Outside In at the Ministry by Philip Willey, May 2011.

Post election time. Results are in. Oh Canada! It’s as if your heart says Roy Green but your head says Robert Bateman. Definitely an anxious time for artists. What next? What cloud is looming over the post-election horizon? Will art writers be sent to re-education camps? Will artists be rounded up and forced to work in the tar sands? Does this mean the end of finger-painting in Canadian kindergartens? Seeking answers to these and other vexing questions I sought the company of like-minded individuals. And what better place to do this than the Ministry of Casual Living.

Happily the Ministry seems immune to government cutbacks. The Minister himself was available for consultation so I asked him what the future held for casual living under the Conservative majority. Well, he said, we will probably take a wait and see approach. Our mandate will continue to be to serve the local community to the best of our ability. A very diplomatic answer I thought and very reassuring. Next I asked him what he thought of Debora Alanna’s art work in the foyer. He liked it he said, there is something theatrical about it. I agreed. The piece consists of a large flowing length of fabric dipped in cement to which polythene has been added along with a few touches of colour. It strains at the confines of the space. Yes, said Debora Alanna, there’s no denying the space is congested. It wants to get out. That’s why she called the show ‘Outside In’.

Exclusivity bothers her. In an artist’s statement she describes the Ministry of Casual Living as being “…cloaked in intrigue. As is Victoria in general, as it pertains to its art and artists. There are pockets of activity and secretive cliques that share what they do with the public in a limited way. Perhaps all art communities have a kind of mystique. Not a native of Victoria, I found this to be particularly true here. I wanted to demonstrate how I felt in relation to the community here. The MOCL is ideal as it allows a site-specific work to show a sculptural depiction of an art myth.

The interior spheres are what is inaccessible, visible from the outside(ers) point of view through the plate-glass window. The swathing of the exterior of MOCL allows a sensibility of inclusion without providing true access.”

Perhaps that can be said of any city. Art communities can be cliquey. Or perhaps she is articulating that feeling artists get of being exposed, vulnerable to public scrutiny. In a broader sense it’s about the way artists react with society. Are we outsiders looking in? Can we ever be fully integrated? To me there is something elemental about Alanna’s installation. Like Rodin or Kapoor. When powerful forces are constrained within objects three dimensions hardly seem enough. It takes enormous courage to do something like that. It’s dangerous work. Like looking into a volcano. You never know when lava is going to burst through the surface. Certainly there is nothing bland about Debora Alanna or her work. They have presence. They fill space, defying the void.

Debora Alanna
“ Outside In “
Ministry Of Casual Living
May 21 to 27, 2011
1442 Haultain St.