Looking Back at BestB4 Collective Community Events — artist salon with Daphne Harwood and Debra Sloan

BestB4 Collective Salon featured a conversation between Daphne Harwood and Debra Sloan on Sunday, 06 December in the On-Tak Cheung Gallery at the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver. 

Daphne Harwood was one of the originators of the Imagination Market, a non-profit organization that promoted the reuse and repurposing of usable industrial discards. Now the building site where the Imagination Market was has been transformed by Vancouver City Council's approval of a 52-storey tower. Harwood spoke about how she has been documenting this transition in photography, journaling, quilt-making and assemblage.

Debra Sloan is a Vancouver-based ceramic sculptor and the 2015 recipient of the Mayor's Design and Craft Award. Her slip cast dogs, horses and baby figures challenge and surprise viewer assumptions and attitudes. Sloan's work has been exhibited locally, across Canada and internationally, and most recently awarded the Vancouver Mayor's Art Award and biannual Hilde Gerson Award by the Craft Council of BC. She spoke about her recent ceramic residency at C.R.E.T.A. in Rome.

Both artists discussed the influence that the environment had on their artist practice and bodies of work. Debra Sloan works in ceramic residencies that offer the opportunity to research both techniques and ceramics history. Daphne Harwood works from a documentary perspective, using journaling and photography as a starting point; her current work continues as Vancouver house progresses from the demolition of the original Imagination Market site to construction and eventually occupancy. 

Telling Story/a visual art exhibition continues in the On-Tak Exhibition Hall at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum of Greater Vancouver (555 Columbia at Keefer) until Saturday, 19 December. The gallery is open Tuesday- Sunday (11 - 5 pm). The limited edition exhibition catalogue can be purchased for $20 at the Chinese Cultural Museum. 

Looking Back at BestB4 Collective Community Events — an artist tour and exhibition catalogue launch

BestB4 Collective artists Jim Friesen, Daphne Harwood, Alison Keenan, Sophi Liang, Colette Lisoway, Edward Peck, Phyllis Schwartz, Debra Sloan and June Yun guided visitors through a  tour of Telling Stories: A Visual Art Exhibition at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum on Sunday 29 November. Artists told stories that enlivened their photography, painting, ceramics, fibre and installations and engaged viewers in dialogue about contemporary issues that weave together their collective exhibition. 


Telling Story/a visual art exhibition continues in the On-Tak Exhibition Hall at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum of Greater Vancouver (555 Columbia at Keefer) until Saturday, 19 December. The gallery is open Tuesday- Sunday (11 - 5 pm). The limited edition exhibition catalogue can be purchased for $20 at the Chinese Cultural Museum. 

Looking Back at BestB4 Collective Community Events — Tea and Storytelling

Sophi Liang, visual artist exhibiting in Telling Stories, organized an afternoon Tea and Story Party for the BestB4 Collective at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum on Saturday, 21 November. The first of three community events included presentations by Ben Fong, tea specialist and Jim Wong-Chu, historian and poet.

Ben Fong explains the purpose of two types of tea bowls

Fong demonstrated and narrated tea preparation techniques. This included several styles of tea brewing accompanied by a samples. A generous assortment of tea cakes and treats were shared along with stories about the history of tea and tea culture.

Wong-Chu read poems about Chinatown from Chinatown Ghosts, published by Pulp Arsenal Press. These poems prompted stories about Chinatown history and culture.

Jim Wong-Chu reads from Chinatown Ghosts

Well attended and well documented, Liang's Tea and Story Party lingered until late in the afternoon. Telling Story/a visual art exhibition continues in the On-Tak Exhibition Hall at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum of Greater Vancouver (555 Columbia at Keefer) until Saturday, 19 December. The gallery is open Tuesday- Sunday (11 - 5 pm).

Telling Stories in the Community

Colette Lisoway: Printmaking Demonstration at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum

June Yun's Calligraphy Workshop
at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum of Greater Vancouver

Telling Stories/a visual arts exhibition invited community to extend the exhibition through participating in workshops offered by BestB4 Collective artists Colette Lisoway (printmaking) and June Yun (Calligraphy). Both workshops drew sizeable crowds for afternoons of skill building and story sharing. 

Colette Lisoway explained the different techniques of transferring an image through a screen onto fabric or paper and also a discussion on colour. Very quickly the students loaded paint onto their screens and then the magic began. Everyone eagerly participated and at the end of the session each had an art work to take home.

June Yun's Calligraphy Workshop introduced the four treasures: rice paper, writing brus, ink and ink slab. Her hands-on teaching approach offered participants an opportunity to learn and practice calligraphy techniques with helped to better understand Chinese art and culture.

Telling Stories/a visual art exhibition continues through Saturday, 19 December in the On-Tak Cheung Gallery at the Chinese Cultural Museum (555 Columbia Street at Keefer), 11AM - 5 PM.

School Tours Continue — Britannia Secondary Students Visit Telling Stories/a visual art exhibition

Britannia Secondary School students in Ariel Boulet's Ceramics and Photography classes visited Telling Stories/a visual art exhibition on Friday, 04 December. They were greeted by Alison Keenan and Phyllis Schwartz,  curators of the exhibition, who introduced to the idea of conflict as a central storytelling element in the exhibition. Edward Peck, Jim Friesen and Debra Sloan spoke to the specifics of their work on show.

Edward Peck explained the process of discovering layers of storytelling on the graffitied walls in Berlin. He quoted Dorthea Langer: "A camera is a tool for learning how to see without a camera," and illustrated the application of this quote in his work.

The development of his series was the focus of Jim Friesen's artist talk. He explained how he used both sequence and title to develop the concept of a mystery unfolding in his landscape photography. In his talk about The Swimmer, he spoke about both poetic and narrative elements in his imagery. 

Debra Sloan spoke about the sources of the stories found in her ceramic sculpture. She focussed on character and conflict. She further explained that the sculptural surface offered the opportunity to add narrative landscape elements. 

BestB4 Collective artists will continue to work with these students in their classes at Britannia Secondary School, and their work will be displayed in the foyer of the Vancouver School Board in February.                  

Sunday's Salon — two artists telling stories about their stories (Part 2)

Debra Sloan: Whisper Sweet Nothings

Join the BestB4 Collective Salon for a conversation with Daphne Harwood and Debra Sloan this Sunday, December 6 (2 - 4 pm) at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum (555 Columbia Street at Keefer).

Debra Sloan: Maple Tree

Debra Sloan is a Vancouver-based ceramic sculptor and 2015 recipient of Mayor’s Design and Craft Award. Her slip cast dogs, horses and baby figures challenge and surprise the viewers’ assumptions and attitudes. Her work has been exhibited locally, across Canada and internationally and most recently awarded the Vancouver Mayor’s Art Award and biannual Hilde Gerson Award by the Craft Council of B.C. Debra Sloan has recently returned from a six-week residency at C.R.E.T.A. in Rome.

Sculptural work by Sloan in Telling Stories is from Horsing Around, a series that grew out of her experience as Artist in Residence at the Leach Potter in St. Ives. This series of horse and rider continued a solo exhibition at the Gallery of BC Ceramics(2015).

Debra Sloan: The Edge of Nowhere

Over time, says Debra Sloan,my figures have become what I call proto-human, neither male nor female, adult or baby. Landscapes and architectural references are about my environs and provide opportunity to add contextual layers. Placing my figures and images within metaphorical constructs, and outside of how we normally encounter them, is how I comment on our interaction with environments and society.

Debra Sloan: On the Merry-Go-Round

Debra Sloan: Riders to the Coast

Sunday's Salon — two artists telling stories about their stories (Part 1)

Join the BestB4 Collective Salon for a conversation with Daphne Harwood and Debra Sloan this Sunday, December 6 (2 - 4 pm) at the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum (555 Columbia Street at Keefer). 

Clay Model of Imagination Market (1989, artist unknown)

Daphne Harwood was one of the originators of the Imagination Market, a non-profit organization that promoted the reuse and repurposing of usable industrial discards. Now the building site where the Imagination Market was has been transformed by Vancouver City Council’s approval of a 52-storey tower. Harwood has been documenting this transition in photography, journaling, quilt-making and assemblage.

Harwood's work for Telling Stories is about two projects in her neighborhood. One project was The Imagination Market that was housed in 1435 Granville Street between 1986-89. The other project is happening right now: the building of a 52 story condo called Vancouver House, designed by Bjarke Ingels.  The installation pieces by Harwood look at the land and the transformations that have taken place on this land from 1850 until the present.  It maps the transition from virgin forrest near a tidal inlet, to a large land-clearing lumber operation, to a zone for light industry that gave way to homeless people, then to a complete razing in preparation for erecting a dramatic building and a new neighborhood complex.

Photo Essay of the transition
from Imagination Market to Vancouver House

In her own words:

I look at these neighborhood projects through several lenses: Impermanence—of buildings & land allocation & communities. Re-use—of materials that are generated by humans. This was a key feature of what Imagination Market did by collecting scraps from industries & business that could be reused for art, craft & play. And re-use is vividly shown in the demolition, excavation, & construction in the block where Vancouver House will go. The Non/Traditional Quilt in the show is made from scrap material. Mapping—my memories are often held in maps that I make of where I went, what I did.  Finally, people often say of quilts, “If the patches could talk what tales they would tell.” I wondered about all the occupants of 1435 Granville Street which was built in 1942. The building is now deceased and its body dispersed, but I did want to think about the “life" of this building. This is the lens of Honoring. The workers, engineers, architects, occupants,  tools, sewer line diggers, & new technologies and old.

The Salton Sea Eco-Disaster - I cannot look away

Phyllis Schwartz—Vacant

This series of photographs by Phyllis Schwartz  is a departure from her work in abstract alternative process photography. The images are monochromatic and stark as well as rivetingly close to their subject matter. What has caused this departure, especially when the work has been simmering since the winter of 2011? Having witnessed the ecological destruction on the shores of the Salton Sea, California’s largest body of water, the images were just too graphic and unworldly. How does a visual artist work with a set of images that seem implausible, yet at the same time so captivating? What are the implications of creating a series around these images that wander between a work of art, a statement of witnessing and a political commentary on our economically driven ecological disasters?

Phyllis Schwartz — Evidence

In the end one cannot really look away, as Phyllis Schwartz expresses in her subtitle, without becoming even more complicit than one already is creating these images. To look away is to do what is so often done, to pretend we are not part of the problem. We are collectively the authors of this series; even in Vancouver, the food grown in this area that flows 15,000 tons of phosphorus and nitrogen into this landlocked sea is the food we shop for on our grocery shelves. The cars we drive that are made in Mexico in the maquiladoras just across the border, emit a toxic stew mixed with sewage, and this flows down hill across the border into the Salton Sea. This artificial river is now the most toxic waterway in North America, we should not be looking away.

Phyllis Schwartz — Diminished

Schwartz's images are simple yet draw in the viewer; they are micro-compositions of areas no larger than a dessert plate. Abstract in presentation and mostly black and white with hints of colour, one can not help but think of Edward Weston’s work and the intimacy he expressed with the objects he photographed. Yet the images are not as subtitle, and unlike Weston, the images are much less rooted in the post modern culture that favours irony while making allusions to knowledge. It also seems to lash out at the pseudo-modern world of around us where iPhones and social media often gives the impression that one is immersed when often one is overtaken or swallowed up.

Phyllis Schwartz — Frozen

Telling Stories — inside the exhibition catalogue

BestB4 Collective launches their exhibition catalogue for Telling Stories — a visual arts exhibition this Saturday. Sassamatt Images has produced this catalogue with contributions from all exhibiting artists. The bi-lingual exhibition catalogue, translated by Toni Zhang McAfee and Sophi Liang (courtesy of the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver), includes a curatorial essay by Alison Keenan and Phyllis Schwartz, exhibition images and artist biographies. 

Telling Stories — the exhibition catalogue has been designed by Edward Peck and Jim Friesen. Both Peck and Friesen draw upon their respective backgrounds as writers and photographers who design books. Their sense of photographic composition is translated into a rhythmic sequence of images between the covers of their books. Edward Peck’s publishing career began in the 1970s as an editor of Canadian fiction, poetry and drama anthologies and assistant editor of the Canadian Fiction Magazine. His recent publications include exhibition catalogues and photographic documentation of artist studios. Jim Friesen studied journalism and creative writing at Red River College in Winnipeg and digital photography at Langara College, in Vancouver. As a poet and independent photographer, he has collaborated with Stephen Gross, of Gravity Press, to design and print books of their own work, as well as volumes of poetry for other writers.

This limited edition exhibition catalogue will be available at the BestB4 Collective's Artist Tour and Exhibition Catalogue Launch on Saturday, 29 November (2-4 pm) in the On-Tak Cheung Exhibition Hall in the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum (555 Columbia Street at Keefer, Vancouver). The catalogue will be available  for purchase at a special event price ($20). It is also available for purchase on line. 

Water and Mountain — an inspired installation

June Yun: Water and Mountain Installation detail

Mountains and Water,  June Yun's installation, was inspired by Banff’s sounding mountains and water and created during her  six week an IntraNation Artists Residency program in Banff Art Centre in the Summer of 2004. Aboriginal artist Shirley Bear Canadian introduced her to traditional papermaking; the process started with tree bark and then flowers, leaves and grasses were embedded into the paper. During the papermaking process, Yun transformed her experiences into the following poem.

Water
Like jade
Soft, heals your heart
Gives you life and comfort
No one can live without it
It is Yin
It is female
Soft flannel
Like with friends or lovers
Sweet, lingering…

When the moon is reflected on such water,
Waves galloping like white horses
Mountains loom with peaks
Like strong, solid shoulders
They are Yang!
When the great billows roll and smash against rocks
Mountains frame water a garden,
Give water a home
They are talking to each other for thousands, thousands years
A partnership forever…

Water, mountain (soil), wood, metal and fire are different
They all exist in the same world
and are a part of world
Water plays music for mountains
Mountains stand beside water, always
They are Yin and Yang’s harmony
Nature’s harmony.

The “Mountains and Water” poem inspired drawings, words and symbols on the paper, using ancient Chinese pictography style calligraphy to draw Yun's thoughts and what she saw in Banff (deer, clouds, river, birds, flowers, Yin and Yang, mountain and water). It extended and enriched her poem, and also reconnected her to her own ancestral tradition.

Mountains and Water is a three dimensional installation poem above. It may be read as a metaphor of Canadian life, nations within nation (IntraNation), a reflection of one's personal nature and culture [water, mountain/soil, wood, metal and fire], and the harmony of community sharing the mountains and water. Like the bark that eventually started a new work of art, June Yun started her new life in this landscape. The lights in the installation lead the way to a hopeful future to built in a new country. 

Strathcona Elders Telling Stories — Strathcona Elementary Students on an Interview Assignment

Joe Wai tells Strathcona students about architecture in their community
(image courtesy of the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver)

Strathcona Elders were interviewed by students from Strathcona Elementary School's as part of a Best B4 Collective community project. Participating students on this interview assignment are from Annie Simard and Cristina Fogale's grade 4/5 class.  They interviewed George Chow, Hilda Ho, Peggy Lee, Beverly Nann, Leander Szeto, Joe Wai, Bill Wong, Bing Wong and Larry Wong.

Telling Stories—a visual art exhibition presents stories by nine visual artists working in photography, fibre, painting, sculpture and installation is an exhibition designed to invite viewers into the gallery space to tell their own stories. Strathcona students had the opportunity to explore the visual stories as well as listen to stories from elders who grew up in the community presenting the exhibition. 

The students interviewing elders and listening to their stories have woven connections across generations and cultures. They have heard details about long, interesting lives that help students learn community history. Most of the elders attended Strathcona Elementary School, and in their interviews, students learned about what has changed and what remains the same. These interviews will be published on a future blog and displayed in the foyer of the Vancouver School Board in the New Year. 

George Chow tells his story to Strathcona students on assignment
(image courtesy of the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver)

Larry Wong Interviewed by Students from Strathcona Elementary School

(image courtesy of the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver)

Bing Wong tours Stratcona students through the Chinese Canadian Military Museum
(image courtesy of the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Vancouver)

Jim Friesen — Poet Photographer

 

Jim Friesen: Pitt Lake — Insuflation

Jim Friesen’s photography reads as a metaphor of oncoming disaster or the release of tension, implying the cyclical nature of storytelling. Having studied both literature and photography, he is interested in the dynamic between words and images and how the imagination is stimulated by their collaboration. Friesen's landscape series in Telling Stories is an experiment in that direction. His titles are doors to works of art, invitations to dwell in the visual space and contemplate. The sky, particularly, becomes a character in his photographic narrative.  The tension, meteorological and emotional, awaits a rapid pressure drop. 

In his own words, Photographs are an exploration. Photographers explore the world, and through their choices they explore themselves. The viewer enters the process which creates a narrative. Insufflation was the word that triggered the idea for the four-photo series in this show. It describes a process in both forensic sciences that has to do with revealing fingerprints. It also describes an arcane practice in the exorcism ritual. I hoped for titles that added a layer of meaning and inspired the imagination without limiting the responses of the viewer.

Best B4 Collective Artist, June Yun
speaking to Strathcona Elementary School visitors
about her appreciation for  Jim Friesen's Pitt Lake — Insuflation

School Tours Begin ~ Strathcona Students Visit Telling Stories — a visual art exhibition

Daphne Harwood welcomes students from Strathcona Elementary School

Students from Strathcona Elementary School visited Telling Stories—a visual art exhibition in the On-Tak Cheung Exhibition Hall on Friday 13 September. Grade 4/5 students in Annie Simard's class were  toured by visual artists Daphne Harwood, Alison Keenan and Phyllis Schwartz.

Questions about Imagination Market Quilts

Daphne Harwood challenged students to consider the story about impact of neighbourhood change in her quilts documenting of the demise of the building that housed Imagination Market. Alison Keenan posed questions about her series Avian Fables, paintings about the territory shared by avian and human inhabitants. Phyllis Schwartz asked students to consider the back story of food production and industry in North America, showing photographs of resultant environmental devastation.

Best B4 Collective artists will work with these students and their classroom teachers to learn interviewing and story writing skills for a project about Chinatown Elders. These students will return to the Chinese Cultural Centre to meet these elders to  interview them so that they can write stories about their lives. These interviews, along with photographs, will appear in subsequent blogs.

Looking for stories in Edward Peck's On the Wall Series

Students notice camouflage and landscape features in Debra Sloan's Rider to the Coast

Alison Keenan listens to students telling stories 

The Story behind the Story

Alison Keenan, Avian Fables 3 (2015)

Alison Keenan’s paintings explore stories in the surreal bodies of land and water, aided by avian guides, harbingers of seasonal and environmental change. These avian guides alert the viewer to a territorial power struggle. The constructed story shows a change in scale and perspective: angry birds eye their occupied territory from this perspective. From a bird’s eye view, there is a claim to land currently occupied rather than shared for mutual coexistence, and an aggressive stance invites speculation about each bird’s next move.

In her own words, Alison Keenan tells the story behind the story of her series on show in Telling Stories: a visual art exhibition. 

When I create a new body of work I often think of the possibilities of a series of paintings or drawings. Images/ideas start to percolate at the research level- although the process often starts with note taking, loose papers/jottings, conversations.

A gift of binoculars was the entry point for sweeping the skyline and focusing on wildlife. At some point I began to recognise bird migrations in spring and fall and realized that the life patterns and survival of birds was completely reliant and to some extent controlled by environmental climate changes. During many conversations/discussions, my observations on the changing weather patterns and human behaviour now shifted to the plight and narrative of birdlife.

Alison Keenan's work is currently featured in the current Emily Carr Alumni Calendar.