UNESCO World Heritage Site

Yes, another World Heritage Site!
In past years I have created pieces based upon these Canadian UNESCO sites: the Rocky Mountain Parks in Alberta + L'Anse Aux Meadows in Newfoundland + Haida Gwaii (SGand Gwaay) in British Columbia + Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta + Quebec City in Quebec...

My latest interest is JOGGINS FOSSIL CLIFFS in Nova Scotia on the Bay of Fundy.

Employing a technique I have used in other series, I am drawing with free machine embroidery stitch on archival tissue paper.

Piece #1 is fish fossils...

Close up - tea dyed, waxed, black thread...

Piece #2 is the Ammonite shell...
Starting phase - draw and colour

Close up of the stitching...

And the final pieces framed...

I can't wait to present them to the public and hear their comments on them!

Calyx Fine Art Sale

Here are the other 2D wall pieces that I had at the Calyx show. They are done in the theme of UNESCO World Heritage Sites located in Canada.

From the rolling hills of L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, these two pieces explore the Celtic connection in Canada and the voyages of the Vikings 1000 years ago:


The parks of the Rocky Mountains (Banff in particular) were the first UNESCO sites in Canada over 100 years ago. The railways were encouraging visitors to view this natural occurring magnificence and build hotels (promoted as 'Castles of the Rockies') along their lines. This series included the Banff Springs, Chateau Lake Louise and Chateau Frontenac in the east. This one is the Prince Of Wales hotel in Waterton National Park in southern Alberta.

Called 'The Tide Remains The Same' the artist statement for this pieces reads:
The power of nature to sustain or destroy humanity is immense. Without action to preserve the earth and the ecosystems that nourish us, we will all fade away, leaving only the evidence of our presence; skeleton, bone and shell. UNESCO World Heritage Sites have been established to ensure the epic human story of civilizations rising and falling teaches us this truth.

Winnipeg Work - art shown in Edmonton

Showing at the McMullen Gallery in Edmonton from April through June this year, I contributed three pieces to the Articulation show on "Urban Textures" inspired by our study session back in 2006 to the city in the centre of Canada (horizontally at least!)

One piece, called "Motif de Fleur" as a nod to the French settlers, is based upon the Bas Relief flowers that decorated the outer walls of the stately banks where, in early 1900 Winnipeg, twenty banks once lined Main Street.

This art has been hand and machine stitched upon archival tissue paper; coloured with chalk and oil pastels; then tea dyed to age the finished piece. Golds of different types and colours were then added as a final gilding.



Another piece is inspired by the immigrants who came to Canada at the turn of the century. Called "Gateway To The West" it tells the story of European immigrants who sailed to Canada landing in either Halifax or Montreal, boarded trains for Winnipeg, then spent time there accumulating household goods before heading out in wagons to their new lives on Government issued homesteads on the Canadian Prairies. Winnipeg truly was the gateway to the west for them.

My family was among these in the 1890s. Both my mother's and father's families moved from the same small village on the Austria/Ukraine border to a small town in central Alberta. This piece shows statistics of the different cultures who were coming west. Squares are hand painted and stamped reminiscent of the plowed fields; the saying "Come to Canada, the land of your future" is written out in various languages that would have been used in Europe to promote immigration; and the names of countries who sent the most settlers are scattered throughout.



My third piece shows the different types of lilies that can be cultivated in Winnipeg's prairie climate. The many different gardens in Assiniboine Park shows locals and visitors to the city the vast range of flowers that can be grown in their global temperate zone.

Again this piece is done on tissue paper, machine stitched, hand coloured, with borders of stitched, melted felt.

Back to reality...

This spring has been so hectic with travel that since I've returned from my last trip I am just hunkering down and vegging at home - can you tell by the date of the last blog entry!?!

2009
The month of March in Artist Residence in Banff...
April travelling the US Southwest...
May bonding with friends on Vancouver Island (more on that next post)...
My daughter's university graduation...
Finally being able to use the cabin since the floods of 2005 when we had 9 feet of water inside - the past summers have been spent cleaning and rebuilding...

And working on upcoming shows...

This week Lesley and I drove to Edmonton to take down the show at the McMullen Gallery on the main floor of the University of Alberta Hospital. This show, based upon the architecture of downtown Winnipeg, Manitoba, is moving to the Mennonite Gallery in Winnipeg in September and will be twice as big as the Edmonton show - so we are all hard at work in our studios producing more masterpieces.

Urban Textures at McMullen Gallery

Articulation's show on Winnipeg's historical Exchange District has been hanging at the University of Alberta Hospital in the McMullen Gallery since April and several of us living in Calgary have made the drive up to Edmonton every other Thursday to teach workshops as part of their art program. I finally got some photos of the exhibit, but encourage you to go to Lesley Turner's blog as she has been featuring each artist with closeups of their work.





This show moves to Winnipeg and the Mennonite Cultural Centre in September and as it is a much larger space to exhibit in, we are all busy producing more work to hang in the fall.

Banff - Day 20

A day for catching up with business items - coordinating the visitors coming over the next week, arranging the poster for our show next Friday, checking our instructor out, and taking all of our art work down from the classroom studio space. Finally got into the Leighton Studio this afternoon and finished hand stitching the orange squares onto the pinkish background - had a lovely talk with Martha about it and it has now changed shows - moved from the Women Rock body of work into the Winnipeg one. I have 5 new pieces planned for the Winnipeg showing of Urban Textures as that gallery is twice as big as the Edmonton one. She never changed our direction, rather tweaked our thinking and made us realize "oh yeah, that was my original thought all along." Enforced the 'follow your instincts' methodology.

Another Friday night and another concert. This time the group of 4 young women from Russia in a string quartet called Rusquartet played the work of Dutch modern composer Louis Andriessen. They are heading to Vancouver for the "Andriessen at 70" music festival to celebrate the composer's 70th birthday. The group was last in Banff for the international string quartet competition in 2007. The CBC was there to record the concert and you can listen to them. Click here.

Urban Textures 1

Well, back to work now that the arm is mostly healed. The exhibition in Edmonton is coming up in the new year so it is time to get working on pieces based upon the historical district in downtown Winnipeg. I am concentrating on old signs painted onto the sides of buildings, so going for the effect of layering, erosion, faded beauty...

At the moment I am pulling out fabrics and threads for colours to work in; checking out techniques to portray the time worn images; and stitches to use in the work. Busy times ahead!

McMullen Gallery Workshops

May 22nd had Lesley Turner and I, along with my classical guitar playing son, head to Edmonton to teach a workshop in the gallery where our art was hanging. With his guitar music in the background, Lesley and I invited patients and visitors into our shop to partake in some creative darning. Using pictures of UNESCO sites in Canada for inspiration, along with samples in our work on the walls, we encouraged our guests to join us in the meditative process that stitching is all about. Working on squares of burlap and using tapestry needles, strips of torn cottons and silks, and yarns, they were encouraged to add layers upon layers to portray their chosen picture in terms of image or simply colour.

We returned to Edmonton approximately every two weeks over the run of the exhibition and felt privileged to be able to share our talents with those in need of a getaway from the stress of hospital life.

Travel Time!

So much news! I have been away for all of May - first to Barcelona, Spain, then Provence and Cote d'Azur, France; returned to Canada then headed off to Sooke on Vancouver Island - will be posting pictures and impressions soon.

Back home and travelling to Edmonton to teach workshops every two weeks at the McMullen Gallery; preparing for Nectar exhibit in August; plus being invited to join the TD Waterhouse 3rd annual Art Show in a couple of weeks is keeping me busy - not to mention the gardening!

Here is some wonderful metal work on the front door of a church in Frankfurt, Germany.

McMullen Gallery Artist Reception

April 24th saw Lesley Turner and I returning to Edmonton for a busy day in the gallery. After teaching a workshop in contemporary darning in the afternoon, we then hosted an information session for gallery staff over dinner, and then the artist reception in the evening. The gallery filled up and a steady crowd kept us busy all evening. Many acquaintences from my childhood days in Sherwood Park attended and it was wonderful to see so many familiar faces and to catch up. We explained our art and the UNESCO theme and had people pinning a world map of heritage sites they had visited, and fillling out a form letter nominating their favourite special places in Canada to be included into the UNESCO family. An eventful day all around!