| Judgment day for the proposed Portrait Gallery of Canada is approaching, and a last-minute effort to rally support for the project is underway in Alberta.
Gary Olson, a portrait artist and instructor at the Alberta College of Art and Design, is urging Albertans to participate in a nationwide letter writing campaign to save the project from Tory budget cuts. But success, he says, has been limited.
"So far we haven’t gotten the momentum going in the West," Olson admits. "I’m hoping we get enough local artists behind this thing. The larger issue is the conservative government’s attitude toward art. This is just another battle in the big war."
While all is quiet on the western front, in the east, several high-profile members of the Canadian arts scene have jumped on board to save the gallery, including new media artist Vera Frenkel; Scott McLeod, director of the Prefix Institute for Contemporary Art; and Ruth Phillips, Canada research chair in modern cultures at Carleton University.
Today, more than one million portrait works by Canadian artists are sitting in storage somewhere in Ottawa, waiting for a new home. The planned location is the old U.S. embassy building in Ottawa, which requires significant expansion to adequately house the work. The federal government even commissioned high-profile British architect Edward Jones, designer of Britain’s National Portrait Gallery, to design the expansion.
The necessary construction for the gallery, however, has not begun. In 2000, Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government approved the project under then Heritage Minister Sheila Copps. However, while the estimated $22 million cost was approved, it was never committed to under the Chrétien or Paul Martin governments.
But in a pledge to trim $2 billion in federal spending, Stephen Harper’s Conservative government recently announced that the project will be reviewed. Backers of the portrait gallery have until September to justify its existence before the federal government. Heritage Minister Bev Oda’s office has only stated that all options will be examined.
The gallery will not have a particular focus, unlike Australia’s portrait gallery, which emphasizes photography. Instead, it will combine methods such as oil painting, acrylic, photography and new media to tell the story of Canadians, says Phillips, who helped curate the aboriginal component of the Gallery.
"This is a tremendously creative and exciting project," she adds. "It would be a tremendous benefit to Canadian artists and has been already. Taxpayers have already spent $9 million on this project and the building is already gutted."
Alberta may be where support is most needed, Olson says.
"We live in Harper territory, and it might have more validity if Albertans write letters. Thankfully, we have two months before it gets really intense. There are two months for artists to respond, but it needs to be done now," he says.
Olson has at least one other ally in the west. Adrianna Davies, a former researcher at the national portrait gallery in London, says a portrait gallery would be an important asset to a country concerned with national identity.
"We’re very conscious in Canada about nation-building because we live next to the States. In terms of differentiating our history, our character, we need museums, archives and galleries. These are absolutely essential for us to identify ourselves," Davies says.
Davies is also the executive director of the Alberta Heritage Community Foundation, an organization that aims to promote historical preservation, identity and research.
She also says the gallery in London has become a cultural hub.
"It nourishes the artistic community. The gallery in London is increasingly popular, and it’s not just because of all of these portraits — it’s because of the young artists that are commissioned to do portraits," Davies says. "(The portraits) are not always respectful. Today we are not so much in awe of monarchs, prime ministers or titans of industry. Contemporary portraiture is much more playful."
Davies also says that a national portrait gallery is an increasingly important institution for any nation because it really tells history from the perspective of individuals.
Canadians who wish to help the portrait gallery are encouraged to write a letter to the federal government’s Department of Heritage or their MP’s. |
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