Exhibit-V

christine clark said...

It's true that without specifics this article reads as slightly irrational. To whom are you referring? Are you suggesting that all the artists, writers, instructors and galleries in Victoria are provincial and mediocre? If you have something to say, you better quit pulling your punches. It will make for a more convincing argument and possibly even an interesting discussion. Pugilistically, Christine

Philip Willey said...

Wow....you really stuck your neck out. It's refreshing to read something like that and I agree with a lot of it. On the other hand I think a lot of people/artists move to Victoria to get away from all the hype and hoopla. Hopefully you can find a balance between escapism and the desire for recognition. I wish you the best of luck.

roygreenart said...

well done Brian...I agree with everything you say...sometimes all Mr. Amos does is quote the press release for the show without offering any opinion about it, ie. the recent Martin Golland exhibit...easy tepid images of lazy flowers,scenic pictures of boats or quaint domiciles and abstraction that is only about 60 years behind the times are prevalent in our fair town...the majority of painters in our bucolic center of somnambulism want to create pictures rather than paintings... I miss your articles in Focus and I look forward to your postings...

Wendy Welch said...

Its quite astonishing to read an article that does an such an excellent job of integrating self-aggrandizement with self-righteousness. Add a little content to this and you might have something of sustenance.

howboy said...

I'll send along by email the longer comments I just posted and were not accepted because, evidently, there's a word limit on comments. Dang. But let me say here, good analysis Brian, but let's not throw the baby with the bathwater. Everything is changing and Victoria is as likely a place as any to be engaged with that change, possibly better. - Rob from ReadingArt.ca

Brandy Saturley said...

There are several magazines that publish articles on art in Victoria, but none of them are 'art' magazines, I think that is the issue. I think the only Canadian art magazines that I have actually purchased or choose to puruse are Canadian Art and Whitehot Magazine. Victoria is a more 'crafty' art group and Victoria art fairs are more like 'flea markets' than art shows. Even the Moss Stret Paint-In, which I have exhibited in, is mostly a glorified flea market. We are very remote and far away from the serious art of the world. I love living in Victoria and have a great respect for the community, I am second generation Victorian artist, but I spend most of my time educating myself on art in the major art centres and traveling as much as I can. I still cannot bring myself to move away from this beautiful place and do belive it is possible to be a respected, successful, serious artist living in Victoria as long as you regularily travel and experience art elsewhere and in places that have a deeper art history than North America.

John Luna said...

I do find these comments very general, and this is disappointing. It's not revelatory (nor was it ten, or even fifteen years ago) to broadly indicate the perpetuation of mediocrity in art exhibition, education and critical reception in Victoria if you will not attend to the exceptions. I look forward to a closer reading in the future.

john luna said...

In the last month, Jessica Berlanga Taylor's imaginative catalogue essay for Daniel Laskarin appeared in print, Debora Alanna wrote an erudite and impressionistic review of Shannon Scanlan for Exhibit-V, Christine Clark managed to be both disarming and sharp in many of her observations on Laskarin (also in this forum), Vanessa Annand offered an engaged, experiential review of Wunder Worry in the Martlet, and I wrote a perfunctory but adequate review of d.bradley muir's exhibition at the Nanaimo Art Gallery for Border Crossings. I would argue that criticism is in fact experiencing a groundswell in Victoria just now, but not at the hands of self-declared authorities. I am concerned that if you don't evince attention to the ongoing progress of your practice, you will risk being perceived a reactionary. I don't recall seeing you at either of the talks about art criticism recently hosted by Open Space, but hopefully you'll be attending Robert Enright's talk this January. In the meantime, I look forward to the dialogue that might take place here, and encourage the rest of you (you know who you are) to weigh in critically and conscientiously.