Art in the Street – February 2015

Featuring Anne Cavanagh at Gallery in the Attic, Theresa Ganz at Evans Contemporary, and ON Edge at Artspace

By Michael Fazackerley -
Published
The self-conscious title of Anne Cavanagh's "Drama Queen" belies the soft energy of this affective piece: its drama is quiet and powerful.
The self-conscious title of Anne Cavanagh's "Drama Queen" belies the soft energy of this affective piece: its drama is quiet and powerful.

Working with Mylar as a new surface for her expressive charcoal drawings, Anne Cavanagh is exploring new ways to present and develop her work. The penetration of light and depth allowed by this translucent material shows her growing sophistication in both form and nuance.

There have been considerable challenges along her journey to this show. “The Mylar Project” — which opens Friday, January 30th from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Gallery in the Attic in Peterborough — is a culmination of a journey that has brought her to her best work to date.

Anne grew up here as part of a large family on a farm in Ennismore. After attending high school at St. Peter’s in Peterborough, she went to college in the U.S. on a cross-country running scholarship to the University of West Georgia where she took a minor in Art.

“If anyone had asked me at the time what I was taking,” she says, “I would have said: ‘Running’.”

When she got injured her life was set to change. She took advantage of a University of West Georgia study abroad program in Normandy, France which included classes in art history, studio art, and French. There were trips to the foremost galleries of Europe. Seeing these places where great art was created and enshrined had a profound effect on her.

“Until you go and you see it,” she says, “and have the appreciation behind what is up on that wall; what historically was going on, what that painter was known for, all these things. It changes things. It changed things in me.”

She says of the pivotal moment when it all sank in, “I remember sitting on a bench looking out on the beaches in Normandy and painting. And you realize … wow. It just balanced and made sense. The reality of making art and making a living from art is a whole other thing, but that was the turning point for me.”

She switched her major to a Bachelor of Arts with a concentration of Pre-Medical Illustration, combining her interests in health and anatomy with her passion for artistic creativity and life drawing. This echoed the approach of Leonardo da Vinci and other Italian renaissance artists who used cadavers to improve their understanding of the human figure.

There is longing, tension, self-consciousness, tenderness, and fortitude in Cavanagh's work.
There is longing, tension, self-consciousness, tenderness, and fortitude in Cavanagh’s work.
After she returned home to live in Peterborough, the birth of her son provided her with a new inspiration. She had always had an interest in drawing children and drew pictures of her siblings when she was younger.

“In terms of drawing people there’s a real genuine quality to drawing children,” she says. “There’s no fake, no façade, no wall.”

This is something Cavanagh really strives for in her work and why she currently uses herself as a model. It gives her access to the psychological depth she’s trying to reach.

Now she maintains a balance between teaching art (at The Art School of Peterborough, The Art Gallery of Peterborough, and privately), commissions, sales of her work, and instructing at the YMCA. She even trains a peewee hockey team.

This is all part of the embodied experience that fuels her practice of making.

“My work is about health. It’s about mind/body connection. It’s about anatomy,” she explains. “To make your work you have to experience the world around you. You can’t sit in your studio and just look at the wall. You have to get out there. All these other things, while they help me make it financially as an artist, they also inspire me. It’s a balance between the time in the studio and the inspiration time, the time outside the studio. They play into one another.”

With the help of Gallery in the Attic curator Liz Fennell and the support of the Ontario Arts Council, Anne has made time to put on a rare solo show. Her work has featured regularly at the Lew Gallery (Buckhorn), Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibit, and on the Kawartha Autumn Studio Tour. This opportunity to see a concentration of her work is not to be missed.

Cavanagh’s work is exceptional. Her latest pieces express the personal progress she has made in coming to terms with her own vulnerability. The solid foundation she has cultivated in rendering skillful drawings and expressive portraiture has crossed a threshold into works of art that are elegant and meaningful. A heightened importance is given to every delineation. Each sparing absence has something to say. There is longing, tension, self-consciousness, tenderness, and fortitude. This show is both fascinating and beautiful.

Nothing is in excess in her work. The sparing use of acrylic in this charcoal on board piece expertly highlights this "Hesitation".
Nothing is in excess in her work. The sparing use of acrylic in this charcoal on board piece expertly highlights this “Hesitation”.
Cavanagh's measure of gravity and form is flawless. Unmoored from its surroundings, this image is alive with tension and movement.
Cavanagh’s measure of gravity and form is flawless. Unmoored from its surroundings, this image is alive with tension and movement.
Cavanagh's latest pieces like "Rush" express the personal progress she has made in coming to terms with her own vulnerability.
Cavanagh’s latest pieces like “Rush” express the personal progress she has made in coming to terms with her own vulnerability.

“The Mylar Project” is on now at Gallery in the Attic (upstairs at 140-1/2 Hunter St. W., Peterborough) and continues its exhibition until February 16th. Her work features along with Russell Davidson’s “Spoused” in the Brick Room, and a new set of works from the Little Red Hen membership collective.

Following the opening reception on Friday, January 30th from 6 to 8 p.m., there will be a special presentation of “Waking Dream” Dub Techno from Hans Ohm & Fever from 7 – 10 p.m. ($5 admission). The opening night reception is sponsored by The Sapphire Room.

Gallery in the Attic is open from Tuesday to Friday from 12 to 5 p.m. and Saturday 11 a.m to 5 p.m. (closed on Sunday and Monday except by appointment). Call 705-868-1162 or visit littleredhengallery.wordpress.com or www.facebook.com/GalleryintheAttic.

For more information on Anne Cavanagh and her work, visit www.annesstudio.com, call 705-930-1120, or email annesstudio@gmail.com.

Photos courtesy of Anne Cavanagh.

“Heart of the Cave” by Theresa Ganz at Evans Contemporary

Was there a reclining figure created intentionally here? The distinction between what has been carved, formed, or created by Ganz's treatment is blurred but clearly represented.
Was there a reclining figure created intentionally here? The distinction between what has been carved, formed, or created by Ganz’s treatment is blurred but clearly represented.
In a continuing investigation into natural forms through photo collages and installations, Theresa Ganz brings her focus to the surface of rock walls. These walls surround Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist temples that she took photographs of at the Ellora Caves in Maharashtra, India. By using digital software to stitch together individual shots, she draws our attention to man-made and natural marks that form the surface of these portals between material and spiritual worlds.

Her process-based method and the automation used to create her large-scale panoramas and silver gelatin prints explore the possibilities of photography in the digital age. By combining images of the real (the photographs point to something in the real world) and the fabricated space of each collage, Ganz brings us to a bewildering tension between what is represented and what is created.

Theresa Ganz earned her BA from Vassar College in Film and her MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in Photography. Her work has shown nationally and internationally and includes exhibitions at the Datz Museum of Art in Korea, the Museum of Craft and Design in San Francisco, and the Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago.

She has been artist in residence at both the Banff Centre for the Arts and the Camera Club of New York.

Ganz also takes photography out of our habitual representation of it in square or rectangular forms and also uses the shape of the pieces themselves to affect how we see their content.
Ganz also takes photography out of our habitual representation of it in square or rectangular forms and also uses the shape of the pieces themselves to affect how we see their content.
Born in New York City, Ganz currently resides in Providence, RI where she is faculty at Brown University. She is a founding member and director at Regina Rex in Brooklyn, now on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

“Heart of the Cave” opens with a reception at Evans Contemporary (302 Pearl Ave., Peterborough) on Thursday, February 5th from 6 to 10 p.m. The exhibition will continue until March 5th.

Evans Contemporary is open for viewings on Wednesday and Thursday from 5:30 to 8 p.m., or by appointment. Visit www.evanscontemporary.com, email evanscontemporay@gmail.com, or call 705-874-6932.

Photos courtesy of Theresa Ganz.

ON Edge at Artspace

This innovative program seeks to engage the public and use social media and mobile communication to expand Artspace's exchange with its membership of regional artists and the creative communities of artist-run centres across Canada.
This innovative program seeks to engage the public and use social media and mobile communication to expand Artspace’s exchange with its membership of regional artists and the creative communities of artist-run centres across Canada.
An exciting series of participatory events and workshops that focus on experimental and/or queer media and performance art practices begins with Philadelphia duo Kris Harzinski and Will Haughery’s debut Canadian presentation of “Arenalodge”.

Artspace will celebrate with an opening for the show on Friday, February 6th from 7 to 10 p.m. Both artists will be in attendance for the opening.

This will be followed by the inaugural events in the series on Saturday February 7th featuring “Captivate: Art Fairs for Life” (a workshop by The Desearch Repartment) from 12 to 5 p.m., and “The Works of Media Art in the Age of Hashtag Politics” panel discussion from 7 to- 9 p.m. The workshop will be hosted at Artspace (378 Aylmer St. N., Peterborough) and the panel discussion at Catharine Parr Traill College (Bagnani Hall, 310 London St., Peterborough).

Kris and Will’s “Arenalodge” consists of sculptural artifacts, performative photography, and choreographed action-based video works. They use these media to re-imagine ideas about masculinity and look to a new future about how we see relationships. Their exploration falls somewhere between the realm of the heterosexual bromance and a more inclusive form of queer embodiment. Humour and light-heartedness are a part of this mashed-up reality as these two world-views butt heads and scuffle with one another.

Kris and Will take a humorous and pointed approach to unmasking stereotypes about masculinity and imagining new ways of having relationships.
Kris and Will take a humorous and pointed approach to unmasking stereotypes about masculinity and imagining new ways of having relationships.
Two distinctive new video works “Hold Up the Bond” and “Brothersport” are part of the exhibition. “Hold Up the Bond” is a two-channel video in eight parts that situates the duo in a pair of distinct spaces: the stage and the locker room. In “Brothersport”, the artists flaunt the all-too-familiar intersections of celebration, inebriation, and violence that often accompany rituals of male bonding.

“ON Edge” continues through February until March 14th, bringing together the public with artists from Peterborough, Toronto, Montreal, Philadelphia, and Cologne. The series (with funding support from the Ontario Arts Council) is presented in partnership with Eastern Bloc Gallery in Montreal and The Darkroom Project in Peterborough. Additional support is provided by The Trent Centre for Gender and Social Justice, and Trent University’s Catherine Parr Traill College, Cultural Studies, and Media Studies departments.

In "Captivate: Art Fairs for Life", The Desearch Repartment (Montreal/Cologne) will introduce you to innovative strategies designed to empower through social media, business innovation, and socially-engaged art practices ($10 or PWYC, no one will be turned away).
In “Captivate: Art Fairs for Life”, The Desearch Repartment (Montreal/Cologne) will introduce you to innovative strategies designed to empower through social media, business innovation, and socially-engaged art practices ($10 or PWYC, no one will be turned away).
For all the information on the many workshops and events, please visit www.artspace-arc.org/exhibition/on-edge/.

Kris and Will’s “Arenalodge” will remain on exhibition after the February 6th opening celebration until March 28th.

Artspace (378 Aylmer St. N., Peterborough) is open on Tuesday and Wednesday from 12 to 6 p.m., Thursday and Friday from 12 to 8 p.m., and Saturday from 12 to 4 p.m. Call 705-748-3883, email gallery@artspace-arc.org, or visit www.artspace-arc.org.

Photos courtesy of Artspace.

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