(photos from JQT Vancouver)
The JQT (Jewish Queer Trans) Artisan Market on May 15, 6-9 p.m., at the Peretz Centre features several local artists, and international performer Stav Meishar presents Oy Slay! at 8 p.m. For more information on the market and other JQT Heritage Month events, including the launch of the B.C. JQT Oral History Project at the Zack Gallery on May 28, visit jqtvancouver.ca.
This year’s West of Main Art Walk will be event founder Pnina Granirer’s last open studio. (photo from Pnina Granirer)
In European cities such as Paris, art has been blooming for centuries and is an essential component of life and culture. Unfortunately, in the relatively young city of Vancouver, art was barely noticed in the early ’90s.
While living in Paris in 1992, I discovered an amazing number of galleries and museums and spent every free moment gorging myself on a wealth of art. One of the most exciting happenings occurred in the spring, when an unusual event burst onto the city: Le Génie de la Bastille. All around the arrondissement (neighbourhood) of the Bastille, hundreds of artists opened their studios to the public for an entire week. A large exhibition at the City Hall was launched and maps were handed out to the public, showing the location of each studio. Every day, map in hand, I would go up and down the ubiquitous five-floor buildings in the area, soaking in the opportunity of seeing the great variety of works and talking to the artists.
Too soon, I was back in Vancouver, still thinking with much pleasure about that wonderful week in Paris. Getting together with my artist friend, Anne Adams, who passed away in 2007, I described to her the exciting days spent visiting the artists’ studios in the City of Lights, when a sudden thought occurred to me. Anne, I said, what if we tried doing this here? Are any artists living in our neighbourhood, who might be interested?
Anne was as excited at the idea as I was, and we approached the now-defunct local Courier newspaper, which was very supportive and published an article with a call to artists. We did not have to wait long for the telephone to start ringing. To our delight, we discovered a good number of artists living in Point Grey, Kitsilano and Dunbar/Kerrisdale who wanted to participate.
A small group of us got together to plan the event. We needed a venue to have an opening exhibition, followed by a weekend when the artists would open their studios and their homes to the public. This had never been done before in Vancouver!
The West Point Grey Community Centre at Aberthau offered its space and the first exhibition opened in 1993. Word spread like wildfire. We were inundated with calls from artists who wanted to join. This will be too much for one weekend, I thought, let’s keep it small and limit the number of studios to no more than 20, so that everyone’s work could be seen.
I had the idea to hold the Art Walk over three weeks, one week for each neighbourhood. There was a lot of work to do, all of it voluntary. This was a time without the internet, so we used a “telephone tree” and the mail. Anne was an excellent organizer. I was quite idealistic at that time and suggested that we do not ask for any grants or taxpayers’ money, although donations from businesses and private donors were welcome. We would prove that artists had initiative and could do such an event by themselves – and it worked! We proved that artists were capable of contributing and enriching their communities by sharing their art and creativity.
We needed a name that would represent us. After sifting through many names, we decided to call ourselves Artists in our Midst, as we were all artists living in the midst of our community. By two years later, our idea had caught on and spread all over the city and the Lower Mainland, and we are all culturally richer for it.
Over the 30 years since we began, much has changed, including the name, which is now West of Main Art Walk. We are now back to only one weekend, but many new artists have joined us. Everyone is invited to visit us the last weekend in May, enjoy the art and perhaps take some home to live with.
As for myself, all of my works will be offered at 50% discount. And I will repeat last year’s idea of a fundraising sale to benefit Stand Up for Mental Health, founded by my son, David, the recipient of a Governor General Meritorious Service Medal. He teaches stand-up comedy to people with mental illness, as a way of building confidence and fighting public stigma and has been invited to work all across Canada, the United States and Australia.
This will be my last open studio and sale. Hope to see you!
West of Main Art Walk features more than 50 participating artists, including many Jewish community members, who invite visitors to their studios May 27-28, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. For the studio map and more information, visit artistsinourmidst.com.
Art House SF’s Max Khusid is one of several artists who will be at Art Vancouver May 4-7. (photo from Art House SF)
Once again, galleries and artists from across Canada and around the world will come together to exhibit their work at Art Vancouver, which takes place May 4-7 at the Vancouver Convention Centre West. At the annual fair, attendees can join the opening night party, purchase art, listen to various talks, take part in classes, and more.
Among the exhibiting artists are local Jewish community members Lauren Morris, Taisha Teal, Sky Lilah, Talin Wayrynen and Lisa Wolfin, who will also be teaching art classes during the fair. In addition to the stories you can find on jewishindependent.ca about these artists, visit their websites for more information: Morris (lmdesignsstudio.com), Teal (taishateal.com), Lilah (skylilah.com), Wayrynen (imtalin.com) and Wolfin (lisawolfin.com).
Other participating Jewish community members include Max Khusid of San Francisco gallery Art House SF (arthousesf.com) and a couple of the gallery’s artists, Tavalina (Rinat Kishony) and Max Blechman, who, with husband Kazu Umeki, comprises the duo BLECHMEKI (a portmanteau of their last names).
Khusid spent the first 20 years of his professional career in the world of technology, and plans to spend the next 20 years diving into the unknown and immeasurable world of art. He is inspired by the mystic art and adventurous life journey of Russian painter, explorer, archeologist and philosopher Nicholas Roerich (1874-1947).
Tavalina lives in Israel and her work “Jerusalem” was recently featured on the cover of a book by the late Amos Oz. A graduate of the Israel Institute of Technology with a bachelor of architecture, she worked in the field for several years. After a personal crisis in her 30th year, she began to paint, devoting herself to art. At the same time, she embarked on a journey of personal discovery and traveled many places, eventually returning to Israel, where she continues painting and presenting her work, as well as teaching art.
Blechman, originally from New York, lives in San Francisco. He and Umeki use mass-produced American pottery from the 1930s to 1980s to create photo tableaux. At first glance, the individual pieces of pottery appear identical, but closer inspection reveals variations both in form and colour. Indeed, the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi (appreciating beauty that is imperfect, impermanent and incomplete in nature) reverberates throughout their pottery.
For the full list of Art Vancouver artists and classes, as well as tickets for the fair, visit artvancouver.net.
– Courtesy Art Vancouver
Playing the game of Risk. (photo © Jorge Royan)
I’ve always thought of the Nordic region as peaceful. Admittedly, my knowledge of the area is largely limited to Risk, the board game, where Greenland, Iceland and the Scandinavian countries are considered a haven, free of imminent attack from the throw of a dice.
Well, Finland just purchased Israel’s David’s Sling defensive system. For $345 million US. It was one of Finland’s first moves after recently being accepted into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. And it was the first sale abroad for David’s Sling, an integrated part of Israel’s multi-tier missile defence system. Israel now carries the title of major supplier to NATO.
I guess the world’s a bit more complicated than Risk.
***
So long, Noa Tishby, the Israeli performer appointed by our previous prime minister, Yari Lapid, to advocate for Israel through her strong social media presence. With the formal and former title of special envoy for combating antisemitism and delegitimization of Israel – fit that onto a business card! – she was known for sparring with BDS advocate Bella Hadid and others. Tishby was also a vocal supporter of Israel’s anti-judicial reform movement. Giving voice to the many thousands protesting the current government and its extreme shift rightward and into sometimes theocratic territory, Tishby says this was the reason for her dismissal. Well, ya. As the hawkish Jerusalem Post editorialist Ruthi Blum noted, “Tisbhy is free to share [her opinion]. But she shouldn’t have expected the government she’s been bashing to keep her as a representative.” Well, no. But keep on truckin’ Noa Tishby.
BTW, Tishby will be a guest at the JNF Negev event in Vancouver on June 29.
***
Israel’s Tel Aviv Museum of Art is again among the world’s 100 most visited museums. This according to international art magazine The Art Newspaper. TAMA was ranked 49th in 2022, a jump from its 56th place the year prior. I am fortunate to be one of those visitors, on multiple occasions, over the past many years, often dragging my two children there when they were younger – how fun was that!
Paris’s Louvre and the Vatican Museum took first and second place, respectively. Canada was represented with a 60th place win by Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum.
***
Congratulations Milk & Honey, Israel’s preeminent whisky distiller, awarded the 2023 world’s best single malt whisky by the World Drink’s Awards for its Elements, Sherry Cask drink. Described as “[f]ruity aromas of citrus zest and white peach with a dash of wood varnish. Sweet to the taste … with flavours of golden syrup, vanilla, tropical fruit and iced tea.…” Sounds like a palate pleaser to me. But, if I had to choose, my favourite would be Seagram’s Five Star rye whisky. Not so much for its taste but for fond memories of fighting with my siblings for the silver sheriff’s star glued to the bottles.
***
Jerusalem was selected by Time magazine as one of the world’s 2023 top 50 destinations, holding the 48th spot. It’s one of my favourite places to visit on a bustling Friday, starting with a walk through the overcrowded neighbourhood of Mea She’arim and enjoying a freshly baked challah. Then, bargaining my way through the Old City’s Arab Market, its tastes, smells and sights, and eventually making my way to the Western Wall, with the golden Dome of the Rock overhead. Ending with lunch at Machane Yehuda, the popular central Jerusalem food market, which has the freshest of meats and vegetables, and many colourful stalls.
Not to be outdone, Canada held two spots. Churchill was third – can’t beat those Northern Light spectaculars. Vancouver was 38th, for its eclectic cuisine and the beautiful Stanley Park.
***
For sure, difficult days in Israel. Sociopolitical cultures are clashing internally. External enemies are looking on with glee, and testing us. But we’re not sinking into despair. Israel has experienced difficult times before and emerged stronger and wiser. So it will be this time.
Arguably, we are being governed by the worst government in our short history – for many reasons, including recent security challenges. I mean, come on, with someone as inexperienced and reactionary as Itamar Ben-Gvir as national internal security minister. Or Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich spouting off on things about which he should know better and doesn’t. But let’s not blame the victims for the terror and rockets. Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran, an inept Palestinian leadership with a hateful street – they are to blame, not the government.
Usually, it’s the right-wing governments that muster support for the very difficult realpolitik choices, from Menachem Begin’s 1982 Sinai exit to Ariel Sharon’s 2005 Gaza disengagement. Even Binyamin Netanyahu’s 2021 peace deals with several Arab countries under the Abraham Accords. Unfortunately, Netanyahu’s current government may be too inexperienced and messianic to enable reasonable, democratic, liberal change – read judicial reform – at such a scale. But who knows.
We cannot despair. At a very esoteric level, Israelis have hope. In fact, hope is the theme of our national anthem, Hatikvah, The Hope.
***
According to the World Happiness Report, published by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Israel remains one of the happiest countries in the world. (See jewishindependent.ca/measuring-happiness.) Rising to fourth place in 2023, just behind Finland, Denmark and Iceland, Israel’s showing likely reflected its reputation as a “villa in the jungle,” as dubbed by former prime minister Ehud Barak – despite being in the Middle East, one of the most contentious spots … on the Risk board.
Bruce Brown is a Canadian and an Israeli. He made aliyah … a long time ago. He works in Israel’s high-tech sector by day and, in spurts, is a somewhat inspired writer by night. Brown is the winner of the 2019 AJPA Rockower Award for excellence in writing, and wrote the 1998 satire An Israeli is…. Brown reflects on life in Israel – political, social, economic and personal.
For the
this year, Steveston, B.C., artist Merle Linde, chose to create a Haggadah cover that would look old and hand drawn. To achieve this authentic feeling, Linde used Taiwan linen paper, traditional Chinese watercolour paints and brushes.
The calligraphy letters in solid black Hebrew-like text feature peacock blue flashes, often seen in antique manuscripts. Yom Tov candles sit on candleholders that borrow their design from ancient Egyptian columns. The traditional Four Cups of Wine are inspired by a set of old silverware featuring raised grapevine leaves and grapes. And a silver seder plate holder has space for the three traditional shmura matzot, the shank bone, the burnt egg, haroset, bitter herbs, green vegetable and salt water for dipping.
Chag Pesach sameach.
“Nostalgia” by Lovena Galyide (photo by Olga Livshin)
Community Longing and Belonging, the fifth annual exhibition in celebration of Jewish Disability Awareness and Inclusion Month, is now on at the Zack Gallery.
Curated by Leamore Cohen, coordinator of Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver’s Inclusion Services, the participating artists demonstrate a range of artistic levels, abilities and social affiliations, but they all strive to answer the same questions in their artwork: What does community longing look like? How to find a place to belong in our ever-changing world?
Cohen has been the driving force of this show for five years. For her, an unjuried exhibition is the best way to honour the commitment to remove barriers and celebrate community members’ creativity. If an artist wanted in, they were in, professional artist or amateur, Jewish or non-Jewish, young or old. Cohen stressed that inclusion is the basic principle, and participation is what counts most.
Many artists in the current show have participated in the Inclusion Services exhibit before. Although most of the works on display are paintings, there are also photographs and drawings. There are portraits and landscapes, figurative and abstract imagery. Some items are for sale, while others are not.
Many of the portraits are disturbing in their naked emotional anguish. The faces are jagged or crooked, angular or cubical. One of them is clearly inspired by Picasso, but all of them portray loneliness, a search for belonging.
Most of the abstract images are similarly angry or sad. Very little figurative recognition manifests, but the emotions explode out of the pictures, multiplied by dark colours and sharp lines. They depict the pain of isolation, the desire for acceptance.
Not every work is bleak. Clare Palmer’s photograph “Red Maple” is full of natural serenity, as if the photographer found her community in nature and recommends it to everyone.
Roi Alexander M. Sanchez’s painting with a long and winding title starting with Clean Environment shows a man and a woman cleaning the land, collecting garbage into sacks, together with their friends in the background. The cleaning they are doing is obviously a community event, and the artist emphasizes this with bright colours and cheerful composition. The painting radiates gladness, with a child-like flare. The author seems to say: we clean our home together.
Togetherness also seems to be the main meaning of Aileen Leong’s untitled piece, where two hearts are pierced by one arrow. Connected by this arrow of love, the hearts fly above the mountains on the golden wings of joy.
Lovena Galyide, on the other hand, doesn’t speak of love in either of her two paintings. Both are larger than most of the others in the exhibit. Both feature a single woman. In one, called “Say Yes to Your Open Door,” a girl lifts the curtain of night above her head, allowing in the light of the morning. She welcomes a new beginning and abolishes darkness. The painting thrums with hope. The girl is alone, with her back to viewers, but maybe the new day will bring her a new friend. Or a new love is waiting for her on the sunny side.
Another of Galyide’s paintings is “Nostalgia.” It is less exuberant than the first. The woman in this canvas stands in the rain outside the window of a flower shop. The viewers are “inside,” looking out. All they see is a blurry female silhouette under an umbrella. But, inside the shop, flowers bloom. Is that pensive, lonely woman going to enter? Buy flowers? Or is she just passing down the street? So many stories could start with this painting, all going in different directions. It is up to viewers to finish those stories.
Flowers are also the focus of Sandra Yuen’s “Bias.” This painting is large, and the close-up flowers are accordingly huge and gloriously pink, blooming in splendid isolation on the blue background. The painting is reminiscent of Georgia O’Keeffe’s gigantic flowers, capturing the beauty and vastness of nature.
Unlike Yuen’s exposition of colour, another large painting, by Rodrigo Perez Parra, seems composed mostly of melancholy, echoed by its subdued, earthen palette. Its title, “The Dance in the Dream,” reflects its subject: a woman standing thoughtfully beside an open door. Does she dream of a dance in her past? Does she hope to dance again? Where is her partner? Only a hat, hanging beside the door, reminds us about them. Are they coming back? Again, stories abound from this painting, some of which might even have a happy ending.
In the middle of all the images on the gallery walls, two 3-D exhibits stand out. Andrew Jackson’s “Folk Guitar” and “Tree of Life Paddle” are tongue-in-cheek, almost goofy. Both are real-life objects, painted in a distinctive folksy style. The guitar flaunts soaring gulls gobbling fish. The paddle is painted with the Tree of Life. Although the guitar lacks its strings, perhaps the artist considers music our inescapable community. Or sports (for the paddle)?
Another unique item on display is a small clay tablet called “The AHA Community.” The artists who created it belong to the Artists Helping Artists (AHA) collective. The plaque doesn’t list any names, but Cohen said each of the 11 little colourful figures placed on the tablet’s surface, all engaged in different artistic activities, were made by different members of the collective. They are merry self-portraits, making the tablet itself a representative of all the artists in this show.
According to their website, AHA is an art studio collective in Burnaby, where artists of all abilities and skill levels are encouraged to come together to make art – visual art, music, writing, anything goes. The studio provides space, affordable materials and the opportunity to pursue the individual artist’s aspirations. A large percentage of their membership is artists with complex needs.
Like the JCC Inclusion Services, AHA believes that art is a vital element in our lives, and that inclusion is mandatory. Their mandates are congruent – each invites people to share their feelings through art.
The Community Longing and Belonging exhibit runs at the Zack until March 28. To view the flipping book, visit online.flippingbook.com/view/836064016.
Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].
Earlier this year, Claire B. Cohen published a book of her 30-plus years as an artist. She made it for family and friends, as a record of her artistic legacy.
“Art is a powerful and a creative force of self-expression. To create art is to develop an ability to communicate visually what cannot be expressed in words.
“By creating the process of art, we change the way we see the world,” Claire B. Cohen told the Independent. “In understanding ourselves, we find areas where we feel limited. In understanding ourselves, we stand up for ourselves and can present ourselves authentically to others. An artist’s creation is unique and original to their work.”
Earlier this year, Cohen published a slim volume, mainly with images that burst from the pages, outlining her 30-plus years creating art. We glimpse the range of her work – landscapes, portraits, semi-abstracts, flowers, multimedia collages and a compartmental series, in which colourful abstract canvases were “connected sequentially in a zigzag for using piano hinges.” Flow and fun describe this series, her portraits – both colour and black and white – capture the personalities of her subjects, her landscapes and collages are bold and full of movement but also balance. The book touches on her work as an art therapist.
Originally from Israel, Cohen came to Canada in 1964. She studied fine arts at York University in Toronto and the University of Ottawa, and later earned her master’s in art therapy and counseling from U of O in 1987. She had many solo exhibits and group shows in Ottawa, and elsewhere, over the years. The book takes readers to 2006, with an exhibit list to 2009. She moved to Vancouver in 2012.
“I continued to paint after moving to Ottawa, but my move to Vancouver changed my focus, since joining my family had taken much of my time, being richly involved with newborn grandchildren,” said Cohen. “However, I still continued painting and showing new work in Vancouver galleries, as well as donating paintings to different organizations in Vancouver, such as hospitals, Louis Brier [Home and Hospital], friends, and creating more collages and multimedia-based work. I participated in group art shows and sold some to the public.”
Cohen said her reason for producing the book “was to create a place to keep all of my art as a legacy to leave to my family in remembrance of my story. COVID times were affecting my spirit, my mood was down and … the idea came about to focus on creating the book for my family and friends.”
During the pandemic, Cohen said she started to lose her connection to creativity.
“Friends cut off from each other, as much as children and family,” she said. “I slowly lost my energy and interest, as well as the need I once had to be close to my easel. The paints, the brushes, the colours all lost their meaning and the need I had to paint slowly deteriorated.”
She began to look back at her past, which, she said, “led me to wake up from my dormancy and questions such as ‘what is my meaning of life?’ I discovered my paintings in storage and wanted to create a book.
“I reflected further on my body of work and questioned: why did I dedicate my years to painting? Was there any purpose to it? The answer eventually arrived – yes. There are many purposes to be alive, and work as an artist, investing my life in art. In my case, most of it was to leave a memory to my next generation.”
Cohen’s most recent exhibit and sale was at Britannia Community Centre in 2021. Art can be cathartic, whether one is making it or experiencing it.
“The process of creating art has a great intensity and full force of emotions that lead to a freedom and release when the piece is complete,” she explained. “Looking at these pieces that I created many years ago leads to a sense of nostalgia and a softening of that intensity. These pieces have followed me through many moves and lives, and have a story of their own that has evolved with the emotions that once created them. The language of art cannot be explained in words, the language of these emotions is form, line, colour and brush strokes.”
This language can help heal, as Cohen well knows from her art therapy practice.
“The more we know about ourselves, the more we learn to grow and develop our abilities to stand our ground,” she said.
Describing art as “a powerful and unique way to explore our creative forces,” she explained that people who participate in art therapy use the “materials to express the self and communicate visually,” composing stories. In a group setting, they “collaborate and share with others … connect and integrate parts of his/her inner self, gain confidence and reduce stress in a supportive environment, with the aid of the instructor.”
It was both a dream and a need for Cohen to do art therapy and counseling.
“I realized that art is not just for selling and decorating homes, rather it was a way to find myself, to grow and see who I am, and to help others with their healing.”
To see Cohen’s body of work, go to clairebcohen.wixsite.com/portfolio/home.
An oil painting by Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy.
Vancouver’s Furniture & Art Concierge, owned by Elliot Nitkin, has received the sole right to bring the work of Germany-based artist Gennady Karabinskiy to Canada.
Karabinskiy, a Russian Jew, uses diverse techniques to express his artistic ideas: oil on canvas painting, tempera, pastel, ink on paper and lithography. In his work, Karabinskiy follows the artistic tradition of Eastern European Jewry, carrying on the work of Jewish painters such as Marc Chagall, Amedeo Modigliani and Anatoli Kaplan.
Since 1989, he has participated in more than 200 solo and group exhibitions, including ones in Norway, Germany, Holland and the United States, and he has been featured in numerous newspaper and magazine articles. His works are exhibited in museums in many countries, and are part of private collections around the world.
More information can be found at the artist’s website, karabinskiy.eu/en, and at theartconcierge.net/gennadykarabinskiyprofilepage.
– Courtesy Furniture & Art Concierge
Suzy Birstein amid her work, some of which visitors to her studio will see during the East Side Culture Crawl. (photo by Britt Kwasney)
“I am most looking forward to healthily connecting with fellow artists and art lovers in real time, real space. Art is always more powerful in person,” artist Suzy Birstein told the Jewish Independent about the East Side Culture Crawl Visual Arts, Design & Craft Festival, which returns to its traditional format Nov. 17-20. Some 400+ artists will open their studios to the public.
“The sense of community, commitment, excitement, inspiration, appreciation – all that brought me to Parker Street [Studios] and East Side Culture Crawl originally is happening again,” she said. “It feels like a renaissance.”
“After the two-year pandemic rollercoaster ride, I am thrilled we are back to a ‘new normal,’” said Esther Rausenberg, artistic and executive director of the Crawl, as well as a participating artist. “I do say ‘new normal,’ as we don’t have a crystal ball and I can’t really speculate how this year’s Crawl will play out. Personally, I am excited to get out and see all of the new and amazing art that has been created and to catch up with the artists. It’s also a real pleasure for me to meet members of the public as they share their enthusiasm for the event, the art and the connections they will be making with the artists.”
Birstein (clay, painting, sculpture) and Rausenberg (photography, Georgia Art Studios) are only two of many Jewish community members who will open their creative space to the public over the four days of the festival, which also features gallery displays, and artist demonstrations and talks. Other community members include, from Parker Street Studios, Shevy Levy (painting), Olga Campbell (clay, mixed media, new media), Mia Weinberg (painting) and penny eisenberg (drawing, painting); from Eastside Atelier, Lauren Morris (mixed media, painting), Ideet Sharon (assemblage, mixed media, painting), Stacy Lederman (mixed media, painting) and Karly Leipsic (mixed media); and, from the Arc, Lynna Goldhar Smith (installation, painting). Overall, festival-goers can explore about 68 buildings and studios in the Eastside Arts District, the area bounded by Columbia Street, 1st Avenue, Victoria Drive and the waterfront.
“This year’s event has a distinctly celebratory tone,” said Levy. “It is a reunion for Vancouver’s established art community, a chance to reconnect, to have meaningful discussions around art, not just with artists, students and educators, but with those who display art, like galleries and art management, and everyone who is excited to work together again.”
Thinking of the last couple of years, she noted, “What was fascinating about the immediate impact of COVID-19 was the sudden loss of collective connection – both human (face-to-face) and the collective understanding of what the future might bring…. When we were forced to isolate, I appreciated the introduction of art to the digital and virtual world, and how it helped the art world, in many aspects, to find new ways to connect with society. However, now I understand how much I, like so many of my colleagues, urgently need constant interactions with the community – 2022 Crawl is here to fill some gaps.”
Goldhar Smith – a multi-disciplinary artist who has spent more than 30 years in theatre performance with painting very much in the background – is excited about the chance to show her visual art to a lot of different people. “I especially love the opportunity to see their responses to the work and engage in lively conversation when it’s possible,” she said.
Interested in integrating her visual art practice with her performance practice, Goldhar Smith said, “I have been building installations in my studio to that end and so, among my paintings and prints, visitors will see the beginnings of more conceptual ideas in some of the physical objects and paper sculptures in the studio.”
Whether abstract or figurative, Goldhar Smith seeks to express the intangible qualities of human experience in her work. “If I paint a landscape, it is as much an emotional or psychological landscape as a place,” she said. “Yet, at the same time, if I paint an urban crow or a heron, it is more an expression of honouring the urban wildlife, and reminding myself that I am in their domain. I hope that makes sense. Whatever I paint, I am like an improvisational actor, responding to the moment, with one brushstroke informing the next. The meaning emerges after the fact. It is not so much I make my art, as my art makes me.”
For Goldhar Smith, the pandemic was a dramatic reminder “that we need to behave more responsibly, more cohesively, with more compassion and care for each other – with more understanding of our connection to each other – and to view ourselves as part of nature and part of one planet all together. Yet, we are so divided. If there was ever a time for artists to get focused, this would be it.
“Artists, and art, have the privilege and responsibility of their voices,” she continued. “We need to use our voices to contribute to the global change that is necessary. We need to speak up with courage and make brave art.
“We need to be endowed with the respect that what we do is of great importance and we need to be valued, supported and encouraged because artists bring meaning and perspective and also disruption and confrontation with the status quo. We need to see how our art fits, not so much into the art marketplace, but as a central driver of change that can address the pressing needs of our time.”
Levy expressed a similar view.
“So many artists, myself included, produce artwork with an outcome in mind, such as an exhibition or career step,” said Levy. “The challenges of the past few years forced me to take the time to reflect on my own art practice, taking it to the next level by exploring new avenues and fresh approaches. I had to remove and free myself from that outcome. I was able to experiment and create work that connects me better to the meaning of being a better human and better artist, as opposed to a ‘professional artist’ operating within the structures of a commercial art world.”
Birstein also used the pandemic period for self-reflection. “The enforced isolation of the pandemic,” she said, “gave me the gift of time: time to create, experiment, reflect, all day, every day. This is a first in my art practice and I was very productive.”
Birstein created two bodies of work for two solo exhibits in 2021 and 2022.
“Tsipora: A Place to Land was exhibited at the Zack Gallery,” she said. “Tsipora is my Hebrew name, meaning Bird. Pre-COVID, the bird symbolized a freedom of spirit while taking flight. With COVID, it was a time to nest, to find a place to land.
“Frida: When I Have Wings to Fly was exhibited at POMOArts. Frida is a continuation of my art historical portraits, Ladies-Not-Waiting, inspired by Velasquez’ masterpiece ‘Las Meninas.’ This series speaks to Frida Kahlo as a symbol of feminine strength and empowerment: a person who transcended tragedy and transformed it into beauty. My sculptures and paintings invite the viewer to converse in intertwined stories of myself, my mother, Frida and other historic figures that embody resourcefulness, resilience and beauty.
“Materially, both bodies of work involved much experimentation with structural techniques, surfacing with fired and cold materials, addition of repurposed objects.”
For Levy, the last couple of years allowed her to start a new direction with her abstract work. “Slowly, I developed large-scale canvases that were marked by bold and expressive brushstrokes,” she said. “I am excited to share with the public my new collection, A Portrait of a Flower. My work demonstrates the flowers as a source of lines, shapes, negative space, gesture, colour and value, or another source of abstraction.”
The pandemic period also gave Levy the chance to explore more remote art communities. “Pre-COVID,” she said, “I used to share and exhibit my art within my immediate community. In the last two-plus years, I had more time to develop my social media presence and expertise. As an outcome, 2021 was the best year ever of showing and selling my work.”
Birstein also pointed to the technological silver lining of COVID. “With the necessity of communicating virtually while globally isolated,” she said, “I see the world of art opening in terms of compassion, imagination, inclusion, respect – all of this so apparent at this year’s Venice Bienale, from which I have just returned.”
In addition to the open studios Nov. 17-20, the East Side Culture Crawl features a multi-venue, salon-style curated exhibition called NEXT, which “explores the after-effects of living through a pandemic as we long for and ponder about what’s next.” There are also several other events. For more information, visit culturecrawl.ca.
Linda Dayan Frimer speaks about her new book, Luminous, at the Waldman Library on Nov. 27. (photo from Linda Dayan Frimer)
Linda Dayan Frimer’s new coffee table book, Luminous: An Artist’s Story as a Guide to Radical Creativity, takes the reader from Frimer’s early years in rural British Columbia through to the present, mixing her own story with encouraging the reader to jump-start their inner artist. Along the way, the multifaceted memoir also incorporates art history, spirituality and Judaism.
For Frimer, who was raised in the Cariboo District town of Wells, where hers was the only Jewish family in the community, making art is something she has done since early childhood.
“Painting was the same as experiencing wonder and awe within creation, where everything – the trees, their trunks and the big starry sky – led to a sense of a creation unified through colour. Just as it was for Chagall, colour from early childhood was love for me,” Frimer told the Independent in a recent interview.
As she grew and learned more of her own cultural suffering, and empathized with the suffering of the First Nations peoples in the Cariboo region, she longed to express this love for creation by unifying and healing in her own way, however she could.
“Art-making was my remarkable tool and the colourful, light-filled forests surrounding my home was my first inspiration,” she said. “I then learned the power of stories and how to tell them visually using photographs. This led to sharing reverence with other cultural groups, particularly in a group show called Kaleidoscope, where I met Cree artist George Littlechild. And our work on sharing cultural reverence through art – and our great and soulful friendship – began.”
A later example of the power of stories occurred when child Holocaust survivor Renia Perel showed Frimer a letter that was written 50 years after the death of Perel’s mother. Frimer created visual tribute in which Perel was able to write the letter into the artwork.
Exploring book’s subtitle
According to Frimer, radical creativity is an intense action that has the potential to occur each time we bring something new into creation. “It impacts upon the fundamental way we see and experience the world at a particular time, which can lead to each of us to having an inward moral experience. To be radically creative is to not only express what is most deeply felt but to hold an intense connection and longing to heal, and to unify this creation and ourselves within it,” she said.
“This calls upon and leads each of us to think deeply and imagine more. Bold and courageous radical creativity is ours each time our heightened emotional selves seeks a creative means to both respond to and enlighten the darkness of uncertain political and societal times.”
Citing various modern artists, Frimer noted that Picasso painted “Guernica” in only black, grey and white in response and protest to the impact and suffering caused by the Spanish Civil War on the Basque town of Guernica. American artist Adolph Gottlieb released the creative potential of the unconscious mind by painting the opposite polarities in existence as dots on a spectrum, where, with only one change, one dot could become the other, she said. And Czech painter Alphonse Mucha wrote that the purpose of art is never to destroy but always to create, to construct bridges.
In an era fraught with loss of species and forests through global warming, the war in Ukraine and other conflicts, economic suffering, the pandemic, among other issues, Frimer said, “We, like the aforementioned spiritual visionaries, greatly need to be people of true feeling with the creative purpose of constructing bridges.”
Radical creativity driven by one’s inner core self, she said, takes colours and forms and, often intuitively, paints an open emotional response to what urgently will need expression in our own time.
“To be radically creative is to be amazed by creation,” she said. “I paint from my heart all that I feel and all that comes through me as my receptive and creative art becomes more abstract. I am open to the source of this inspiration and grateful.”
Source of inspiration
Throughout her book, Frimer delves into the history and significance of colour. She includes dozens of exercises for aspiring artists of all levels, and highlights the role of creativity as a positive force between humanity and nature.
In Frimer’s words, “All creativity begins with a dot, in our imagination and on paper. In that movement of the first spark, everything and everyone is equal, and all of us equally creative.”
She hopes the reader will “take a journey to their own essence, their inner child who was created without memory and was free from fear of appearances and outside judgment – and also to look and to see more deeply and to be more aware of the energy of the colours in their midst daily. And to use these colours in their own expression of radical creativity.”
Colours are symbols and tools that can offer personal and universal meaning and lead to deepening understanding and caretaking of both nature and culture, she said.
“I’m hoping the art history shared and the stories of great artists, who, as seers in their time were radically creative, can enlighten and inspire individual pathways ahead,” she said.
Luminous is available through Chapters, Amazon, area bookstores and the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. Frimer will speak at the Waldman Library on Nov. 27, at 3 p.m.
Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.
