.com/portfolio/home.

Format ImagePosted on December 23, 2022December 22, 2022Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Books, Visual ArtsTags art, art therapy, Claire Cohen, family, health, memoir, painting
Artist advocates for nature

Artist advocates for nature

Lori Goldberg’s artwork reminds viewers that “that which we discard doesn’t disappear.” (photo from Lori Goldberg)

If you attend a performance at Queen Elizabeth Theatre, you will see the artwork of Lori Goldberg. She is one of the artists whose creations are at the theatre for another couple of weeks. The exhibit opened Oct. 29.

“Queen Elizabeth Theatre has a program for exhibiting artwork by local artists,” Goldberg told the Independent. “There was a call that was sent out a few years ago and I responded. I was accepted and the work was to be installed just when the pandemic began, so it was postponed until this year.

“It is an ideal venue,” she continued, “as thousands of people a week attend events at the Queen E.  My art has a message about climate change and it is important that it gets seen by as many people as possible. My pieces are on exhibit until Dec. 19, and people are only able to see it if they have a ticket to an event. Alternatively, I am available to take anyone interested on a private tour.”

The paintings in the exhibit come from three ongoing series: Plasticity, Poetics of the Discarded, and Reconstructing Nature.

“For many years, I have been investigating what happens when two opposing places – cities and nature – collide, connect and transform,” said Goldberg. “Through more awareness and experience firsthand, many of my works have ultimately been about the precarious relationship that we have with our natural world. Seeded in environmental advocacy, an animating factor in my practice has been reclaiming, recycling and reimagining refuse.”

photo - “Rogue Fish” by Lori Goldberg
“Rogue Fish” by Lori Goldberg (photo from Lori Goldberg)

In the description of Plasticity on her website, Goldberg mentions her discovery that ink can be transferred from, say, a plastic bag, to canvas. Her creative process invites such discoveries.

“I am a diverse artist and my ideas dictate my art,” she explained. “My practice has primarily focused on painting, but I have had to explore other mediums to adequately express my concept.  Besides paint, I have explored photography, assemblage and sewing.  I have worked with clay, glass, so-called ‘trash’ from my studio, single-use plastic bags that I fuse on canvas, and I have stuffed lost socks with fabric remnants given to me by tailors.”

For Goldberg, the camera is her “sketchbook” and a photo is generally the starting point for her painting.

“My work references the physical world at one point in my creative process,” she said. “When I research and gather information, I look for source material that is usually filtered through my own photo documentation. Other photo images can come from friends, the internet or by random discovery. I also use memory, dreams – and always my imagination. I take parts of photos that resonate for me and incorporate that visual language – usually recontextualizing and altering it – in my work.”

As an example, Goldberg spoke about the series Reconstructing Nature, which references nature/urban tensions found in Vancouver. “There is no lack of trees here and our city is in constant state of flux, with the demolishing of buildings and the construction of new ones, so I take photos of the nature that is all around me, but also of the scaffolding and cranes that are so prominent in the city as well,” she said. “In the Poetics of the Discarded series, I started by visiting a number of refuse sites, with an interest in memory and objects. Within the refuse, there were mounds and mounds of history: the detritus of days spent, life and death, business, conveniences used, sentimental things and so much more. I would photo-document these toppling heaps of refuse and re-contextualize and resurrect them as a visual reminder of the ongoing narrative between humans and their environment, reminding us quietly: that which we discard doesn’t disappear.”

photo - “Reconstructing Nature” by Lori Goldberg
“Reconstructing Nature” by Lori Goldberg (photo from Lori Goldberg)

While Goldberg does not paint on location often, she said, “My creative process is to go out into nature or the city, experience it, document it and return to my studio. Having said that, making work outdoors is becoming more interesting to me and it is a future direction that I plan to spend more time doing.”

With her art, Goldberg said, “I would like to think that I am creating work that is impactful to the viewer and especially the younger generation, that they will be empowered to take action towards making a difference as they engage with the world.

“The works are meant to be educational and I hope that they impart to the viewer a sense of personal responsibility – that they put to action what they feel and be one small ripple of change to create a better future for themselves.”

An educator for more than 30 years, Goldberg has taken her classroom outside and into the public arena, where, she said, “I create hands-on workshops using materials that address repairing the planet and healing ourselves. I created a project titled Lost Socks, where the public stuffed and sewed lost socks together to create a long tubular form that stood for connection, diversity and difference. Recently, I have used single-use plastic packaging to create wearable art. What I enjoy about these workshops is that they attract all ages and so it is intergenerational and accessible to all.

“Artists are essential in our communities,” she stressed. “Some of us choose to create work that challenges topics that are highly charged and sensitive, but, without venues in which to work and to exhibit, the messages cannot be passed on. I appreciate the exhibits I have had over my life at the JCC – I cannot imagine what would happen if we lost such a significant public space as the Sidney and Gertrude Zack Gallery. It is a venue for Jewish artists and Jewish content. It reinforces Jewish identity, conversations and connections. It is a gallery that has assisted me in my journey as an exhibiting artist and has given me opportunities to work with preschoolers, seniors and poets.”

Goldberg believes in giving back and donates her work frequently to different organizations, such as Big Brothers. “My recent donation was to Tikva Housing,” she said. “I gave them three paintings from my Judaica series. There is a satisfaction that is hard to explain, but it is a joy to be able to offer something of value to make others feel uplifted.”

Goldberg is currently applying for artist residencies in different parts of the world.

“I am interested in responding to the environment that I would be in and allowing it to dictate the direction of my work,” she said. “I want to contextualize my work in such a way that I am creating awareness about our healing of our planet but indirectly, through healing ourselves. Artist residencies offer opportunities for new perspectives and fewer distractions, so you can shed the restraints and discover what is there, but has been hidden.”

For more information, visit lorigoldberg.ca.

Format ImagePosted on December 9, 2022December 7, 2022Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Visual ArtsTags environment, Lori Goldberg, nature, painting, Queen Elizabeth Theatre
Art for wide variety of tastes

Art for wide variety of tastes

Margaux Wosk makes pins, magnets, necklaces and other items. (photo from the artist)

Last year’s Affordable Art Show at the Zack was such a success that the gallery is repeating it in 2022, just in time for the winter holidays. Gallery director Hope Forstenzer hopes it will become an annual tradition.

Everything in the show is less than $250, and the selection is wide enough to appeal to a variety of tastes. The participating artists are a mix of repeat appearances and newcomers. Some of the newcomers have exhibited in Zack group shows before. For the others, this is their first event at the gallery.

Margaux Wosk is one of the new artists. Their company, Retrophiliac, produces pins, magnets, necklaces and other items, many of which are priced below $20.

“I’m an autistic, self-taught artist, designer, writer, entrepreneur and disability advocate,” Wosk said. “I have been a ‘retrophiliac’ for a long time. I am inspired by retro and vintage styles, but I also want to celebrate neurodiversity.”

In addition to their company’s distinct merchandise, Wosk creates vibrant, retro-inspired paintings and mixed media work. “I hope to break down barriers and eliminate the stigma of neurodiversity,” they said. “With my art, I want to open a dialogue about what autistic and disabled people are capable of.”

Aimee Promislow, another new artist, works with glass. Her company, Glass Sipper, produces reusable drinking straws. “I met Hope [Forstenzer] a number of years ago,” she told the Independent. “We were both members of the same glass co-op. When she joined the Zack Gallery, she began reaching out to me for various events and shows. Last year, I participated in the Hanukkah show here. I’m excited to be part of the Affordable Art Show this year.”

photo - Aimee Promislow works with glass, making reusable drinking straws
Aimee Promislow works with glass, making reusable drinking straws. (photo from the artist)

Promislow summed up her creative path and why she chose it. “I have always, since a young age, dabbled in art,” she said. “My mother is an artist, Nomi Kaplan. She had introduced me to various art forms. After high school, I tried pottery, then glass enamel, then I played with resin. Eventually, about 15 years ago, I started melting coloured glass. I love colour and I love watching things form in fire. Glass is hard when cold, but, once heated, it is malleable, and I love moving it around.”

At first, Promislow made glass beads and sculpted little animals out of glass: dogs, cats, turtles. “At the same time, our family enjoyed smoothies,” she said. “The kids wanted straws for their smoothies, but the only smoothie straws I could find were plastic ones.”

Concerned about the environment, she combined her passion for glass with her care for nature. “I had a ‘eureka’ moment,” she recalled. “I realized that, instead of making glass beads, I could make reusable glass drinking straws and decorate them with my tiny creatures. That night, Glass Sipper was born.”

She also makes glass mezuzot and yads (the pointers used to read Torah). “They are perfect gifts for bar and bat mitzvah,” she said. “And everything I make is under $100, ideally suitable for the Affordable Art Show.”

Another glass artist in the show is Sonya Labrie. Her company, SML Glassworks, produces vases and other elements of home décor, as well as jewelry. “I’ve always created pieces that could be in anyone’s home,” she said. “The idea that art is to be loved and available to everyone in our community is very important to me.”

With such a mindset, when Forstenzer invited her to participate in this show, Labrie’s answer was an unequivocal yes.

“I started working with glass in 2005,” she said. “The first glass class I attended was at Red Deer College in Red Deer, Alta. Then I went on to complete a three-year advanced diploma in craft and design at Sheridan College, majoring in glass. I’ve also had the opportunity to study glass at the renowned Pilchuck Glass School in northern Washington.”

photo - Glass artist Sonya Labrie creates vases and other elements of home décor
Glass artist Sonya Labrie creates vases and other elements of home décor. (photo from the artist)

Labrie said she can’t imagine her life without creating beautiful things out of glass. “My body of work includes blown glass, flamework and kilns-cast items,” she elaborated. “Glass has endless possibilities, it is a challenging medium, and I keep discovering new ways of working with it.”

She also teaches glasswork for the Vancouver School Board. “I teach students grades 8 to 12 and I teach continuing education workshops for adults at the Terminal City Glass co-op.”

Unlike these company-owning creators, fibre artist Deborah Zibrik doesn’t consider herself a full-time artist. Not yet.

“I am a registered dietitian,” she said. “I’m still working part time, finishing a career that started in 1975. I will retire soon, after a research project at the B.C. Children’s Hospital Research Institute is completed. Until then, I simply don’t have enough time each day to work as a full-time artist. However, I consistently carve out ‘me time’ every day to complete some stitching. Ideas are constantly percolating in my head. Typically, many pieces are framed up or in the sketchbook phase at any one time. Perhaps the best descriptor for me is a part-time artist.”

Zibrik makes elaborate embroidered pieces. Some of them are like miniature tapestries, landscapes emerging out of fabric and threads. Others are tiny blossoms, beetles and butterflies that could be used separately or together, each one a delightful surprise. She also does golden embroidery.

“Smaller pieces are often whimsical and stitched quickly, with a minimum of stitches. On the other hand, my gold work requires hours to complete, and the materials are much more costly.”

Zibrik started learning needlecraft when still very young. “Like many girls growing up in rural Canada, I was taught by my mother and grandmother. They wanted to make sure I had all the critical homemaker skills, from crocheting blankets to mending socks…. Later, after 10 years of part-time study at Gail Harker Creative Studio, I completed Level 2 Design (based on a City and Guilds of London Institute in the U.K. curriculum) and Level 4 Diploma for stitch. Luckily for me, the studio is located in La Connor, Wash. That made it possible for me to attend sessions in-person to complete the evidence-based curriculum.”

photo - Fibre artist Deborah Zibrik makes elaborate embroidered pieces
Fibre artist Deborah Zibrik makes elaborate embroidered pieces. (photo from the artist)

After receiving her diploma in 2015, Zibrik decided to share her skills with others. “Time permitting, I have been teaching workshops for specific needlework techniques,” she said. “Guild members are my usual students. There is currently a discussion among the guilds about the lost generations of children who haven’t learned any of the needle arts, including embroidery; they haven’t had the exposure. Because of that, membership in the guilds is declining, as members age. I am considering ways to fix that. Perhaps I could offer embroidery classes to youngsters, maybe at the community centre level, to teach basic skills and prime creativity to future artisans.”

When asked where they see themselves on the scale of art versus craft, artists’ replies varied.

“I’m an artist and a designer,” said Wosk.

Promislow said, “I am a craftsperson. I use my medium to make things that are functional and beautiful.”

“My work rides a fine line between both,” said Labrie. “There is a fluid movement in my practice.”

“My personal journey suggests that, especially for women, craft and art are inextricably linked,” offered Zibrik. “More, they have been connected for thousands of years. They are but different places on the same continuum. In that sense, I am privileged to say: I am an artist.”

The Affordable Art Show continues until Dec. 30. And, if you’re visiting the exhibit Dec. 5-7 or 12-14, check out the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver’s Chanukah Marketplace, which takes place in the centre’s atrium.

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

Format ImagePosted on November 25, 2022November 23, 2022Author Olga LivshinCategories Visual ArtsTags Affordable Art Show, Aimee Promislow, Deborah Zibrik, gift ideas, glass, Margaux Wosk, painting, Sonya Labrie, textiles, Zack Gallery
Karabinskiy art for sale

Karabinskiy art for sale

An oil painting by Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy.

image - An ink drawing by Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy
An ink drawing by Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy.

Vancouver’s Furniture & Art Concierge, owned by Elliot Nitkin, has received the sole right to bring the work of Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy to Canada.

Karabinskiy, a Russian Jew, uses diverse techniques to express his artistic ideas: oil on canvas painting, tempera, pastel, ink on paper and lithography. In his work, Karabinskiy follows the artistic tradition of Eastern European Jewry, carrying on the work of Jewish painters such as Marc Chagall, Amedeo Modigliani and Anatoli Kaplan.

Since 1989, he has participated in more than 200 solo and group exhibitions, including ones in Norway, Germany, Holland and the United States, and he has been featured in numerous newspaper and magazine articles. His works are exhibited in museums in many countries, and are part of private collections around the world.

More information can be found at the artist’s website, karabinskiy.eu/en, and at theartconcierge.net/gennadykarabinskiyprofilepage.

– Courtesy Furniture & Art Concierge

Format ImagePosted on November 25, 2022November 23, 2022Author Furniture & Art ConciergeCategories Visual ArtsTags art, Gennady Karabinskiy, ink, painting
Culture Crawl set to return

Culture Crawl set to return

Suzy Birstein amid her work, some of which visitors to her studio will see during the East Side Culture Crawl. (photo by Britt Kwasney)

“I am most looking forward to healthily connecting with fellow artists and art lovers in real time, real space. Art is always more powerful in person,” artist Suzy Birstein told the Jewish Independent about the East Side Culture Crawl Visual Arts, Design & Craft Festival, which returns to its traditional format Nov. 17-20. Some 400+ artists will open their studios to the public.

“The sense of community, commitment, excitement, inspiration, appreciation – all that brought me to Parker Street [Studios] and East Side Culture Crawl originally is happening again,” she said. “It feels like a renaissance.”

photo - Photographer Esther Rausenberg, artistic and executive director of the East Side Culture Crawl
Photographer Esther Rausenberg, artistic and executive director of the East Side Culture Crawl. (photo by Adam P.W. Smith)

“After the two-year pandemic rollercoaster ride, I am thrilled we are back to a ‘new normal,’” said Esther Rausenberg, artistic and executive director of the Crawl, as well as a participating artist. “I do say ‘new normal,’ as we don’t have a crystal ball and I can’t really speculate how this year’s Crawl will play out. Personally, I am excited to get out and see all of the new and amazing art that has been created and to catch up with the artists. It’s also a real pleasure for me to meet members of the public as they share their enthusiasm for the event, the art and the connections they will be making with the artists.”

Birstein (clay, painting, sculpture) and Rausenberg (photography, Georgia Art Studios) are only two of many Jewish community members who will open their creative space to the public over the four days of the festival, which also features gallery displays, and artist demonstrations and talks. Other community members include, from Parker Street Studios, Shevy Levy (painting), Olga Campbell (clay, mixed media, new media), Mia Weinberg (painting) and penny eisenberg (drawing, painting); from Eastside Atelier, Lauren Morris (mixed media, painting), Ideet Sharon (assemblage, mixed media, painting), Stacy Lederman (mixed media, painting) and Karly Leipsic (mixed media); and, from the Arc, Lynna Goldhar Smith (installation, painting). Overall, festival-goers can explore about 68 buildings and studios in the Eastside Arts District, the area bounded by Columbia Street, 1st Avenue, Victoria Drive and the waterfront.

“This year’s event has a distinctly celebratory tone,” said Levy. “It is a reunion for Vancouver’s established art community, a chance to reconnect, to have meaningful discussions around art, not just with artists, students and educators, but with those who display art, like galleries and art management, and everyone who is excited to work together again.”

photo - During the pandemic restrictions, painter Shevy Levy started a new direction with her abstract work
During the pandemic restrictions, painter Shevy Levy started a new direction with her abstract work. (photo from Chutzpah!)

Thinking of the last couple of years, she noted, “What was fascinating about the immediate impact of COVID-19 was the sudden loss of collective connection – both human (face-to-face) and the collective understanding of what the future might bring…. When we were forced to isolate, I appreciated the introduction of art to the digital and virtual world, and how it helped the art world, in many aspects, to find new ways to connect with society. However, now I understand how much I, like so many of my colleagues, urgently need constant interactions with the community – 2022 Crawl is here to fill some gaps.”

Goldhar Smith – a multi-disciplinary artist who has spent more than 30 years in theatre performance with painting very much in the background – is excited about the chance to show her visual art to a lot of different people. “I especially love the opportunity to see their responses to the work and engage in lively conversation when it’s possible,” she said.

photo - Lynna Goldhar Smith
Lynna Goldhar Smith (photo from Chutzpah!)

Interested in integrating her visual art practice with her performance practice, Goldhar Smith said, “I have been building installations in my studio to that end and so, among my paintings and prints, visitors will see the beginnings of more conceptual ideas in some of the physical objects and paper sculptures in the studio.”

Whether abstract or figurative, Goldhar Smith seeks to express the intangible qualities of human experience in her work. “If I paint a landscape, it is as much an emotional or psychological landscape as a place,” she said. “Yet, at the same time, if I paint an urban crow or a heron, it is more an expression of honouring the urban wildlife, and reminding myself that I am in their domain. I hope that makes sense. Whatever I paint, I am like an improvisational actor, responding to the moment, with one brushstroke informing the next. The meaning emerges after the fact. It is not so much I make my art, as my art makes me.”

For Goldhar Smith, the pandemic was a dramatic reminder “that we need to behave more responsibly, more cohesively, with more compassion and care for each other – with more understanding of our connection to each other – and to view ourselves as part of nature and part of one planet all together. Yet, we are so divided. If there was ever a time for artists to get focused, this would be it.

photo - “Gloria” by Lynna Goldhar Smith
“Gloria” by Lynna Goldhar Smith (image from Chutzpah!)

“Artists, and art, have the privilege and responsibility of their voices,” she continued. “We need to use our voices to contribute to the global change that is necessary. We need to speak up with courage and make brave art.

“We need to be endowed with the respect that what we do is of great importance and we need to be valued, supported and encouraged because artists bring meaning and perspective and also disruption and confrontation with the status quo. We need to see how our art fits, not so much into the art marketplace, but as a central driver of change that can address the pressing needs of our time.”

Levy expressed a similar view.

“So many artists, myself included, produce artwork with an outcome in mind, such as an exhibition or career step,” said Levy. “The challenges of the past few years forced me to take the time to reflect on my own art practice, taking it to the next level by exploring new avenues and fresh approaches. I had to remove and free myself from that outcome. I was able to experiment and create work that connects me better to the meaning of being a better human and better artist, as opposed to a ‘professional artist’ operating within the structures of a commercial art world.”

Birstein also used the pandemic period for self-reflection. “The enforced isolation of the pandemic,” she said, “gave me the gift of time: time to create, experiment, reflect, all day, every day. This is a first in my art practice and I was very productive.”

Birstein created two bodies of work for two solo exhibits in 2021 and 2022.

“Tsipora: A Place to Land was exhibited at the Zack Gallery,” she said. “Tsipora is my Hebrew name, meaning Bird. Pre-COVID, the bird symbolized a freedom of spirit while taking flight. With COVID, it was a time to nest, to find a place to land.

“Frida: When I Have Wings to Fly was exhibited at POMOArts. Frida is a continuation of my art historical portraits, Ladies-Not-Waiting, inspired by Velasquez’ masterpiece ‘Las Meninas.’ This series speaks to Frida Kahlo as a symbol of feminine strength and empowerment: a person who transcended tragedy and transformed it into beauty. My sculptures and paintings invite the viewer to converse in intertwined stories of myself, my mother, Frida and other historic figures that embody resourcefulness, resilience and beauty.

“Materially, both bodies of work involved much experimentation with structural techniques, surfacing with fired and cold materials, addition of repurposed objects.”

For Levy, the last couple of years allowed her to start a new direction with her abstract work. “Slowly, I developed large-scale canvases that were marked by bold and expressive brushstrokes,” she said. “I am excited to share with the public my new collection, A Portrait of a Flower. My work demonstrates the flowers as a source of lines, shapes, negative space, gesture, colour and value, or another source of abstraction.”

The pandemic period also gave Levy the chance to explore more remote art communities. “Pre-COVID,” she said, “I used to share and exhibit my art within my immediate community. In the last two-plus years, I had more time to develop my social media presence and expertise. As an outcome, 2021 was the best year ever of showing and selling my work.”

Birstein also pointed to the technological silver lining of COVID. “With the necessity of communicating virtually while globally isolated,” she said, “I see the world of art opening in terms of compassion, imagination, inclusion, respect – all of this so apparent at this year’s Venice Bienale, from which I have just returned.”

In addition to the open studios Nov. 17-20, the East Side Culture Crawl features a multi-venue, salon-style curated exhibition called NEXT, which “explores the after-effects of living through a pandemic as we long for and ponder about what’s next.” There are also several other events. For more information, visit culturecrawl.ca.

Format ImagePosted on November 11, 2022November 9, 2022Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Visual ArtsTags art, East Side Culture Crawl, Esther Rausenberg, Lynna Goldhar Smith, multimedia, painting, sculpture, Shevy Levy, Suzy Birstein
Art of unweaving as midrash

Art of unweaving as midrash

“Romemu” by Laurie Wohl.

Laurie Wohl’s “unweavings” are currently on display at the Zack Gallery, until Nov. 8. The exhibit, Journeys, features two of the New York artist’s collections: the Shabbat Project and the Meditation Project.

“By unweaving the fabric, I make manifest what is hidden within the material – liberating the threads to create shape, then ‘reweaving’ through colour, texture and text,” says Wohl in her artist’s statement.

“My unweavings process came out of my concern with narrative and storytelling,” she told the Independent. “I began as a painter on stretched canvas over 30 years ago, but I came to feel that painting on a flat, rigid surface felt static – distancing me from my materials and my stories. So, I began experimenting, cautiously making slits into the canvas, then unweaving, thread by thread – engaging with the material, exploring it. My work became completely ‘unstrung’ by 1989.

“Unweaving became a meditative process that allows me to feel my way into the material at the same time that I am feeling my way into the spiritual texts that have caught my attention,” she said. “Liberating the threads – creating different forms physically – has given specific resonance to the biblical, spiritual and poetic texts that fascinate me. Both the words within each piece and the unwoven form suggesting these words serve as a visual commentary, a visual midrash. This process of unweaving, then reweaving with text, paint, texture and beads, becomes a modern interpretation of the narrative and ritual function of textiles.”

photo - Laurie Wohl
Laurie Wohl’s textile art is on exhibit at the Zack Gallery until Nov. 8. (photo from Laurie Wohl)

Wohl’s maternal grandfather was an Orthodox rabbi – “I was very close to him, going to Shabbat morning services with him, sitting with him in the intense quiet of a Saturday afternoon twilight, at the waning of Shabbat,” she said.

“I was raised in the questioning tradition of Reform Judaism and I have read widely in the faith traditions of Christian and Eastern religions,” she continued. “My work has grown out of my own search for meaning – what is important to me as an artist in our complex world – and from my exploration of a medium that’s congenial to this meaning. The events of our time and my own life experiences have captured my imagination, and led me to be concerned with possibilities for reconciliation, both political and religious – in post-apartheid South Africa, in Christian-Jewish relations and, after Sept. 11, 2001, in possibilities for interfaith conversations among Jews, Christians and Muslims.”

Wohl uses a heavy cotton canvas for her works. She describes her creative process on her website: “I first release either the warp or weft threads to create the desired shape. Various textures may be collaged onto the surface, such as fibrous papers, sand and pumice. My images and calligraphy are applied with modeling paste. I then apply acrylic paints to the surface, and a final thin layer of gold wash. Where gauze is used, the fabric is dipped in diluted paint, then hand-painted and embellished with fibrous papers. In the last part of the process, beads – prayers and marking points – are affixed with acrylic gel.”

Wohl’s textiles are held in numerous public and private collections, including the Museum of Arts and Design, and some of her pieces have been on long-term loan to U.S. embassies in several countries. Her works are recognized by the American Institute of Architects’ Interfaith Forum on Religion, Art and Architecture, and by the Surface Design Association, and she has exhibited in widely differing venues, from Jewish community centre galleries to university galleries to galleries in theological seminaries.

“One of the exhibits in a Christian theological seminary led to a feature on my work in a magazine, Christianity and the Arts, which led to my work being exhibited in a major church in Chicago – Fourth Presbyterian Church,” she said. “This led to a commissioning by the church of 12 pieces for their sanctuary. And that led to another commission in New York City by Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church.

“The pieces I made for these sanctuaries are my responses to the particular interfaith work of those communities and their Old Testament roots. The Psalms Project for Fourth Presbyterian’s main sanctuary consists of 12 large pieces…. The church asked me to use Hebrew as well as English calligraphy to underscore the congregation’s immersion in its Old Testament roots, and the psalmic motif emphasizes the Christian-Jewish dialogue to which that church is committed. The project for Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church uses texts from both Old and New Testaments, and Hebrew, English and Greek calligraphy.

“Between 2001 and 2010, as I was working on projects exploring the relationship of Christianity and Judaism, the necessity of expanding my work into the realm of Islam was percolating beneath the surface,” she said. “I had just moved to New York City when the events of Sept. 11, 2001, occurred. Experiencing the trauma and aftermath, and especially the demonizing of many Muslims, I began to think about how I, as an artist, could contribute to a better understanding among Jews, Christians and Muslims – to suggest a way that art can be used to mediate at the intersection of faith and politics. After extensive reading in medieval and contemporary spiritual texts and poetry in 2009, I began my 18-piece project – Birds of Longing: Exile and Memory – in which I explore the relationships among the three Abrahamic religions, using text, texture, colour and form. I relate spiritual and poetic texts from the Convivencia (the Spanish medieval period) to contemporary Middle Eastern poetry, particularly Israeli, Palestinian and Syrian. The pieces explore common themes of spiritual love, exile, nostalgia for Andalusia, poetry referencing Old and New Testament texts and the Qu’ran, and poetry speaking of mistrust of enemies, yearning for reconciliation.”

Wohl began the Shabbat Project after Birds of Longing, which had been an intense process. “I was somewhat exhausted spiritually – there seemed to be no end in sight to the fighting and misunderstanding in the Middle East, and xenophobia was heating up against immigrants and refugees coming to our borders,” she said. “I felt a need for spiritual renewal and turned to our tradition. The Kabbalat Shabbat service at my own synagogue – Stephen Wise Free Synagogue [SWFS] in New York City – is a wonderful blend of reflective and joyous music. Through wordless music – the niggunim – and through prayerful words set to music, we are invited to enter into the spiritual, the transcendent, both individually and in community.

“Music has long been an important part of my art practice. The pieces in the Shabbat Project embody prayers and psalms of the Kabbalat Shabbat and Shabbat morning services, both in terms of the texts inscribed and the form of each piece, which evokes – hopefully – the spiritual texts. I was fortunate to collaborate with Cantor Dan Singer at SWFS for a soundscape that is integral to and accompanies the project.”

Wohl shared the meaning behind a few of the works from the Shabbat Project. “The piece ‘Kabbalat Shabbat’ is a circular piece suspended from the ceiling,” she explained. “With this form, and using semi-transparent materials, I try to evoke the mystery and beauty of the Shabbat bridge. There are references to many prayers and melodies embedded in the piece: Y’did Nefesh, Ahavat Olam, V’al Kulam, L’chu N’ran’na.”

image - “Sanctuary: Mishkan” by Laurie Wohl
“Sanctuary: Mishkan” by Laurie Wohl, who explained: “The partially unwoven centre alludes to the bima and altar, and the piece includes words from Psalm 19, Yih’yu L’ratzon: ‘May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to You….’”

Another example she gave was “Hashkiveinu: Evening Prayer,” which, she said, “suggests a tallit or prayer shawl and embodies words from an ancient prayer. ‘Cause us to lie down in peace and raise us up, our Sovereign, to life renewed’: ‘Hashkiveinu, Adonai Eloheinu, l’shalom. V’haamideinu shomreinu l’chayim.’

“‘Romemu’ also echoes the form of a tallit or prayer shawl, and incorporates the praise text from Psalm 99:9: ‘Let us exalt Adonai our God  / and worship at His holy hill / for holy is Adonai, let us exalt.’ (‘Romemu Adonai Eloheinu / V’hishtachavu l’har kodsho / Ki kadosh Adonai Eloheinu, romemu.’)”

In total, 12 pieces comprise the Shabbat Project and the Meditation Project encompasses 11 pieces.

“For many years, the process of unweaving and working with spiritual texts has been a form of meditation for me,” said Wohl of the latter project. “Living in New York City at the beginning of the COVID pandemic, the incomprehensible numbers of those dying daily caused me to search for a way to find solace in a world turned upside down. Rabbi Angela Buchdahl, the senior rabbi at Central Synagogue in Manhattan, started a daily meditation practice on Zoom just then. I found comfort in her teachings and in the communal aspect of the meditation. Rabbi Buchdahl has continued the communal meditation once a week, and I have continued my meditation practice. The pieces in the Meditation Project draw on the teachings from her sessions and my responses to them. My hope is that the thoughts I held as I created the work will project a sense of mindfulness and serenity that viewers can carry with them.”

Format ImagePosted on October 28, 2022October 26, 2022Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Visual ArtsTags art, Judaism, Laurie Wohl, midrash, textiles, unweaving, Zack Gallery
Capturing community spirit

Capturing community spirit

Photograher David Cooper in a self-portrait.

David Cooper is renowned for the skill with which he captures energy and light in photographs and film. But the multiple-award-winning artist was not appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2020 only for his “innovative contributions to Canadian performance photography,” but also “for his dedicated mentorship of emerging artists.” One of the many ways in which he has shown that dedication is his support of the Downtown Eastside (DTES) community in which he is based.

Cooper has taken countless photographs for the DTES Heart of the City Festival since the annual festival began 19 years ago, and for Vancouver Moving Theatre – the festival’s main presenter, along with Carnegie Community Centre and the Association of United Ukrainian Canadians – for at least three decades. The festival photo sessions at his studio have been community-building gatherings and the festival provides copies of their photos to the culturally and socially diverse artists who live, perform and create in the neighbourhood. This year’s Heart of the City takes place Oct. 26-Nov. 6, with more than 100 events throughout the DTES and online.

photo - Larissa Healey, from the Heart of the City Festival, in a photo taken by David Cooper
Larissa Healey, from the Heart of the City Festival, in a photo taken by David Cooper.

It was Vancouver Moving Theatre co-founder Terry Hunter who introduced Cooper to the Heart of the City Festival, since it involved artists, writers, singers and storytellers and Cooper’s career has always been in the arts. Though that wasn’t always where his interest lay.

“I started training at U of T [University of Toronto] for architecture,” Cooper told the Independent. “It was a five-year undergraduate program and I came out west after my second year, as a break. I’ve always had a camera but never had formal photography training beyond a summer course at Banff when I was a teenager. Through a friend, I checked out a local theatre company to see if they needed any photos taken. Eventually, I was given a chance to shoot a play at the Vancouver Playhouse Theatre, directed by Christopher Newton. They were really excited about the results from a dress rehearsal and offered me a job. I spent four years there in the publicity department, also creating posters and marketing material.”

Cooper is from Forest Hill in Toronto. He grew up in a conservative Jewish neighbourhood. “I went to Hebrew school but I stopped practising Judaism when I moved out west from my family,” he said. “I still go back for special occasions and joined the JCC here in Vancouver.”

As a theatre, dance and music photographer for more than 40 years, Cooper’s photos and videos have publicized more than 60 companies throughout Canada and the United States. The Shaw Festival, Bard on the Beach, Arts Club Theatre, the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, 605 Collective, Karen Flamenco Company, Vancouver Opera, Vancouver Symphony, Electra Women’s Choir, Chor Leoni Men’s Choir, Spirit of the West and Uzume Taiko Drummers are just a dozen-plus of the groups with which he has worked. He has been a stills photographer for several TV series and his dance videos have been shown internationally. In addition, he teaches and mentors students, holds workshops for both amateur and professional photographers, and photographs for theatre and dance schools.

Among the many recognitions Cooper has garnered, he received a Jessie Richardson Theatre Award in 1995 for his outstanding contribution to the Vancouver arts community and was elected a pioneer member of the B.C. Entertainment Hall of Fame in 2006.

“I’ve mostly been a theatre photographer, shooting live shows,” said Cooper. “I spent 15 years shooting film and transitioned to digital in 2001. It was a Canada Council grant in 1978 that took me to the Royal Winnipeg Ballet to learn more about ballet and I spent two weeks in class and rehearsals documenting the process.”

Firefly Books in Ontario recently published the coffee table book David Cooper Body of Work: Theatre and Dance Photography. Each of the 500 copies published includes a limited-edition print signed by Cooper.

photo - Only 500 copies of David Cooper Body of Work have been printed
Only 500 copies of David Cooper Body of Work have been printed.

“I have worked with a great graphic designer and art director, Scott McKowen, for 30 years, photographing marketing materials for the Stratford Festival, the Shaw Festival, Yale Repertory Theatre, Canadian Stage, Theatre Calgary and others together,” said Cooper of how the publication came to be. “He suggested we compile all our work into a book and include my dance work that is separate from the theatre.”

According to Firefly’s website, the book includes essays on Cooper’s theatre photography (by Newton, artistic director emeritus of the Shaw Festival), on his dance images (by Vancouver writer and arts commentator Max Wyman) and on his marketing images (by McKowen). Ballet dancer Evelyn Hart “has contributed an appreciation, and Cooper himself discusses the most intimate relationship between photographer and subject – portraiture.”

When asked what the most gratifying parts of his career are, Cooper told the Independent: “Working with talented performers. Getting to travel all across Canada and the U.S. shooting for different arts organizations.”

For more information on Cooper, visit davidcooperphotography.com. To purchase a copy of David Cooper Body of Work, go to fireflybooksstand.com. And for the lineup of this year’s Heart of the City Festival, check out heartofthecityfestival.com.

Format ImagePosted on October 7, 2022October 5, 2022Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Visual ArtsTags dance, David Cooper, Downtown Eastside, DTES, Heart of the City, photography, theatre, tikkun olam
Occupying the same space

Occupying the same space

Megs Gatus’s solo exhibit, Leaves in Space, runs until Sept. 22 at the Zack Gallery. (photo from Megs Gatus)

Megs Gatus – whose solo show, Leaves in Space, opened at the Zack Gallery on Aug. 24 – unexpectedly stumbled onto an artistic path.

“It started for me when I saw a photograph of a butterfly,” she said in an interview with the Independent. “It was in 2010. I was fascinated by that picture. I thought maybe I could be a photographer too.”

She had never taken photos before that day. She came to Canada in 2002 from the Philippines and worked (and still works) for the City of Vancouver. “But there is a creative gene in my family,” she said. “My brother is a contemporary dancer. My sister sings. I decided I wanted to be a photographer.”

In 2011, Gatus signed up for a photography workshop at a local community centre. “I bought my first camera from Craigslist,” she recalled. “It was only a hundred dollars.”

After that, she started taking photos. Portraits, flowers and landscapes were among her favourite subjects.

“I joined an online photography group on meetup.com because I wanted to share my pictures with the others,” she said. “I was amazed when the group picked my photos to display on their website. It was so encouraging. Later, a friend told me I had an eye for composition. I was elated. I wanted to learn more about the photographic art, so I enrolled in the Emily Carr certificate program, evening classes.”

She kept up her daytime job through it all, even as she graduated from Emily Carr University of Art + Design in 2018.

“I never stopped taking photos,” she continued, “but, by that time, I stopped being interested in reality photography. I didn’t want my photos to reflect the objects by themselves, the way they are off camera. I wanted people to see my photographs as an art form, different from reality. I wanted my pictures to invite curiosity in viewers.”

Gatus began experimenting with her camera settings. She also tried to move the camera while taking the photos, and the results meshed perfectly with her artistic vision. No recognizable objects manifested in her images when she used the technique called intentional camera movement, combining it with multi-exposures.

Each image is a play of colours and patterns, abstract and bright. The lines and the colours dance together in her photographs, which look more like paintings. She seems to invite viewers to use their imagination, while she herself explores every possible hue and shape to convey her ideas. Her camera is her paintbrush. “I do everything inside my camera. No Photoshop,” she said.

In 2016, Gatus joined Photoclub Vancouver. Since then, she has participated in many of their group exhibitions, including those the group held annually at the Zack Gallery. She liked the energy of the gallery, so, a few months ago, put forward the idea of a solo show and it was accepted.

“This is my first solo exhibition in a gallery space,” she said. “But I had a show recently in the Britannia Art Gallery, together with another photo artist, and I often display my works in several coffee shops.”

photo - “Edges” by Megs Gatus
“Edges” by Megs Gatus.

Gatus created all the work displayed in the current show during the pandemic. “We all felt so isolated, but we all occupy the same space. We are all responsible for our environment: plants, leaves, flowers. That’s why I used the shape of a circle,” she explained. “I took photos of nature: autumn leaves and spring flowers, and the circles enclose them. The circles symbolize all of us. That’s what the name of the show means: Leaves in Space.”

No image in the show looks like a standard photograph. One doesn’t see leaves or trees, but rather abstract compositions throbbing with life and fantasy. They could be science fiction illustrations of distant galaxies, visual representations of a soul or screenshots from a computer game. Or just beauty emerging from the artist’s insight.

“I like taking photos of organic matter. Leaves, plants, flowers – they are all alive,” she said. “I take photos in parks and gardens around B.C. I only enhance the colours a little inside the camera. Through my technique, the images become abstract, and I try to find ways to present them differently. I want to engage viewers.”

Besides the images hanging on the gallery walls, Gatus also offers large silk scarves for sale. All the scarves are imprinted with the photographs she used in the exhibit. The same swirls of colours in a different medium look surprisingly different, almost unrecognizable, but still pretty and vibrant.

“Sales are not my motivation,” she said. “I want to show my pictures, to share them with people.” That’s why she enjoys commissions. “A client of mine liked one of the pictures in this show so much, she asked me to enlarge it and she put it in her spa office.”

Gatus has big plans for these works after their run at the Zack Gallery.

“I’d like to exhibit this collection in other B.C. cities: Surrey, Port Moody, Langley. Later on, maybe even in Toronto and Montreal. I’m going to retire soon, and then I will dedicate all my time to my art.”

Leaves in Space continues until Sept. 22. The official opening reception will be held at the gallery on Sept. 8, at 7 p.m. To learn more, visit the website megsgatus-abstract.myportfolio.com.

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

Format ImagePosted on September 2, 2022September 2, 2022Author Olga LivshinCategories Visual ArtsTags art, Megs Gatus, nature, photography, Zack Gallery
Sculptures inspired by Kahlo

Sculptures inspired by Kahlo

“She Was Like a Walking Flower, Centred by a Rod of Steel,” by Suzy Birstein, inspired by Frida Kahlo’s “Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940.”

“She Was Like a Walking Flower, Centred by a Rod of Steel,” by Suzy Birstein, was inspired by Frida Kahlo’s “Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940.”

photo - “She Was Like a Walking Flower, Centred by a Rod of Steel,” by Suzy Birstein, inspired by Frida Kahlo’s “Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940”
“She Was Like a Walking Flower, Centred by a Rod of Steel,” by Suzy Birstein, inspired by Frida Kahlo’s “Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940.”

In her artist’s statement, Birstein writes about this ceramic work: “‘Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940,’ is one of my favourite Frida self-portraits. In it, she is at her most beautiful, surrounded by flowers, butterflies, her monkey and cat. Her direct stare compels us to reflect upon her body in pain, her complex relationship with Diego [Rivera] and her relentless drive.

“The metal headdress references an iron-clad spirit, topped with a golden bird holding my mother’s pill box. Both Frida and my mother required medication to alleviate their pain, which they housed in these beautiful containers.”

Birstein’s solo exhibit, When I Have Wings to Fly, opened at the Port Moody Arts Centre in the Canadian Pacific Gallery July 28 and runs to Sept. 4. For more information, visit pomoarts.ca/exhibitions/when-i-have-wings-to-fly.

– Courtesy Port Moody Arts Centre

Format ImagePosted on August 19, 2022August 18, 2022Author Port Moody Arts CentreCategories Visual ArtsTags art, ceramics, Frida Kahlo, PoMoArts, Port Moody, sculpture, Suzy Birstein

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