doreyme

joy#149 of an American white haired woman , 8x8, watercolour June 1.09

paintings of Obama, proliferate

+ more here

kid's bike, Old Montreal, May 31.09

I'm sensing a pattern here + it's pretty clever. (The garbage bin + bench were covered with colourful tape in the Plateau, about a month ago.) It's striking + not as evasive as, eg.  spray paint. 

me + my shadow, May 31/09

went to a fabulous show at the dhc in Old Montreal  called Particles of Reality,  along with a group of photographer/friends.  I'd never heard of this artist Michal Rovner, who lives in NY + in Israel on a farm, but after seeing the show it felt to me her art could only be created by someone who lives in NY + rural Israel.  She marries the most sophisticated technology with the most primitive...eg. rocks.  It's on all summer into the fall + truly, it's a show not to be missed. 

Percy Walters Park, wrecked by the city of Montreal

For years + years  (like centuries) Percy Walters Park, situated very near to downtown Montreal has been the city's best dog park, official or not.  Legend has it that it was left to citizens "+ their companions" for all time.  This week the good city fathers + mothers decided it was due time ( a few months before a civic election) to erect a fence half way through it.  One side for children (from 2 to 5 only) the other side for the inner city dog owners.  So this is temporary, a huge ugly fence not keeping with the historic park will probably be erected.  I love kids as much as the next person but, hey, there's a huge park next door, called Mount Royal (where unleashed dogs are not allowed)  plus, if there are any kids around here, they are the the children of privilege, the cottage children, the big backyard children + the children whose nannies might prefer the Mountain to this canine oasis.  This city has so many designated parks + fields + arenas + stadiums for athletes+sports fans plus there are the bike paths the new zillion dollar bike rentals etc.  -- you'd think the city councillors could throw the occasional bone to the dog people? (Also, see how dark it is on the "kid side"?  Nice play area.  Unless they now pull down all the trees, too? 

I love it when people send me new artists to discover. Thanks, S.

joy#148 of white haired women , 8x8, watercolour May 31.09

Duluth St. Montreal, May 30.09

more new white house art

here

new art the obamas add to the whitehouse

Joy#147 of clearing my mind with an abstract, 8x8, watercolour May 30.09

Big mega raspberry symphony to the tawdry little yuppie wannabe couple of submoronic elementary school dropout poseurs who Angus + I unfortunately encountered this night. Pity their poor little labradoodle who is undoubtedly locked in his tiny crate all day in a sterile, tv blaring overpriced artless, plantless basement apartment + only gets out a few leashed minutes under the cover of darkness to do his toiletry in a tiny sandbox (literally) of a toddler's park no Plateau dog owner,ever,ever brings his/her dog to. People, + I use the term loosely, like them are the major pitfall of a neighbourhood gone trendy + make a person's mind turn towards craigslist: housing, Queen Charlotte islands or the remote such. This is childish of me, yes, but it's therapeutic + now I feel a bit better.

  What a great concept, "make your own kind of music". Thanks E for passing it along on this grey Vancouver day. Week. Month.

+ the Grange Prize Winner is Marco Antonio Cruz

who I had to vote for, too   I felt a bit unpatriotic for voting for a non-Canadian on this "Focus on the Best in Canadian and International Contemporary Photography" competition, but his photos are just too too amazing...

if the water fountains are running, it must be spring

+ for the feint-hearted, the fountain is in a dog park. A great dog park, an official dog park, in Outremount, not like our official Plateau "dog park" off that super-highway, Park Avenue, where there is not even a fence + the hours are very limited.  

joy#146 of working on a school project with kids, 8x8, mixed media on wood, May 29.09

I like to think that every time one of the pc's attack ads on Ignatieff plays, a new Liberal voter gets his/her wings.

Is art good for you?

a thoughtful article by fabulous artist David Byrne + this is a painting he did in high school

joy#144 of the fleeting lily of the valley, watercolour 8x8" May 27/09

joy#143 of a joyful spring crow, watercolour on typing paper, 8x10" May 26/09

sit, St. Laurent + Rachel, Montreal, may 21.09

joy#142 of the amarylis acrylic + oil on canvas, 30x40", May 25/09

me and my shadow, St. leonard, may 24.09

Joy#141 mixed, of finding a jpg of a destroyed painting, 10x12, oil on canvas,May 24/09

joy#140 of receiving flowers, thank you E+G, 8x8, watercolour, May 23.09

2 views of Francis Bacon

 Self Portrait      By Lucien Freud

There's a big Francis Bacon show in NY right now at the Met.  Recently a Canadian columnist, Barbara Kay wrote an article about it in the National Post, a right-wing newspaper I subscribe to because of, ironically, the art.  It actually writes quite frequently about art + culture, etc. unlike our local paper, the Montreal Gazette. Not usually by Barbara Kay, however.  I don't know what possessed her to write an article about Francis Bacon.  She doesn't say she went to the exhibition.  In any case I found her article very disturbing + distressing. 

I'm not a huge Francis Bacon fan. I cover my eyes during gory bits in movies + the news.   I hate CSI, etc.  But Barbara Kay called Francis Bacon's work "so called art" + stated that it was "degenerate".  Well, I studied art history + the word "degenerate" in relation to art, as BK well knows,  was most famously used by the Nazis to describe virtually ALL modern art.  Then, later,  post war-horror Francis Bacon's early modern art works were of Nazis -- Eichmann, Hitler, Himmler, etc.  Small world.

But back to the article in the National Post,  entitled  "A Perversion of Art"  -- Ms Kay also talks about the touring exhibit Body World, which features plastinated cadavers,  +  Lawren Harris of the Group of 7.  She mentions his great grandaughter apparently is a wheelchair erotica model. 

I don't get what the cadaver freak show or Lawren Harris's grandaughter has to do with Mr. Bacon's show in NY, but that's not what really gets me.  What gets me is that people like BK who has an M.A. in Literature + has taught at all sorts of Canadian schools + lectures + edits magazines + writes for a national paper, etc. would take the time and effort to so stridently crap on an art show in NY of an artist who died in 1992?  Like, why?  Like, where's the fire?  

And why in such a virulent, clunky, unnuanced manner?  Does she not care that Harper, our ultra-Conservative Prime Minister has probably posted her indictment of Bacon on his fridge door?  Does she not care this government is shutting down museums?  That articles like this help to enflame the red-neck "a (degenerate) monkey could paint that" crap too prevalent in Canada?  Starting from the top, from a PM who thinks art is for elitists...  To paraphrase the old sawhorse -- youth is wasted on the young  -- education is wasted on the stup--close-minded. 

Someone in BK's position, ought to be promoting the arts.  Surely there is an exhibition somewhere on this planet she might encourage her readers to visit?   I mean, for us Canucks,  we really have to go out of our way to see Bacon's show in NY.  So am I going to cancel my subscription to the National Post?   +  gee,  today it's got this marvelous article + pics of the Vancouver architect 

arthur erickson an exceedingly talented + kind man who died this week.  (He once wrote a glowing letter of recommendation for me + a group of young optimistic Vancouver art school students in the 1970's to obtain an art grant to "bring art to the people".  We got that grant + worked our butts off + had enough money to pay tuition in the fall.)  

+ I absolutely adore the Post's editorial cartoonist, Gary Clement, even more since he wrote this about BK's article.  Then he said she said... Here is BK's note to "knee jerk liberal art critics: Nazi + homophobics don't own the word degenerate"

What evah.   A national newspaper has a responsibility to publish nuanced articles + BK's rant is wayyyyyyyy over the top.  It has to be a cynical move by the paper to provoke readership much like the View's use of Elizabeth Hasselbeck.

In any case, to counter balance BK's rant, here is Roberta Smith's art review in the NY Times, called If Paintings Had Voices, Francis Bacon's Would Shriek.  

So yeah it's definitely time this knee jerk liberal stopped subscribing to the National Post. Like today. Thanks Babs. Hello Globe + Mail.     

poor montreal 28th out of 29 north american cities with populations over 2 million

read it + weep

+ the only city poorer than Montreal (calculated via gross domestic product) is Riverside, San Bernardino, the largely hispanic + black low income side of LA.

Montreal ranks 28th in the percentage of residents older than 25 who have a high school diploma!!!!  Unbelievable, this in a city that  has the highest student population in North America (or is it tied with Boston? I forget). Guess they are out of towners.  

joy#139 of Bambi butterflies 14x14, acrylic + oil on wood, May 22.09

33 of the healthiest foods

+ why

boy, who made this guy president?

Doesn't he realize there was an election?  That Americans voted on a new path?

joy#138 of neighbours magnolia before they dropped off 14x14, May 21.09

joy#137 of clouds acrylic + oil + encaustic on wood, 14x14, May 20.09

new lightposts on park ave, montreal may 15.09

1985

what the world's most continuously creative, innovative artist --David Hockney-- is up to recently

what a guy

Terry Ewasiuk, photography show, Vancouver June 5.09

Another good friend/Emily Carr art school buddy (when it was called Vancouver School of Art) is showing new photos...it should be a great show.  Terry's got a very

sharp, witty eye 

while the Obamas encourage art that "defines who we are as a people"

shame on Canada

Harper + the  current Canadian government believe the arts are only of interest to an elite group and not relevant to "ordinary" folk +  close down museums eg. the photography museum in Ottawa, killing the portrait museum....Arg. 

free aun san suu kyi

to sign the petition

joy#136 of my neighbour's magnolia, acrylic + oil on wood, 14x14, carved May 19.09

pink flamingoes together at pat pink's gallery but not talking

shoe time, may 17.09

joy#135 of pink flamingo's mate, 24x36 acrylic + oil on wood, carved May 1809

to whom we thank for this 3 day weekend...

thanks to all the people who came to the verni at Pat Pink' today

joy#134 of pink flamingo, 24x36 acrylic + oil on wood, carved May 17.09

tomorrow, Sunday May 17.09

Liberace, Tori, Olga, Studs, Pierce, Debra, Janet, Henry + me

   

 

(all 16th of May Taureans, all quite tenacious, altho don't know much about Pierce or Janet Jackson for that matter)

Bush style politics in Canada, way to go Conservatives

joy#133 of a serene model, 7x10, watercolour May 16.09