Standing Figure II
Standing Figure II
collagraph
97 x 63 cm.
by Marja-Leena
by Marja-Leena Standing Figure I
Standing Figure I
drypoint & etching
105 x 69 cm.
by Marja-Leena Olga Campbell exhibition
(Images copyright of the artist, used here with her permission)
WHISPERS ACROSS TIME, paintings, prints and sculpture by Olga Campbell
Opening reception on Thursday, April 21, 2005, from 7 to 9 p.m.
Gertrude and Zack Gallery, 950 West 41st Avenue, Vancouver
The exhibit runs until May 18, 2005.
Olga’s statement about her work:
“It started with a whisper – reminding me of things forgotten, things past – then it became deafening in its explosion of feelings.”
Olga Campbell’s mother lost her whole family in the Holocaust. She knew that everyone died in concentration camps, but could never find out when or where. She escaped the same fate only because she was arrested by the Russians at the Polish/Russian border in 1939 and taken to a russian prison camp, where she gave birth to a baby girl who only lived for a few days.
Two years ago, it became evident that the feelings caused by this tremendous loss, were transmitted from mother to daughter and had their origins in these events which took place over half a century ago.
Olga Campbell then embarked on a difficult and emotional journey into the past. Through the internet and Yad Vashem, she was able to get information about her family. She found articles and photographs, saw artwork and received letters from a person who had known members of the family. The bare facts, the bare bones which she had grown up with were fleshed out by this information and took on a new life. She felt surrounded by family, as if they had just been waiting to be heard. She then translated this journey into art, her medium of expression, also because most members of the family who perished were artists.
This exhibition deals with memories and losses. Many of the pieces in the show are fragmented, broken in appearance. Half there, half not. The presence of things, the absence of things. The presence of people, the absence of people. The materials used reflect this. Masks made of wax and straw show the ephemeral nature of life, broken, scarred- not whole, fragile, fragmented, but still there. Bronzes dealing with the difference between the inside and the outside. Rusted metal figures in groups against a backdrop of metal with negative spaces where the figures once were. An inherent connection between past, present and future. Life as a progression. The other works in the exhibit, ceramic sculptures, mixed media, photographs and text echo the same theme. But the artwork also portrays a sense of resurgance, a life spirit which emerges from the devestation of the past. This is a tribute to a family. Giving them back their identity and their dignity.
Olga Campbell has been doing art since 1993, when she graduated from Emily Carr School of Art and Design. She does sculpture, printmaking, mixed media and photography.
Olga Campbell is a member of the Art Institute, Sculpture at Capilano College**. I came to know her during her visits to the printmaking studio to do some digital prints to include in the body of work she has been preparing for her exhibition.
Added 18/05/2005: Please see my post about my visit to Olga’s exhibition
Update 2011: **now University, with updated link.
by Marja-Leena Geist’s maps of Canada
Oh, I must share this find from my morning blogstroll! Today, while still in fairy tale mode after yesterday’s post perhaps, a link to The Fairy Tale Map of Canada piqued my interest at plep.
It turns out to be at the site of Geist, a Vancouver-based literary magazine of Canadian ideas and culture. There are more “maps” of Canada based on thematic place names – some are really quite funny, cheeky even a bit naughty, so go and enjoy yourself! Browsing through some of the essays, I had another chuckle over the story of a mushroom-gathering foray titled Gribnicki, and some bittersweet memories reading Apricot Platz.
Oh, and do read the more serious and insightful Cautionary Tales for Children by Alberto Manguel – “Some years ago, Susan Crean amusingly suggested that nations might be defined or understood through their emblematic children’s books and according to whether the protagonist was male or female.”
by Marja-Leena Hans Christian Andersen Bicentenary
A few days ago I received a lovely letter from a good friend in Denmark. She mentioned that the whole country is celebrating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Hans Christian Andersen, as are many countries around the world. She wondered if we might have anything happening here. I hadn’t noticed anything, though admittedly I’ve been half asleep the last three weeks, until yesterday’s edition of the “Vancouver Sun” newspaper where on page C4 is an article by David Montgomery entitled “The ugly duckling’s happy ever after.” Unfortunately it’s available online to subscribers only.
Anyway this sent me searching and finding lots of interesting sites, including a dedicated Hans Christian Andersen 2005 website. Many of the first celebrations happened early April, which I would have loved to have seen, but it looks like much is going on throughout the year in many places around the world, including China, Japan and Singapore.
H.C. Andersen wrote novels, poetry, travelogues and plays but achieved his greatest success with his fairy tales. He was also an artist, doing drawings of his travels, and imaginative papercuts, collages and picturebooks.
I agree with David Montgomery that Andersen’s fairy tales have been told and retold and adapted and appropriated. Later generations feel such proprietorship that they take liberties with the work. I’ve always been annoyed by Disney Studios and many children’s book publishers taking and changing stories by Andersen (and many other authors), often without any acknowledgment of the original. All because the poor cobbler’s son somehow managed to unlock the shared human storehouse of image, action, moral and meaning, and weave them into captivating tales that spoke universally. His fairy tales were not just for kids. He grew into a literary swan. Many of his stories have become part of our daily language, like about politicians/leaders and the “emperor’s new clothes”.
Happy 200th Birthday, Hans Christian Andersen – you live on in your beloved stories!
More links:
– Wikipedia
– Interesting notes on official illustrations as well as some papercuts done by Andersen himself, one of which was used in the stamp above.
by Marja-Leena Artists in Our Midst
“Artists in Our Midst” is Vancouver’s West Side Annual Art Studio Tour. Sorry I’m late posting this, having missed the first weekend opens in Kitsilano.
This coming weekend April 15 – 17th Dunbar/Kerrisdale area artists have a preview exhibition and open their studios. West Point Grey artists do the same April 22 – 24th.
Please check the schedules, maps and the lists of participating artists at the Artists in Our Midst website. This annual event was initiated by artists Anne Adams and Pnina Granirer in 1993 with over 60-70 artists taking part. Merchants in the area also feature artworks in their windows, so it is a very popular community event.
You may recall my posts about Pnina’s recent exhibition and my visit to her studio.
by Marja-Leena reading break
And when at last a puff of air would toss a delicate thread of scent his way, he would lunge at it and not let it go. Then he would smell at only this one odor, holding it tight, pulling it into himself and preserving it for all time. The odor might be an old acquaintance, or a variation on one; it could be a brand-new one as well, with hardly any similarity to anything he had ever smelled, let alone seen, till that moment: the odor of pressed silk, for example, the odor of a wild-thyme tea, the odor of brocade embroidered with silver thread, the odor of a cork from a bottle of vintage wine, the odor of a tortoiseshell comb. Grenouille was out to find such odors still unknown to him; he hunted them down with the passion and patience of an angler and stored them up inside him.
The above quote is from page 35 of Perfume: the story of a murderer by Patrick Suskind, translated from the German by John E. Woods. This is a beautifully written story of a very strange, very scary child of the slums of 18th-century Paris, who grows into a dark and sinister young man. He has an incomparable sense of smell that is his passion in life. At one stage he apprentices himself to a perfumer, quickly making his employer rich and successful. You will never think of the organ called a nose in the same way again. A most compelling story, yet I’m almost scared to approach the end, not being fond of murder stories.
I must mention that a few months ago, because I was wait-listed for “Perfume”, I read my first Patrick Suskind book: Mr. Summer’s story, a very charming yet with a disturbing undertone, little adult fairy tale illustrated by Sempe with a surprise ending. (Warning: don’t read the Amazon blurb – it gives away the whole story!)
Enforced rest and recuperation is allowing me to indulge myself in a small reading binge. I have an inviting stack of books lent by a good friend plus the local library plus some of their DVD films. I’m enjoying reading All That Matters by Wayson Choy, about the life of Chinese immigrants in the 1930’s and 1940’s in Vancouver’s Chinatown, as seen through the eyes of a little Chinese boy as he comes of age.
Some others tempting me on the stack:
The Reconstruction by Claudia Casper of Vancouver, about a sculptor who is hired to build a life-sized model of Lucy. “The gradual process of reconstructing her human ancestor forces Margaret to explore fundamental questions of evolution, the human condition, and her own troubled and perplexing life.” I had actually read this a few years ago and absolutely loved it and look forward to rereading it. I rarely buy novels, preferring the library, but this one is tempting.
Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson, about a murder mystery and trial set against the background of the tragic history of the Japanese Americans in the Puget Sound area of northwest Washington State during World War II. This has been made into a movie which I’ve not yet seen.
Finally, of several DVD movies we’ve watched, Italian for Beginners (in Danish and Italian with English subtitles) was the very best with its quirky gentle humour, very un-Hollywood, about several lonely individuals who get together to learn Italian, and then decide to travel to Venice. My favourite character was the newly ordained and very timid new pastor who arrives in town.
Notice there is not one art or archaeology book on the list, unless you count Casper’s – I said I’m indulging myself, didn’t I?
UPDATE April 16th: I finished “Perfume” today and must say it was a most unusual and powerful story! I highly recommend it. I’ve also finished “All That Matters” and recommend it for it’s very insightful views of Vancouver life up to and including WWII – the discrimination against “foreigners” signing up for war service and having a vote, discrimination in the hospitals keeping foreigners separate from the AngloSaxons, the treatment of the Japanese, Germans and eastern Europeans as enemies, and so on. I’m rather shocked again that this was happening less than 60 years ago here in Vancouver and all over Canada.
Last night we watched Finding Neverland, the story of James M. Barrie’s friendship with a family of four boys and their widowed mother, who inspired him to create Peter Pan. It’s very well done, and I continue to be impressed by Johnny Depp’s acting – definitely one of the best of the younger generation of actors, unlike many of his pretty boy contemporaries.
Lastly, I forgot to mention the very good Marion Bridge, a story of three estranged sisters who reunite to care for their dying mother and deal with old conflicts and secrets. It is set in Cape Breton on the east coast of Canada.
by Marja-Leena Stolen Art
You may recall my posts last month about Pnina Granirer’s exhibition and my visit to her studio.
Some time ago, I was horrified to learn that two of her works have been stolen. This is a terrible thing for an artist to experience, and shocking that such a popular place like the Roundhouse Community Centre has so little security. Below is the press release. If you live in the Vancouver area, do keep your eyes out for these works.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 28, 2005
Theft of paintings from local artist
Two paintings by local artist Pnina Granirer were stolen from the Roundhouse exhibition during the last days of the Vancouver International Dance Festival, March 25 or 26.
Titles and cat. nos. on the back:
1. (top) In the Spotlight, cat.no.1602, size 26×20 in., mixed media on canvas, signed
2. (lower) One plus One, cat.no.1608, size 28×22 in., mixed media on canvas, signed
Both framed in new, black wood frames.
Anyone who has seen them or has any information leading to their recovery is kindly asked to call the artist, at 604-224-6795, or the police, file no.05-071632, on the name of Jay Hirabayashi.
This is an appeal to the people who took them, to return them to the Roundhouse or the artist- no questions asked.
Reward offered to the finder.
Please be so kind as to publish the images of the stolen works and the documentation describing them.
For more info please call
Pnina Granirer 604-224-6795
Jay Hirabayashi at Kokoro Dance 604-662-7441
by Marja-Leena interactive digs
Thank you, everyone, for all the lovely get well wishes, I do appreciate them very much. A bad week was followed by another one, still battling bronchitis now with some antibiotics, but I think it can only get better now.
When I started the blog I said to myself I would not talk about politics, religion or health. Broke one out of three, in trying to explain my absence, but I’ll try not to let it happen again.
Did you visit plep today? He lists some interesting interactive digs to the Maya Underworld, at Sagalassos,Turkey and at Pompeii. Have fun!
by Marja-Leena a bad week
I’ve been trying to start this post several times but incoherent thoughts, suddenly worsened keyboarding skills, (I do wish spellcheck would fix the typos!) and constant heavy rib-hurting coughing haven’t made it easy.
Last week Thursday, I felt wonderful having successfully completed my recent project. I’ve mentioned that I’ve been making prints that are on paper, with a clear printed mylar layer on top. After testing various methods of attaching these layers, I chose three eyelets, or small grommets, along the top edge. I’m very pleased with this because it gives me the option of using clear pushpins to hang them close to the wall, or they can hang off long nails out from the wall, or use nylon line and hang them freely anywhere. A bonus is that the editions are easy to store flat, remaining attached and ready to hang. So, I was pretty excited and really full of ideas for the next pieces.
That night I began to feel like a deflated balloon, the next day, like I’d hit a wall. I had caught this nasty bronchitis-like bug going around the family. So, lots of sleep, chicken broth, tea and water. But as the cough worsened sleep became more difficult. I’m told it may still take another week to get over the worst, then some to fully recover. Maybe my mind will clear up soon so that I can at least read some books, the usual delicious benefit of sick days. Hopefully regular posting will return soon.
Friend Anna knows how to cheer me up with visions of lovely English fields of blue scillas and this.