Made You Look at Art
News & Blog Posts2021-07-07T15:14:09-04:00

News & Blog Posts

Back in the Saddle

Sometimes a break is good for the soul.  I needed time to create something different and I worked on some linocuts in August and took a break from clay. I'm back working with a vengeance now, as I have two shows coming up in November and December.  Here are a couple of images of work from the first bisque firing. The two shows are the weekend of November 18th and 19th.  The first one is Christmas at the Marshland Centre is at the Marshland Centre, at 65 Hague Blvd., Lakefield.  Lots of different work at this show, [...]

Linocuts

Rabbit (linocut) While I have been taking the month of August off from pottery/ceramics to give myself a break and refresh, I've been playing around with Linocutting.  I took a day course a few months ago to introduce myself to this and I've had a great time!  I will likely incorporate it into future clay projects in the future, but for the moment I am loving the immediacy of it.  No waiting for it to dry, bisque fired, glazed and then fired again,  hoping madly that nothing cracks, warps or has unsightly blemishes.  To see [...]

Fusion – Unearthed Invitation

I have the honour of being in a show with 13 other talented ceramic artists this month.  Here is the invitation. I applied and was accepted last year for a mentorship.  It started in September and is wrapping up now with this show.  Exhibition is from August 19 - September 10, 2017.  Artist Talk is on Sunday August 27th, 1pm, Reception September 8th, 7 - 9pm.  Take a look at my gallery page to see some of the work of mine that is on display.

Creative Directions

Last year I was one of fifteen people chosen to participate in Fusion's Creative Directions.  As they say on their website: Creative Directions is FUSION's new and exciting program for potters and sculptors designed to expand their technical skills, develop critical thinking and build confidence. Basically, it has been a mentorship and has been hard and rewarding, frustrating and fun at the same time.  I've learned a lot from our mentor Michelle Mendlowitz, but also from all of the other participants.  We are going to be in a group show at the Robert Mclaughlin's Gallery A from [...]

Getting Inspiration

I saw this cool poster recently on Pinterest and I'm not sure if Meredith from Crafted Fragments created it or if it was from Text my Journal.  However, it is a brilliant poster and sure to get some ideas flowing.

Gregory Thielker: Under The Unminding Sky – WeTransfer This Works

  “In my paintings, I’m interested in highlighting the way we see the world,” says American painter Gregory Thielker. Initially this seems like a simple statement, but when you think about it, it is more complex than it first sounds. He is an artist interested in our perception of the physical things around us, rather than those things themselves. So reads the article about Gregory on the site wetransfer.com, a popular site for transferring large files.  They transport you to a rainy summer day when the rain is coming down in buckets.  I think they are exciting [...]

Five questions to ask yourself as you ring in the new year

Forget New Year’s resolutions, New Year’s questions are a healthier alternative Source: Five questions to ask yourself as you ring in the new year If less than 10 per cent of us keep New Year’s resolutions, why make them in the first place? with most things in life, the motivation underlying making resolutions is key. All too often we spout off a long list of all the things we wish we were “better” at. These often include changing our exercise and/or eating habits, losing/gaining weight, and quitting/reducing a habit that we believe is unhealthy, such as nicotine, [...]

Auto Mechanics Hilariously Recreate Renaissance Paintings

A very clever idea for a calendar, instead of the tired nudes that people have been copying ever since the Calendar Girls movie from the UK came out.  It was good when they did it!  These are brilliant.   US-based photographer Freddy Fabris had always wanted to pay homage to the Renaissance masters with his photos in some way, but he wasn't sure how until he stumbled upon an auto-mechanic shop in the Midwest. This led to a brilliant series of portraits with auto mechanics reenacting famous Renaissance paintings. Source: Auto Mechanics Hilariously Recreate Renaissance Paintings

bitforms gallery » PomPom Mirror

  I'm going to NY next week, I think this will have to be on my agenda! Rozin’s anthropomorphic PomPom Mirror features a synchronized array of 928 spherical faux fur puffs. Organized into a three-dimensional grid of beige and black, the sculpture is controlled by hundreds of motors that build silhouettes of viewers using computer-vision. Along its surface, figures appear as fluffy animal-like representations within the picture plane, which is made permeable by a ‘push-pull’ forward and backward motion of meshed ‘pixels’. Ghostly traces fade and emerge, as the motorized composition hums in unified movement, seemingly alive [...]

A Global Art Project Brings Paintings of Anonymous Figures out of Museums and onto the Streets | Colossal

What a great idea! While visiting the Louvre last last year, artist and filmmaker Julien de Casabianca was struck by an Ingres painting of a female prisoner tucked unceremoniously into a corner of the museum. He suddenly had an idea: what if he could somehow free her—both figuratively and literally—by reproducin Source: A Global Art Project Brings Paintings of Anonymous Figures out of Museums and onto the Streets | Colossal

A Global Art Project Brings Paintings of Anonymous Figures out of Museums and onto the Streets

What a great idea! While visiting the Louvre last last year, artist and filmmaker Julien de Casabianca was struck by an Ingres painting of a female prisoner tucked unceremoniously into a corner of the museum. He suddenly had an idea: what if he could somehow free her—both figuratively and literally—by reproducin Source: A Global Art Project Brings Paintings of Anonymous Figures out of Museums and onto the Streets

Show in Peterborough a big success

The Kawartha Potters Guild had their annual show at the end of November and it was a huge success.  All the potters' work was beautiful and sales were up by 20%.  Here is an image of my own display for the show.  Next year is the 20th anniversary and we are hoping to have some surprises for our visitors.

Toronto Landmark gets recognition

Peter Doig’s Country-Rock (Wing-Mirror) painting sells for $15.5M Oil landscape depicts odd Toronto landmark as seen from the passenger seat of a car. Our beloved rainbow painting, was originally painted by Berg Johnson, who was 16 when he first decided to decorate the concrete tunnel that passes underneath a railway line next to the Don Valley Parkway. Originally from Norway, Johnson was inspired by the memory of a friend named Sigrid, who died in a tragic car accident nearby. He often would complain to her that people in Toronto “never looked up”, and following her death, endeavored [...]

Art or Craft?

In this informative video, it is cleverly illustrated what the difference is between Art and Craft.  Apparently it all started in 1550.  But don't let me spoil it for you!  Watch the video. However, it is a debate that has gone on for hundreds of years.

Art made with found objects

These are beautiful works made with buttons and other items in the colours that are found, not recoloured.  Very beautiful. See bluebowerbird.co.uk/ for all of the images.

Technology and Pottery Meet up

It is exciting when an ancient art form and a new technology meet up in exciting ways. Experimental animation meets pottery from Crafts Council on Vimeo. Click on title to see video.

How a Working Class Couple Amassed a a Priceless Art Collection

By Jed Lipinski Herb Vogel never earned more than $23,000 a year. Born and raised in Harlem, Vogel worked for the post office in Manhattan. He spent nearly 50 years living in a 450-square-foot one-bedroom apartment with his wife, Dorothy, a reference librarian at the Brooklyn Public Library. They lived frugally. They didn’t travel. They ate TV dinners. Aside from a menagerie of pets, Herb and Dorothy had just one indulgence: art. But their passion for collecting turned them into unlikely celebrities, working-class heroes in a world of Manhattan elites. While their coworkers had no idea, the [...]

Art Makes you Smart

By BRIAN KISIDA, JAY P. GREENE and DANIEL H. BOWEN Published: November 23, 2013 According to a recent article in the NY Times, a large-scale study of school tours of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, showed up some suprising data about the children who were able to attend the museum and get some art education. Read more here....

What Value Art?

There was a lot of talk last week of the sculptures by artist Timothy Schmalz when his sculpture "Jesus the Homeless" was blessed by the Pope on November 20th.  Prior to that, he couldn't get any church to display the sculptures.  But of course, since the artist and his work got recognition by the Pope, someone has decided that the sculpture (a resin version) may be worth something. It's sad that an artist's work only has value once someone says it has.  The art hasn't changed, just the perception. For the article, please click here.

Made you look, didn’t I?

This site was created because of a piece of art I made.  I created a tile (or rather two) of the QR code for this site.  The general idea was that people are so fixated on their devices that even at an art show they would be driven to scan a QR code to see what was behind it. So the irony would be that they would be at an art show, looking at a picture about people looking at their phones while in a gallery, while they were doing the exact same thing.  Sort [...]

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