The Art Collective

Montreal artist François Morelli's latest show, Parades, opens Jan. 11, 2007, and runs until Feb. 4, at la Galerie d’art d’Outremont. François, who has provided advice to The Art Collective and co-curated one of its shows,

Below is a description of his show, from the Gallery's website, which is at:http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/pls/portal/docs/page/arr_out_fr/media/documents/Calendrier_expositions_2006-07.pdf

Il nous fait plaisir de vous annoncer l’exposition Parades de François Morelli qui aura lieu à la Galerie d’art d’Outremont du 11 janvier au 4 février 2007.

English translation of the text on the website, followed by the French text on the website:

For more than 15 years, François Morelli has printed on various media (paper, walls, sheets, clothing, skins…) through the use of special ink stamps he has produced by a Montreal company. He chooses each of the images, which he finds in illustrated books, his sketchbooks or in the objects in his work environment. As with collage, this involves a conversation of juxtaposition and inclusion. This heterogeneous compositional approach has parallels with Byzantine mosaic work as well as with the lyricism of heavy metal images on rock T-shirts.

Depuis plus de 15 ans, François Morelli imprime sur divers supports (papiers, murs, draps, vêtements, peaux…) à l’aide de tampons encreurs qu’il fait fabriquer mécaniquement par une industrie spécialisée. Il sélectionne chacune des images, qu’il récupère dans des livres illustrés, dans ses cahiers à dessins ou à partir d’objets se retrouvant dans son environnement de travail.
Comme dans le cas de la technique du collage, il s’agit très souvent d’opérer une rhétorique de la juxtaposition et de l’inclusion. Cette constitution hétérogène rappelle autant les mosaïques byzantines que l’imprimé heavy métal et pourtant lyrique d’un t-shirt de rocker.

Posted by Robert W at 06:00 PM | Permalink

This excerpt from a New York Times story provides a fascinating look at the changing art world in Los Angeles.

October 1, 2006
Artquake
By BRUCE HAINLEY
New York Times
I am amused by fancy art-world types who breeze into Los Angeles planning to “get” the scene in a few days. They would have better luck reading “In Search of Lost Time” over a long weekend. America’s second-largest city sprawls — physically, aesthetically, socially — over nearly 500 square miles, so any attempt to nutshell the burg and its cultural bazaar takes on comic aspects. Note that the Pompidou Center’s recent survey of Los Angeles art was called “The Birth of an Artistic Capital” and that Michael Govan, the new director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, has declared Los Angeles the new New York, forgetting perhaps that Angelenos have never wished to be New Yorkers and that long before the 1955 birth date pronounced by the Pompidou, Hollywood was producing things as provocative, philosophical and influential as anything given the name of, well, art.
Sun, sand, great surf, a climate usually allowing a smooth shift from beachwear to cashmere pullover and until recently — “recently” thanks to no major earthquake in more than a decade and brutalized New Yorkers’ finding respite here — relatively cheap studio and living spaces, all with easy access to the materials of the film, television and porn industries, explain why anyone, not just artists, would wish to live and work here.

Continue reading "Los Angeles Art World Morphs" »

Posted by Robert W at 07:00 PM | Permalink

This excerpt from an excellent New York Times story discusses the growing influence of art advisers in the art world.

October 15, 2006

Art Advisers
By MIA FINEMAN
New York Times
WITH so many wealthy collectors competing for the work of a few dozen international art stars, top galleries are in a position to handpick their clientele these days, keeping long and closely guarded waiting lists for new work. As a result, many insiders say, today’s art consultants are valued as much for their entree as for their advice on choice acquisitions.
“The most important thing an art adviser can provide is access,” said Mark Fletcher, 44, an adviser who specializes in postwar art with an emphasis on emerging artists. “It’s become much more difficult to buy art these days, especially in the primary market, which is highly imperfect because, unlike auction buying, it’s a closed system based largely on relationships of trust.”
Like many top advisers Mr. Fletcher spent years forging connections in the art world before starting his own business in 1998. He worked for several years as director of the Gladstone Gallery in New York, and then in London at Anthony d’Offay Gallery.

Continue reading "Powerful role of Art Advisers" »

Posted by Robert W at 06:40 PM | Permalink

This is an excerpt from an excellent New York Times story about Damien Hirst dealing with his dead shark piece

Swimming With Famous Dead Sharks
By CAROL VOGEL
ASTON DOWN AIRFIELD, England - In this vast Gloucestershire flatland dotted with abandoned airplane hangars, a former Royal Air Force Station where pilots once plotted classified missions during World War II, the artist Damien Hirst was overseeing a secret operation of his own one recent morning.
It was a delicate undertaking, one that required rubberized protective jumpsuits, long tables of medical equipment and more than 224 gallons of formaldehyde. The goal: to replace the decaying tiger shark that floats in one of Mr. Hirst’s best-known works of Conceptual art, “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living.”
As rap music quietly played in the background, five men and one woman wearing bright yellow suits, black rubber gloves and breathing masks huddled over the shark’s hulking 13-foot-long replacement. The immediate impression was that the shark was being treated by a team of acupuncturists: some 200 large needles dotted its body.
So toxic was the air that the property could be reached only through security-coded iron gates, and no one, not even the artist, was allowed near the shark without protective gear. As Mr. Hirst, 41, looked on, he plucked a long hypodermic needle from a nearby worktable.

Continue reading "Damien Hirst and the Dead Shark" »

Posted by Robert W at 10:11 AM | Permalink

Here are excerpts from an interesting story about the legality of street photography in the U.S.

New York Times
March 19, 2006
Art
The Theater of the Street, the Subject of the Photograph
By PHILIP GEFTER
IN 1999 Philip-Lorca diCorcia set up his camera on a tripod in Times Square, attached strobe lights to scaffolding across the street and, in the time-honored tradition of street photography, took a random series of pictures of strangers passing under his lights. The project continued for two years, culminating in an exhibition of photographs called "Heads" at Pace/MacGill Gallery in Chelsea. "Mr. diCorcia's pictures remind us, among other things, that we are each our own little universe of secrets, and vulnerable," Michael Kimmelman wrote, reviewing the show in The New York Times. "Good art makes you see the world differently, at least for a while, and after seeing Mr. diCorcia's new 'Heads,' for the next few hours you won't pass another person on the street in the same absent way." But not everyone was impressed.

Continue reading "Street Photography Story" »

Posted by Robert W at 12:25 AM | Permalink

Here are excerpts from a fascinating story about interpretations of Edvard Munch's work.

New York Times
March 19, 2006
Art
How to Spot the Kubrick in Edvard Munch
By ANNETTE GRANT
Is Edvard Munch a great painter? Is he over the top? Is he still relevant? Do we feel his pain? Or is he just weird? Those questions and more were discussed recently by six artists who took a tour of the Munch retrospective, "The Modern Life of the Soul," that opened last month at the Museum of Modern Art and continues through May 8. Their comments ranged from a riff on stealing paintings (a reference to the theft of "The Scream" in Oslo in 2004) to an examination of the relationship of Munch (1863-1944) to advertising and cinema, especially horror films.

Continue reading "How We View Munch" »

Posted by Robert W at 12:17 AM | Permalink

Here is an excellent critical analysis of a retrospective show of Hockney's work
Excerpt from:
New York Times
March 17, 2006
Art Review | David Hockney
After a Half-Century, Taking a Census of Hockney's People
By KEN JOHNSON
BOSTON — Around 1966, when Pop, Minimalism and Color Field painting were the preferred options for a serious artist, the British painter and Los Angeles resident David Hockney embarked on a daring exploration of what was then thought irretrievably retrograde: realist painting. Over the next decade, he created full-figure portraits of people, alone or in couples, that were as intimate as they were monumental and as poetically thrilling as they were visually lucid. The best of them can still be counted among the most memorable artworks of the postmodernist era.

Continue reading "Story on David Hockney Show" »

Posted by Robert W at 12:08 AM | Permalink

The Art Collective's next show will be April 9 to 13, 2006, on the ground floor of the Visual Arts Building in downtown Montreal. The show will be a mix of individual work by members of the collective, collaborative work from the collective's regular sessions and five special large-scale pieces made especially for this show. The opening is Tuesday April 11.

Posted by Robert W at 12:30 AM | Permalink

Art Collective newsletter for Feb. 9, 2006:

Next session: Friday Feb. 10, 10 to 130 in room 315 of Visual Arts Building. Fresh bagels, coffee and grape juice will be served.

This newsletter deals with: new work and photos on website, how we’re documenting our work better, our homage to new MOCCA show, curating session this Friday with Holly King, the collective is going on a television show during Art Matters, our special events at Art Matters, Trans-species Collective history recounted, our next show is moving until late March, Jarmila’s show in Trois Rivières opens on Sunday.

Continue reading "Art Matters schedule/TV show" »

Posted by Robert W at 03:25 AM | Permalink

The Art Collective did several pieces at its Jan. 27, 2006, session that were an homage to The Perm Show which opened that day at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto.

To read a story in Concordia University's The Journal about David Liss by Robert Winters, co-ordinator of The Art Collective, click here:
Story about David Liss

The pieces, which explore issues of fashion, performance and celebrity, were inspired by the invitation card for the show, which can be viewed in our Photos gallery.
MOCCA's Perm Show is a selection of Beauties from the permanent collection of the museum. The exhibition, which is on from Jan. 27 to March 26, 2006, includes work by Montreal artist Holly King, an adviser to The Art Collective who curated part of the group's next show at a special curating session on Feb. 10, 2006.
To find out more about Holly King's work:
Holly King

To view the MOCCA Perm Show invitation card, please visit the Photos section of our website.
A photo of MOCCA director David Liss by Robert Winters is in our Photos gallery.
To find out more about the MOCCA show, please click here:
MOCCA's site

Here is how the MOCCA website describes the show:
The show features "a selection of highlights from the museum's collection of over 400 pieces by 150 Canadian artists. January 27 to March 26. This is not a passing fashion!"
The exhibition includes work by these artists: Stephen Andrews, Carl Beam, Edward Burtynsky, Chris Cran, William Eakin, Paterson Ewen, Graham Gillmore, Betty Goodwin, Angela Grauerholz, Geoffrey James, Shelagh Keeley, Holly King, Micah Lexier, Arnaud Maggs, Damian Moppett, Roland Poulin, Tony Scherman, Jeannie Thib, David Urban, Ian Wallace, Tim Whiten and Kelly Wood.
David Liss was honoured with an Artistic Achievement Award by Concordia University Alumni Association's Fine Arts Chapter at an event at MOCCA in November.
To find out more about this event, you can visit the Fine Arts Chapter's website at:
Fine Arts Alumni website/a>

Posted by Robert W at 11:48 AM | Permalink

Montreal artist François Morelli gave a well-received lecture at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts on Jan. 18, 2006, as part of the high-profile Defiant Imagination series that is a joint project of the Museum and Montreal's Concordia University. François, who has given key advice to The Art Collective, titled his presentation Sleep, Eat and Go. In this overview covering 30 years, he presented a selection of his sculptures, installations and graphic works that stem from these three activities of his daily life. Alone or accompanied, he systematically notes and celebrates his encounters and the passage of time. Weaving a peripatetic narrative framework, he has developed a poetic and personal syntax built from a system of symbols that is dream-based and political. The presentation was framed as a journey that highlighted the key moments of his career.

To read an account of the presentation in The Journal, please click here:
Journal Story here

To read about François Morelli's work presented at the Biennale de Montréal in 2002, please click here: Biennale page

Here is an excerpt from the website of the University of Lethbridge, where he gave a presentation in December 2003: Morelli's research questions the status of the object within the creation process and the perception of the work. Notions of passage, circulation and transformation are essential in his work; according to him, the object is often the echo of a passed action or an intervention translating the relation of the artist with society, individuals between themselves, or of an individual with the object.

Born in Montreal, François Morelli completed his BFA at Concordia University in 1975 and an MFA at Rutgers University in 1983. Morelli's work has been shown extensively; including solo exhibitions at Lewis and Clark College, Portland, 2003; Gallerie R3, Trois Rivières, 2003; Galerie Christiane Chassay, Montreal, 2002; and in group exhibitions Walkways, Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, Portland, Western Washington University, Washington and Oakville Art Gallery, Oakville; Corp et Machine, Galerie d'art de I'UQAM, Montreal; and La Biennale de Montréal, Le Centre international d'art contemporain de Montréal.

Posted by Robert W at 09:32 PM | Permalink

Michael Shenker, Arts & Life Editor at Montreal daily The Gazette, gave some tips on how to publicize Concordia University’s Art Matters festival to the co-producers of the event, Emily Shanahan and Corina Kennedy. A photo of this encounter is in the Photos gallery.

Michael spoke with the Art Matters co-producers at the opening of an art show, Laterna Phantasmagoria, presented by collective member Robert Winters at the Visual Arts Building in January 2006.

Robert's show received curatorial assistance from Leigh Gillam, a Montreal artist and graduate from Concordia University's Fine Arts program, who helped direct the positioning of the pieces in the space and made a selection of drawings for a section of the show. The curatorial task of arranging the show's elements included the challenge of positioning pieces that included photo-based prints as well as drawings. Leigh's work included placing a piece about the artist not existing if his father was killed during the war next to drawings that iincorporated red marks.

Robert's show was prepared as part of his work under the direction of Eric Simon, a visiting professor in Concordia's Studio Arts program. Eric, who presented an overview of his work in a visiting artist's presentation at Concordia in January 2006, felt Robert's book of drawing and painting prepared last year while working with artist François Morelli, was the strongest piece of work in the show.

Eric's shows have included a 1998 solo exhibition in Zurich, Switzerland, of science fiction paintings and a 1999 exhibition in Montreal with David Liss, now director of the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art. To find out more about Eric Simon, click here::

Eric Simon

The Art Matters festival, a celebration of fine arts at the university, kicks off its sixth edition March 3-17, with events on campus and at venues around town, co-ordinated by a team of curators. In 2005, Art Matters was crowned Best Art Exhibit in the Best of Montreal Mirror Readers Poll. For the first time, it placed in the Top Ten Festival category, securing fifth place. To find out more about Art Matters, visit their website by clicking here: Art Matters

On the home page of Art Matters, you can see an illustration by collective member Shawn Kuruneru.
To visit Shawn's website, click here: Shawn’s site

To find out more about The Gazette, click here: Montreal Gazette

Posted by Robert W at 12:48 AM | Permalink

Read some excerpts from recent New York Times stories about the Manhattan art scene.

Continue reading "New York Art Scene" »

Posted by Robert W at 12:12 AM | Permalink

A photo of collective member Carina Phillips working on a drawing with references to Victorian Fairy Paintings can be vewed in our Photo gallery. The piece, done at the Feb. 3, 2006, session, can be viewed by visiting the Our Work gallery.

Fairy paintings were the focus of a 1998 Art Gallery of Ontario exhibition. The work shown at the AGO was previously exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, where it broke attendance records.

The Fairy Painting show, which travelled to the University of Iowa Museum of Art after its Toronto stop, is described in this excerpt from the University of Iowa's website:

Fairy painting was commercially and critically popular during the 19th century. It combined the Romantic interest in fantastic subject matter with the realistic techniques of Victorian painting. These qualities allowed fairy painting to bring together for the first time some of the most important concerns of 19th-century British art: the nude, the romantic landscape, the costume study, the sentimental narrative and imagery from literary, theatrical and historical sources.

Because it combines many of these elements on one canvas, fairy painting is a particularly incisive tool with which to address the nuances of the Victorian mindset. The exhibition will consider fairy painting in a historical as well as an aesthetic context. The impact of the IndustrialRevolution, Darwin's discoveries and other developments of 19th-century Britain will be examined, along with sexuality, religious dogma, nationalism and other social issues of the time.

Though fairy painting was primarily a Victorian achievement, the fascination with fairies and other mythical creatures is present throughout English literature. The paintings' story lines are frequently derived from the legends of the ancient Celts and Saxons. Victorian notions of fairies, however, were greatly inspired by characters in literary works derived from myth by Shakespeare, Pope, Spenser and others. Critics frequently name Shakespeare's Puck in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and Ariel in "The Tempest" as the quintessential fairy models.

The Victorian fascination with fairyland reflected a Shakespearean revival in the theater and the introduction of fairy themes into Romantic ballet. Plays and ballets at this time were enlivened by dramatic transformation scenes, actors "flew" on wires, and the introduction of limelight in 1826 made eerie lighting effects possible. One section of the exhibition will illustrate the development of such stage effects in theater, ballet and pantomime and will include designs for costumes and stage scenery.

The Victorian interest in the mythical world was also fueled by works in translation, including Wilhelm and Jakob Grimm's "German Popular Stories." The availability of such texts reflects the growth of a literate audience in the middle of the 19th century.

Though the popularity of fairy painting began to wane later in the century, advances in education and mass printing technology encouraged the adaptation of fairy subjects into printed media. Their appeal to children made illustrated fairy tales an ideal carrier of moral messages.

Fairy stories were also used in lavishly printed gift books into the 20th century. As with the empirical sciences, the advent of photography and its extreme realism may ultimately have led to a demand for more fantastic art.

Posted by Robert W at 09:19 PM | Permalink

Take a look at some of the new images posted in the Our Work gallery of our site. New images include ones from our God series and an image that can be read as a reflection on psychological links between minds. Also take a look at the progress being made on our Art Machines large-scale piece, which has been taken over for completion by collective member Jarmila Kavena. The Art Machines images can be found in the Photos section.

Posted by Robert W at 04:47 PM | Permalink

The Art Collective's new show opens Monday Nov. 7, 2005, at the VAV Gallery, at 1395 Rene-Levesque Blvd. in downtown Montreal. The show, which runs from Nov. 7 to 18, is part of the gallery's special Interactive show. The official opening party, not to be missed, is at 7 p.m. Tuesday Nov. 8. You are invited to come and see our exhibition and participate in two special interactive projects: our Interactive Wall No. 6, where you can put up your own work; and a special project on the theme of Taking Apart Pop Culture, involving collage, painting and drawing. The Pop Culture pieces produced Tuesday evening will be shown in the VA building lobby for the two weeks the Interactive show is on.

Finally, the Interactive Wall will be operating on week days from noon until 230. And for a special treat, come on Friday Nov. 11 and Friday Nov. 18 to see members of the collective doing collaborative drawing in the gallery. You can even join in.

You can see the best examples of the collective's collaborative art making in this special exhibition which presents many exciting pieces of recent work combined with several of the top pieces created by the collective since it began in September 2004. Several pieces were selected by Montreal artists Francois Morelli and Holly King in a special curatorial session. The final curatorial selection was made by VAV Gallery co-directors Michelle Lacombe and Evita Karasek. Check out our Photos section to see Michelle and Evita with a dog image that was featured in a recent show.

Continue reading "Visit Our New Show" »

Posted by Robert W at 03:05 AM | Permalink

The Art Collective extends a warm welcome to five new members who have made substantial contributions to our collaborative art making work this fall. One of the five, Monica Eckert, also was an active participant at several of the collective's interactive events in the fall of 2004 and the winter/spring months of 2005, including our Art Matters drawing event at Universite du Quebec a Montreal's Cafe des arts.

We meet every Friday from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. in painting studio VA-315, in the Visual Arts building at the corner of Rene-Levesque Blvd. and Crescent St. in downtown Montreal. The sessions are open to Fine Arts students, alumni and professional artists. Please feel free to drop by. For more information, please contact the collective's co-ordinator, Robert Winters, at: robertwinters@videotron.ca

Posted by Robert W at 08:17 PM | Permalink

We submitted our proposal for the VAV Gallery show we are applying for, with our interactive event co-sponsored by the Painting and Drawing Association. If we are accepted, show is week of Nov. 6, with opening evening of Nov. 8. We also made the deadline for our funding request for the Fine Arts Student Alliance; we are asking for $500 for materials for our sessions and for interactive sessions.
Amelie Labreche's excellent short film about our McGill event is posted on our website now, in a low resolution version. It is, of course, even better in its original high-res version, which we will present at our next show. Congratulations, Amelie!
Our session last week was very productive and several excellent pieces were done. Bea Parsons, who is in her second year as a member of The Art Collective, brought in a painting she is working on and Khadija C. Baker, a new member, showed us a painting she recently completed. David King started a fascinating drawing called Twins, which you can see in the Our Work section of our site, that was also worked on by new member Joanna Nawracaj and Cassandra Witteman, who was attending her first session.

Continue reading "Great session last week/new photos, images" »

Posted by Robert W at 03:32 AM | Permalink

We welcomed a new artist member last week, Joanna Nawracaj, a studio arts student who decided to join after looking at work on our website and finding the images were surprisingly coherent for collaborative work.

Our session included work on the topic of “shocking� among other themes. This theme included a piece begun by Kyla Chevrier, a second year studio arts student who dropped by to work on an unusual piece that was also worked on by collective veteran David King and new member Shawn Kuruneru, a 3rd year studio arts student with a flair for drawing in a unique style.
Shawn has a website you can visit to see his work:
shawnkuruneru.tripod.com

Another collective veteran from last year, Bea Parsons, added her strong touch to some work and told us about her experiences teaching students, which is part of her art education program.

Our gallery of art work and photos is back up, thanks to hard work of our webmaster, Robert Turenne, and Robert Winters will be doing an update of content in next couple of days with new work and fresh photos from this year’s sessions:
http://gallery.theartcollective.net

We're meeting each Friday, 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., in room 315 of the Visual Arts Building, at the corner of Crescent and Rene-Levesque in downtown Montreal. Drop by for coffee, a fresh bagel or juice, and some collaborative drawing.

I submitted our request for $500 in funding from the Fine Arts Student Alliance by the deadline on Thursday. We received $500 last year from FASA, which helped us with materials. VAV proposal to be submitted by Monday, including images. The painting and drawing association has agreed to co-sponsor our collaborative art making proposal for the VAV show which starts week of Nov. 6, opening is evening of Nov. 8. They will contribute some money for materials for the event, and also will encourage members to join in.

Painting and drawing association has show opening Friday Oct. 21, 6 p.m., Espace 306 in Belgo building.

Artist François Morelli, who helps advise the collective, has a show opening at esthesio gallery in Quebec City on Saturday Oct. 21, if you feel like an outing on the weekend.
http://www.esthesio.com/index.htm

With the Van Gogh drawing show opening Oct. 18 at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, you can listen to an audio file from the Met in which actor Kevin Bacon reads excerpts from Van Gogh’s letters; 600 of them survive, as well as the 1,100 drawings he did in the only 10 years that he lived after he took up drawing.

http://www.metmuseum.org/vvg/

The Met Van Gogh website section also has a rather unusually easy to use page where you can draw yourself using a variety of pen sizes.

http://www.metmuseum.org/explore/van_gogh/menu.html

It’s part of the surprisingly well done Van Gogh for kids section:
http://www.metmuseum.org/explore/van_gogh/intro.html

That’s all for now

Robert Winters

Posted by Robert W at 12:02 AM | Permalink

We've moved to a new server. THe look and feel will be adjusted soon, but for now, the 'Corporate Blue' is how it is.

Posted by Robert T at 04:29 PM | Permalink

The Art Collective has begun its second year of collaborative art making. We've held two regular sessions and an interactive drawing event that have generated more than a dozen pieces, several of which have been posted in the Our Work section of our site.

We are welcoming new members to our group, so please feel free to drop by to see what we're doing and to try your hand at drawing and painting with us. We meet each Friday morning in Room 315 of Concordia University's Visual Arts building, at the corner of Crescent St. and René-Lévesque Blvd. in downtown Montreal. Sessions are 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

We also are planning special events, so watch our site to keep up with coming activities.

Posted by Robert W at 02:16 PM | Permalink

If you missed this year's Agora festif, a dynamic one-night Montreal arts festival, make sure you make next year's. At the May event, which drew an estimated 5,000 visitors, The Art Collective led a collaborative art making project that involved more than 100 people drawing and painting together.
Collective members Stephanie Reynolds, Robert Turenne, Chan Tchen and Robert Winters co-ordinated the crowd's artistic endeavours and selected pieces which were ready to be placed on the Interactive Wall, a standard feature of our shows. While electronic music pulsed through the sports complex, a light show and a mist in the air created a magical atmosphere, providing a dream-like showcase for a wide variety of creative talents, including performance art, dance and body painting.
Participants in The Collective's project worked at three long tables, using permanent ink materials and acid-free paper provided by the group.
The Collective's collaborative art making project at Agora festif was co-sponsored by Concordia University's Fine Arts Student Alliance, the university's Art Matters Festival, the school's Studio Arts Department and the VAV Gallery, which helped provide materials for participants to use. Each of the co-sponsors was highlighed and thanked on the Agora's television monitors at the event, which provided participants with information about what was taking place.

Posted by Robert W at 11:28 AM | Permalink

The Art Collective's fourth show was put on display in April 2005, presenting 19 pieces in five groups of images. You can view the show and read about the work by visiting the section of our website titled "Our Work." The exhibition was produced at the group's special spring curatorial session on April 8. Collective members Jarmila Kavena, David King and Robert Winters selected the pieces from the collective's body of collaborative work. The pieces were then arranged in five groups of three or four to produce this special online show of what we consider our best work to date. The pieces are on 9 X 12 inch watercolour paper, 90 pound and 140 pound, as well as 90 pound drawing paper and pastel paper, with all paper being acid-free. Permanent ink and watercolour paint and pencils were the main materials used in these pieces done in recent sessions of the collective.

Posted by Robert W at 10:46 AM | Permalink

If you're in Chicago this summer, don't miss collective member Jarmila Kavena's show at Inspire Fine Art, from June 8 until July 17, 2005. The show, called Inner Beauty, features work by Jarmila and another Canadian artist, Deborah Carruthers. The gallery is at 435 E. Illinois, Suite 131. Inspire Fine Art gallery
The show is described on the Chicago Gallery News website Chicago Gallery News
Jarmila is represented by Engine gallery on Queen St. W. in Toronto. Engine

Posted by Robert W at 01:08 AM | Permalink

Friday morning, April 1st, The Art Collective will be doing a curatorial session. We will review numerous drawings made over the last few months and decide which ones we think should be identified as "worth showing". Why not come by and take a look?

Everyone invited. VA building, corner of René-Lévesque and Crescent, room 315 (or 313), from 10h00 'till 13h00.

Posted by Robert T at 09:23 AM | Permalink

Drawing food was on the menu at Montreal's McGill University on March 15, 2005, when The Art Collective led an Interactive Drawing day as part of Concordia University's Art Matters festival. Check out images from the event in our Photos section. McGill's Midnight Kitchen, a collectively operated food-serving organization, co-sponsored the event and served tasty vegan dishes to all participants. To read a McGill Daily story about Midnight Kitchen, please click here: Midnight Kitchen

The Daily described the Interactive Drawing day as a chance for McGill students to take advantage of Concordia's "vibrant arts community." Read the article: McGill Daily story

Posted by Robert W at 04:31 PM | Permalink

Don't miss The Art Collective's new show, Bestiary and Babies, which opens Friday March 11, 2005, from 6 to 10 p.m. at the high-profile Mezzanine space on the second floor of the main Hall building on Concordia University's downtown Montreal campus, at 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. (Go up the escalator from the main lobby and you've arrived.)

Come and make your mark on our Interactive Wall Project No. 2, where you can start a drawing and put it up on the wall or do a collaborative piece with another artist. Or just pick up some drawing tools and work on the pieces already up on the wall. You can also become a self-appointed curator and rearrange work on the wall to reflect your vision of what art should look like. There's even an "I Curator" button for you to put on if you want.

Come along and start a collaborative art piece and get to know some of the talented Fine Arts students, alumni and professional artists who will be at this special event.

The Concordia Alumni Association's Fine Arts Chapter, which is co-sponsoring this special alumni/student Art Matters event, has sent invitations to several thousand alumni in Montreal and Ottawa to come and participate in this ground-breaking festival event. It's co-ordinated by The Art Collective, which is open to Fine Arts students, alumni and professional artists.

The Interactive Wall project will also be active from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Monday March 14 and Wednesday March 16.

On Tuesday, March 15, there is a special Interactive Wall project at McGill University (see details in previous news item). On Friday March 18, 2005, we have a similar event at Universite du Quebec a Montreal, at the Cafe des Arts, Room J-6170, 405 Ste. Catherine St. E., on the 6th floor near the Visual Arts studios. Metro Berri-UQAM. Bilingual animators will be on hand.

The Collective's latest show was co-curated by artists François Morelli and Holly King, both veterans of many Canada Council juries. To find out more about the co-curators, please click on "Continue Reading" just below.

Continue reading "The Collective@Art Matters!" »

Posted by Robert W at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Art Matters Festival is coming soon! We will post a detailed schedule of The Art Collective events in the near future. So far we've secured collective events with McGill University and UQAM, with a permanent show at the Mezzanine.

Our Friday morning meetings (at 9h30 in room 313,315 or 317 in the VA building of Concordia University) are the main production events. For those of you who hate Friday mornings (not my choice!), we are planning an evening meeting. We'll post the details here.

Posted by Robert T at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Art Collective is evolving. Our art is getting more focused. As we learn to work together and in particular as we start to understand better the artistic approach of each other, our work reflects that awareness. This is one example. There is a lot more to see once you click on the "Our work" link on the right!

Continue reading "Getting Hot" »

Posted by Robert T at 10:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tuesday March 15, 2005, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.: The Collective presents an Interactive Drawing project at McGill University, that is part of Concordia University's Art Matters festival. Students from the two universities will work together on drawings and put up their pieces on The Collective's Interactive Wall. Concordia art students and McGill art history students are expected to be particularly interested in this event, as well as alumni of Concordia Fine Arts and McGill's Art History department.
The event is being co-sponsored by McGill's Midnight Kitchen, a collectively run food service which is similar to Concordia's Peoples Potato.

The event is in Room 302 of the William Shatner University Centre, at 3480 McTavish St., on the west side of McGill's campus, between Sherbrooke St. and Docteur-Penfield. McGill metro station. Lunch is served from 12:30 to 2. The meal is vegan and by donation, and the suggested donation is $2.

Posted by Robert W at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Don't miss The Collective's second show which runs from Jan. 17 until Jan. 21, 2005, in the lobby of Concordia University's Visual Arts building in downtown Montreal. A selection of collaborative work done by The Collective is presented in this show.

You are invited to special interactive drawing sessions Tuesday and Thursday, noon to 3 p.m., and Friday, 9:30 to 3 p.m., when visitors can draw with members of the art collective or add to somebody else's drawing, then put it up on the wall.

Also on display are collaborative pieces produced by participants during the group's Interactive Wall Project No. 1, held at the university's VAV Gallery in November 2004, as part of its Greater than One show. As well, several of the fascinating collaborative art pieces produced by the audience during a panel discussion on art collaboration are included.

The show is dedicated to The Royal Art Lodge, a Winnipeg-based art collective whose collaborative art-making process was a major inspiration for our group and its way of creating art. The Royal Art Lodge, which has a show at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles until Feb. 14, has welcomed our dedication and sends its best wishes for our project and the exhibition. You can see The Royal Art Lodge's message on the main wall of the show at the Visual Arts building at the corner of René Lévesque Blvd. and Crescent St.

The exhibition was curated by collective members Jarmila Kavena, Stephanie Reynolds, Robert Turenne and Robert Winters.

The Collective operates in collaboration with Concordia's Studio Arts Department. We are co-sponsored by the Fine Arts Student Alliance.

Posted by Robert W at 09:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Collective raised its profile through its Interactive Wall Project No. 1 at the VAV Gallery's Greater than One show. Concordia University's Thursday Report carried a story in its Dec. 2, 2004, issue about the Interactive Wall and published a photo of an artist putting up a piece of her work on the Wall.

Link

Posted by Robert W at 12:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When Luisa Santos of The Link appeared in Cafe X, the student cafe at Concordia University's Visual Arts building, she wasn't looking for java, she wanted The Collective. Group member David King happened to be within earshot and soon, Luisa was dropping into one of the collective's Friday morning sessions to see what was going on. Luisa's report can be found at:

Link to news item

While you're visiting The Link's site, you can read other columns Luisa has written about Concordia's arts scene for the paper. Luisa, an art history student who also serves as a copy editor at The Link, might be dropping in on the group again in the new year when she has said she would like to get involved. You can also see Luisa making her mark on one of our drawings at the Nov. 26 session, in the photo gallery section of our site.

Posted by Robert W at 01:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Something to Look Forward to In case you haven't noticed, drawing's back. Amsterdam's Geert Dekkers capitalizes on its quiet renaissance by using webspace to disseminate art to an unlimited viewership. Nznl.com is a New Zealand-based weblog and 'a drawing a day' has been programmed to generate a new drawing daily at exactly 00:00 CET since May 2002. Dekkers explains that 'The drawings, even if they are not strictly drawings (but web pages or flash movies) are, in essence, plans, and I see them as the most basic form of an artistic idea. Which is of course why most of the content is in some way related to planning some event in the future.' The drawing a day project dovetails out of Dekkers' ongoing preoccupation with the concept of future, the basis for other threads such as 'One Day,' a series that 'takes a wish or desire and throws it forward into some unspecified future.' - Peggy MacKinnon http://www.nznl.com/

Posted by Robert T at 07:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Collective has been invited by Concordia's Studio Arts Department to participate in this year's post-it art competition. We have been given a bag with about 1,700 post-it notes of different sizes and colours. See details below.

There are eight individuals or groups participating from Concordia and one of these will be chosen to compete in the final post-it competition.
The prizes are: 1st prize= $5,000 for the winner and $5,000 for his/her school 2nd= $1,000 3rd= $500

Continue reading "POST-IT ART COMPETITION" »

Posted by Robert W at 02:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Concordia University's main website featured the Collective's invitation to
participate in our Interactive Wall Project No. 1 as one of the university's
top entertainment events during the week of the show, Nov. 15 to 19, at the
VAV Gallery in downtown Montreal:

http://news.concordia.ca/entertainment/003132.shtml

Posted by Robert T at 10:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Concordia's Thursday Report, which describes itself as the university's
community newspaper, published a story on the Collective in its edition of
Nov. 18, 2004. It can be viewed at:

http://ctr.concordia.ca/2004-05/nov_18/08/

Posted by Robert T at 09:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Don't forget: This week's Friday morning meeting is at 9:30 (yes, it's AM!) in room 315.

This will be the last meeting before Christmas.

Posted by Robert T at 09:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Welcome to the latest version of our site!

In fact, we have re-done the whole thing, using new tools that will allow members to update content.

Not a member yet? Let us know and we will gladly add you to the list.

Check out the links on the right: They point to other parts of our site. Especially worth a visit are the Photos and Our Work galleries.

We're also working on a way to let members of The Collective and visitors to the site work on images in a collaborative fashion.

Have fun, and be sure to check back soon. We have lots more images and photos to post, and we want your feedback as The Collective grows.

You can leave your comments on many entries ... tell us what you think!

Posted by Robert T at 01:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Will be integrated into our web site design.

Posted by Robert T at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)