Colourful pennants

Colourful pennants

 

The grounds of the Green Door Heritage building (new interim home of the Cowichan Public Art Gallery) have stayed the same for quite a while, so it was decided to add a little colour and motion to let people know that change has arrived.

Come and sit for a while and see for yourself if the mood is a little bit happier than it was before. While you are there; drop in to the Gallery and see the art exhibition that is on at that time (bring your friends if you like!).

My thanks go to Al Brunet for assisting me in the installation. I said to Al: “If I fall off the ladder and kill myself, I want you to tell my wife that I died doing something that made me happy.”

– Dorian Melton, CPAG Director

 

Hanging the pennants

Exhibition: Graham Pettman

Exhibition: Graham Pettman

May 18 to July 5

Tuesdays to Saturdays – 10am – 4pm

Cowichan Public Art Gallery, 126 Ingram Street, Duncan

contact: info@cowichangallery.ca

 

The Cowichan Public Art Gallery Society (CPAG) is pleased to announce the second exhibition in its interim home.

 

Graham Pettman was born in 1938 at Fort Vermillion, Alberta, of a Cree mother and a British father. Being nomadic most of his life, Graham has been traveling with his work between BC and Alberta. Many of his works end up in sculpture collections outside of Canada, and his work is acknowledged to be the originator of a new style now in common use among many indigenous sculptors, not unlike the indigenous painter, Norval Morrisseau famed for creating the contemporary eastern woodland style of indigenous painting.

This exhibition at the Cowichan Public Art Gallery is about the Mimigewsiwak or the Cree “Little People” which Graham has illustrated in marvelous stone sculpture. Twenty or more “Little People” sculptures will be presented along with other artwork in this powerful exhibition. The exhibition is a master class in observation and masterly carving inspired by native traditions.

Graham grew up in small town Alberta, spending time with Cree relatives living in the old ways. Observing the lifestyle of his grandfather, an herbalist and trapper; Graham saw a man who lived a simple life surrounded by nature right up until his death at nearly one hundred years of age.

Encouraged by a friend and his brother to work in soapstone, he started carving full-time in 1982. More of Graham’s Cree background and Native heritage is depicted with the integration of the symbols that nature displays. His inspiration comes from the existing shape of the stone before he commences carving.

Graham feels fortunate to live in an area where he can participate in the Native culture, invigorating, enlivening, and illustrating re-emerging ancient traditions relating to the Creator. He enjoyed sketching as a youngster and met and was influenced by A.Y. Jackson (a founding member of the Group of Seven) as a youth in Yellowknife and was later inspired to attend the Alberta College of Art in 1965.
Graham presently lives in 100 Mile House in the Cariboo region of British Columbia Canada where he enjoys the company of his three children: Demian, Mikara, and Aaron.

 

Installation

 

Reception

 

Exhibition

Exhibition catalogue

click image to open catalogue in a new window

 

About the Cowichan Public Art Gallery (CPAG)

Founded in 2017, CPAG is working to build a world-class art gallery in the town of Duncan in the Cowichan Valley. Once completed, the Gallery will welcome exhibitions from British Columbia, Canada and the world — including engagement and educational events for the public. In the meantime, CPAG has an annual exhibition program enhancing and expanding arts and cultural opportunities for everyone. More than 400 individuals have signed our petition in favour of the project and it enjoys support from all levels of government. CPAG is a registered charity.


Spring clean-up

Spring clean-up

Green Door Heritage Building, home of the Cowichan Public Art Gallery.

 

Cowichan Public Art Gallery cleans up in preparation for an active season.

 

Students from Brentwood College School in Mill Bay helped to raise funds for their projects by pitching in on a major clean-up of the grounds of the Green Door Heritage Building.

“The grounds of the site have not looked this good since it was first revitalized back in 2001!” says founder and event organizer David Coulson. The students scrubbed decks and siding, pruned back plants, bushes and small trees and bagged a ½ ton truckload of debris in the process. We here at CPAG very much appreciated the energetic help!

Food to feed the hungry students was generously donated by Save-On-Foods (located in Duncan Village). The sandwiches were fabulous and enough to feed a small army!


In praise of Volunteers

In praise of Volunteers

As every non-profit organization knows very well: without volunteers, nothing would get done.

Zip.  Zero.  Zilch.

The Cowichan Public Art Gallery’s inaugural art exhibition in our new home in the Green Door Heritage building is currently open to the public 5 days a week thanks to the efforts of a group of arts-loving volunteers who have committed their time to being there to greet visitors to the gallery.

My own involvement in community volunteering began around 1990 after having joined a Karate class in a Vancouver Community Centre. A couple of years later, one of the Senseis suggested that I wouldn’t have to pay the monthly membership fee if I would assist with the class. Senior students helping junior students is the norm in such classes and so my volunteering days began.

Assisting others in learning can be a very effective tool for deepening one’s own understanding of a subject, so it was beneficial for everyone involved. I was surprised and very gratified by the sense of community that would come from having this as a regular activity in my life and consider the people I met to be friends to this day.

After coming to live in the Cowichan Valley in mid 2017; I looked forward to seeing what pleasures awaited in the local arts scene and soon noticed that I would have to travel beyond this area if I wanted to visit public art galleries. After being introduced to artist Jock Hildebrand by a mutual friend and hearing of his plan to bring a public art gallery to the Cowichan Valley; I became involved with the newly formed Cowichan Public Art Gallery Society (CPAG).

In the years since the beginning of my involvement, I have made many new friends in the CPAG group and take great personal satisfaction in being able to contribute in a meaningful way to this ambitious project which promises to add to the already rich cultural fabric of this area for generations to come.

Volunteering is good for you…if you haven’t already; try it, you might like it.

More information is here on our Volunteer page

Please contact our Volunteer Coordinator Sheila at sheila@cowichangallery.ca if you have any questions.

CPAG potluck dinner-2019

John Frith

John Frith

John Frith, Designer

 

John Frith Creates Artful Desk for Cowichan Public Art Gallery (CPAG)

John Frith of JJ Frith Design has created and donated a spectacular desk for front-of-house at CPAG’s new gallery space in downtown Duncan. It is both practical and a work of art. This local cabinet designer’s pieces grace many homes and offices throughout the Cowichan Valley and beyond.

Frith refers to this $10K installation as his origami piece, as it contains angles and cuts that remind one of the paper-folding art form. The process of taking an assignment like this and turning it into a memorable piece begins with closely listening to the client, then fleshing out a design and drawing it to scale. Next, Frith seeks out the right material – in this case, locally grown cedar, milled and finished at Glenora Farm by Irvine Bahnmann of Bahnmann Timber, who offered a significant discount. Frith found a talented builder in Curtis Neufeld at Neufeld Furniture, who did the work for half price. The remaining costs were donated by JJ Frith Design, along with John Frith’s time and talent.

Frith ensures that his creations, from humble mud room to elegant furniture, fit not only their intended spaces but also are in alignment with their surroundings. A gleaming, stark countertop wouldn’t work in a rustic cabin, for example. So, for the CPAG desk, you can see scars in the tree integrated into its artful design, reflecting the aesthetic of the gallery.

CPAG deeply thanks Frith for his time, energy and talent in providing its first gallery space with a welcoming, unique look, and a beautiful spot for its guestbook. And why did he choose to help out? He said, “I feel aligned with what CPAG is doing. It’s about time. Everyone should have access to beauty. Without art there is no civilization. I am glad to have been able to donate this piece for the new gallery space.”

Contact:
John Frith ​​250-510-4005 (Designer)


Art Exhibition – “A Feminine Vision”  the art of Maggie Hazell-Rosen

Art Exhibition – “A Feminine Vision” the art of Maggie Hazell-Rosen

Tuesdays to Saturdays – 10am – 4pm

Opening: Thursday March 16 at 7pm

Cowichan Public Art Gallery, 126 Ingram St., Duncan

contact: info@cowichangallery.ca

 

The Cowichan Public Art Gallery Society (CPAG) is pleased to announce the opening of its interim home.

CPAG has taken over the lower level of the Green Door Building, located at 126 Ingram Street in downtown Duncan, and will open its doors on March 16th with a retrospective exhibition of the work of Maggie Hazell-Rosen.

Maggie was one of the first women to exhibit abstract expressionist art in both Vancouver and San Francisco. Her earliest exhibitions, to which she primarily contributed portraits, were in Vancouver in the mid-1940’s, but in 1953, after spending five years in San Francisco where she studied at both the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the California School of Fine Arts, she contributed several abstract works to the 9th group show at the Vancouver Art Gallery. In the fall of 1954 she moved to Sausalito, across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco, where she quickly joined its lively arts culture. She was the director of the 1956 Sausalito Art Festival, greatly expanding its scope and turning it into one of the Bay Area’s most important annual art festivals. For many years she was a regular participant in that festival and in the San Francisco Art Festival. She was also active in the San Francisco Women Artists, serving as secretary and then president.

Maggie’s work is distinctly feminine, with a warm colour palette and often displaying a strong sense of humour. It’s easy to recognize these qualities in the work that has been assembled for this retrospective exhibition, which is a very small sample of her total oeuvre. Most of the earliest works shown are abstract oil paintings on canvas or masonite; owning to her having developed an allergy to turpentine, her work after 1970 expanded to include acrylic paintings, etchings and other prints, and drawings, many of which include some watercolour or coloured pencil elements. She had a firm but relaxed line, which really drew out the personality of her subjects.

Maggie’s early influences include Clyfford Still, Hassel Smith and David Park, all of whom were at the California School of Fine arts in the late 1940’s. She was also a keen student of Spanish and Italian artists, and in particular of those artist’s drawings.

Maggie was born in Vancouver in 1919, and while she proudly retained her Canadian citizenship, she lived most of her life in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she died in 2010. Her father was the songwriter Charles Franklin Harrison, her sister the playwright Poppy McKenzie, and her grandmother the opera singer Marie Harrison, also known as Madame Yulisse.

 

The exhibition

 

Hanging the exhibition

After the curatorial decisions have been made about placement of the art works, the hanging crew puts the work on the walls and adjusts the lighting.   It is interesting to see the transition of the space to its final stage of presentation.

 

Opening Reception

We wanted to reward the many people who have supported our vision of a Public Art Gallery in Duncan over the past few years since we formed the Cowichan Public Art Gallery Society.   Opening receptions are a time to re-connect with old friends and make new ones…this one was filled with high energy (and laughter when one of the resident cats “Big Bear” decided to come in and see what all the fuss was about.

CPAG would also like to thank Zanatta Estate Winery for the generous donation of their excellent wines for this occasion.

 

About the Cowichan Public Art Gallery (CPAG)

Founded in 2017, CPAG is working to build a world-class art gallery in the town of Duncan in the Cowichan Valley. Once completed, the Gallery will welcome exhibitions from British Columbia, Canada and the world — including engagement and educational events for the public. In the meantime, CPAG has an annual exhibition program enhancing and expanding arts and cultural opportunities for everyone. More than 400 individuals have signed our petition in favour of the project and it enjoys support from all levels of government. CPAG is a registered charity.