Gord Smith‘s art is pretty easy on the eye and customers might be drawn to the delightful, bright colours and the superficially abstract shapes and patterns dancing across the surfaces of his paintings and tiles. Don’t be fooled. The creative process behind the work is radical, not decorative.
Gord Smith at the Gerrard Art Space, May 4, 2014
Faced with a choice today of listening to a 2-hour artist’s talk by Gord or tagging along on a Jane’s Walk about the Art of the Danforth, I went to hear Gord. Too bad the events were at the same time, because I would have liked the Jane’s Walk, but I don’t regret my choice.
Without hearing Gord’s talk, would I ever have suspected the notions that inspire his output? Probably not. A quick glance won’t do with these pieces, but that’s almost what they invite. Only if you take time to observe them for a while, does their energy begin to draw you in, setting up questions about how they work and why.
Month: May 2014
A chilly, damp, noisy Jane's Walk
Let’s not tar and feather Porter Airline’s Robert Deluce for wanting to add jet traffic to his turbo prop noisemaking. Exile him to a small, mid-Atlantic island, far from Toronto’s shore? OK, that seems reasonable.
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Jane’s Walk leader Anshul Kapoor of NoJetsTO apologizes for the difficulty he has speaking over the Porter airplane noise, even with a megaphone. The noise is shocking. I don’t know how people live down there.
This racket happens 200 times a day, until 11:00 at night. Locals complain of powerful smells of aviation fuel. And Deluce wants to add jets. “Whisper jets” he calls them, because they could be as QUIET as the ones he’s flying now.
The mayor of whom Anshul speaks is in Chicago for addiction rehab. Let’s hope he also learns why Chicago ripped out its waterfront airport.
Day One: Art of the Danforth
Friday began the annual Danforth art event which is ongoing until May 11. Inside Artisans At Work, I met Tara Shelton, who not only runs the place (and started it, with fellow artisans), but is possessed of many skills. She does wood burning, teaches sculpture and listed so many more crafts, I can’t remember all of them.
The studio/gallery/shop offers variety, too. Paintings, drawings, ceramics, leather goods and jewellery are for sale. There are life drawing sessions, craft classes, community meetings and monthly art exhibitions. On May 24th there will be a swap meet for trading and selling unused art supplies.
There is wisdom in this article
Click the pic to go to the BBC item …
My take on the article
I must admit that I have succumbed too often to purposeful walking and I am the poorer for it. When I started my goal of walking at least 10,000 steps a day, my walks were purposeless, free and uplifting. But slowly, I began to spoil my walks with destinations and chores.
I am grateful to the author of the BBC article for reminding me of something I already knew, but was neglecting. Purposeless walking is the real deal. Nothing can replace it, not even cycling. Not even purposeless, bike-path cycling.
As the weather warms, I’ll be happy to get our bikes down from the garage wall, and I’ll enjoy the rides, but I would be cheating myself to let them become substitutes for the kind of walking that Finlo Rohrer has written about.
Crackle déja vu
I opened the Crackle movie app and felt myself whisked back in time. Suddenly, I was standing in my local corner store, waiting my turn at the cash counter and idly perusing VHS videos that I never rented.
You don’t expect much from a free movie app, but its power as a time machine is surprising! I haven’t been inside that corner store since I quit smoking over 20 years ago, but looking at the Crackle covers, I could vividly visualize the old store’s walls and spotty fluorescent lighting, its aisles and worn wooden floorboards.