| While Alberta Scene, the big party to showcase the province’s creative output, continues in Ottawa until May 10, there is no shortage of artistic activity taking place right here in Calgary.
One of the more intriguing – not to mention, briefer – local offerings this month is a three-day show called Eight to the Power of Five. It’s located at 536 - 9th Ave. S.E. (one block east of the now-defunct King Edward Hotel), has its opening Thursday, May 5 from 6 p.m. until midnight, and only runs until Saturday, May 7. Featured is an exhibition by eight Calgary artists working in five mediums: paint, glass, metal, wood and stone. Go to the back door, up the stairs and check out the work of Peter Ford, Cindy Howard, Chris Jordan, Jeffery Klassen, Davis Martin, Mark Martin, Rob Nicholls and Shane Sutherland.
Calgary is also fortunate to be the location of two fine visual arts training facilities, both of which are presenting graduating students’ shows this month. Alberta College of Art and Design (ACAD) hosts its 2005 exhibition until May 7. For more information visit www.acad.ca. At the University of Calgary, the 2005 BFA graduating class exhibition takes place in the Nickle Arts Museum until June 10. This is a great opportunity to see the works of these students before some of it ends up in galleries from coast to coast. Also on until June 10 at the Nickle is Bev Tosh: One Way Passage.
At The New Gallery (516D - 9 Ave. S.W.) you can find Provenance, a show by 2002 ACAD graduate Anu Guha-Thakurta, who is the current chair of liberal studies at the college and is also known for her work in textiles. Provenance, which runs until May 28, explores how artwork is organized and presented. Selected objects included in the exhibition are available to be taken away by viewers.
Until May 19, Alliance Française of Calgary is hosting Saffron Robes and June Rain, a collection of paintings by Thép Thavonsouk, on the second floor of the Memorial Park Library building.
Meanwhile, Herringer Kiss Gallery (101, 1111 - 11 Ave. S.W.) is showcasing photography by Lynn Huntley-Wyczolkowski in an exhibition entitled Nature’s Perfection. Focusing on flowers, this photographer’s creative output is presented in Cibachrome prints, a largely forgotten form of photographic reproduction known for its deep, saturated colours. The show runs until June 7.
Down at the Truck Gallery, on the lower level of the downtown Grain Exchange building, is something called Rounding Error – Three Years of C0C0S0L1DC1T1 Projects. What is it? According to the gallery, it’s an "international group exhibition of audio and video work reflecting the narratives of escape technologies, urban paranoia, mobile structures, propaganda and transient architectures." This Luddite’s nightmare continues at Truck until May 28.
It seems an unlikely place for a visual arts exhibit, but the Calgary Science Centre (recently renamed the Telus World of Science) is showing the photographic works of Edward Burtynsky throughout the months of May and June. Although you have to pay to get through the turnstiles to see these photos, they are worth the price of a ticket. Disturbing and alluring at the same time, Burtynsky’s pieces detail locations such as pipelines, rail cuts and gas plants in the way that only a large-format camera operated by a master photographer allows.
The science centre is hosting other exhibitions of art throughout 2005 as part of Alberta’s centennial year celebrations. Beginning May 10, it will have an installation called Still Life with Rotting Fruit from Lethbridge-based artist David Hoffos. Using time-lapse photography that has been transferred to video and is projected in a theatre (and accentuated by the aroma of lemons and bananas), Hoffos once again presents viewers with a new perspective on some of art’s most tired conventions.
This year isn’t just the Alberta centennial, of course, but also marks the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. At the Museum of the Regiments there’s an art exhibit specifically to commemorate the liberation of Holland from the Nazis, in which Canadian troops played a major role. Called Orange Tulips: 1945-2005, it features work created especially for the occasion by Dutch artists. Hosted by the Honorary Consul of the Netherlands, it’s on display at the museum until June 28. |
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