September Arts Diary - the artsathon

Lin's September Kingston Arts Diary.
Or: After 3 weeks of Hot Arts Kick offs and Trying to Memorize Hundreds of Names, Can I Leave Town for a Few Days, Please?

INTRO. Although I have had the pleasure and opportunity to write what began as a monthly arts blog for Kingston Life (kingstonlife.ca) once it was turned into a semi-monthly piece, I realized I couldn’t even scratch the surface. Of course, the Whig won’t pay for any more arts writers and has been laying people off right and left, so what is an art snoop to do but actually start a real blog? Note: this won’t be perfect , since it’s a volunteer gig whereas my semi-monthly kingstonlife.ca artsblog has been rather impeccably (knock on wood) edited by someone else. Here I’ll try to go back to monthly news, or more frequent, on my own (which will make it shorter than this ridiculously thorough introductory tome! )

For more succinct synopses, please check out the kingstonlife.ca blog around the first of November, January, March, etc. because they also have a lot more listings and editorial online as well. Other local arts-related news sites to check are http://www.artskingston.com/ (daily arts updates, twitter sign up, and a calendar) and www.kingstoncanada.com Modern Fuel, if you’re a member, sends out a darned good list of things happening too. And Nancy Grieg, of Absolutely Music, does the best “press release forwarding” around! Let’s keep the cooler months warm by congregating together in all the culture hot spots, okay. (FYI, I can even mention a few out-of-town things that we go to. Would love to hear your ideas too.)

Sept 7-12 Maybe we can just start September after Labour Day, since I can’t remember anything back in the first week. This is probably because I was just getting into “school year mode” again, and writer Donnalee Iffla and I realized we’d better get cracking if we were actually to perform the little piece we’d promised as part of Theatre Kingston’s opening launch. That and “geez, I’d better get signed up for that fall class after all” –which turned out to be portrait painting at Kingston School of Art. We also joined the Kingston Opera Guild for the first time, because they offer tickets and /or trips (and talks) to some great operas at the new Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto. I also started working on laying some groundwork for the new Arts Hub project at the Kingston Arts Council. – which is devoted, in large part, to combing through a couple of thousand names in the database and getting to know all about who does what here. Thank you, God, for the opportunity to re-sharpen a memory I’d started to doubt! If you think you’re not on the database, email me at lin@artskingston.com and tell me what you do.Anyway, with names going through my head night and day, it was time to add a few more, as the Arts Season 2009/2010 kicked off in Kingston

The packed Theatre Kingston launch at the library’s Wilson Room Sept. 10 was a good place to start, since Diane Schoemperlen’s reading gave a taste of not only the sort of level of writing we would soon be experiencing at the inaugural WritersFest, but also a taste of the work to be combined with movement in tk’s season opener, Mark Cassidy’s theatrical staging of her Forms of Devotion. Theatre legend Jim Garrard also spoke a bit about Charlotte Corbeil Coleman’s version of Hamlet that Kingston-raised Rockne will perform in Jim’s Salon Theatre co-production of The King’s Conscience in the new year. Kim Renders (artistic director) movingly read from an excerpt from the stunning Joan Didion work The Year of Magical Thinking, in which she’ll perform this season. Donnalee Iffla and I turned out to be a regular standup comedy routine of cheeky old broads in our piece Sixty Secrets About The S- Word, which rather surprised us, after having tanked at a poetry reading at The Artel a few days earlier. I guess that’s what “out-of-town- previews are for! Those Artel readings, (hosted by writer in residence, Bruce Kauffman with really good coffee and snacks) were sort of art gallery -serious, but also intimate in a sparse living room atmosphere and featured everything from political sound-based works to funny theatrebits by my hub, John Lazarus.

Sept 13 – 20 Since my “art event” of that week was the Milestone Birthday and the family theatrics that ensued, I had to miss things like the first Arts and Letters Club night in their new location, the RCHA Club. Nonetheless, we did pop into Sandra Whitton Gallery to see the ever beautiful charcoal abstractions and drawing work by the equally lovely Laurie Sponagle (who, I’m happy to hear, is now teaching drawing at Brockville’s St. Lawrence College campus.) We fortunately, also to the OKWA (Organization of Kingston Women Artists) Juried Show at Chameleon Nation which featured things such as a beautiful button collage/family history by Zillah Loney, a haunting (prizewinner) by J.T.Winik, a stunning Skeleton Park (prizewinner) ceramic bowl by Marney McDiarmid and evocative works by women such as Margaret Hughes and Barb Carr. Good thing I went when I did because barely at the end of the week, we got the news that the CN’s doors had been bolted by the landlord, and the OKWA show would only be able to be seen one more time: at the Art After Dark reception night, which was brilliantly moved to (and accommodated by) Kingston Glass Works.

Sept. 21- 28 Arts and Culture week. AKA: A Whole Month Packed Into 7 days!
I started the Downtown Kingston Business Improvement Association’s Arts And Culture week both excited and grumpy. Not only had that whole Chameleon Nation business been so distressing, I was concerned that the consultations for the Kingston Cultural Plan ironically had to happen on probably the biggest culture week in Kingston (those who did like culture or were involved in making it probably wouldn’t be there…) We never are correct in our prognosticating, of course (you MUST read the non-self-help book Stumbling on Happiness) and those meetings, in general, were good news, as it was all about finding some consensus on Kingston arts issues. Appropriately, the amazingly busy Lindsey Fair remarked on how great it was that there are now “clusters” emerging…which is true…although we do have a habit speaking up more about our complaints rather than our kudos. Someone even noted that the CKAF (City of Kingston Arts Fund) was a good thing for more than just the money, because people actually now look outside of their rabbit holes to see what those who get the money are doing, and they actually have to evaluate their planning. Sessions like these, led by some very talented culturati Jenny Ginder and Janis Barlow highlight the positives first…which should be a rule everywhere in life! And it was good to see young movers and shakers around the tables with the “older guard” and institutional policy makers.

Art and Culture week was even more active than the posters and ads would lead you to believe, since the Downton BIA’s mandate is promoting downtown events, (and apparently the bigger ones). The Kingston WritersFest dominated my week (as it did for hundreds and hundreds of other Kingstonians) starting out with Margaret Atwood’s theatrical booklaunch for Year of the Flood. It had a style that certainly echoed the book….everything from the amused and diminuitive grande dame herself, reading little bits at the corner, to three “genuine actors” (Michelle Girouard, Krista Garrett, Jim Garrard…my God, I didn’t realize they were the G-Guys!) doing staged excerpts on the other side of the stage. Each of them was great, since Jim is born to play an irreverent reverend and Michelle was perfect as a punky cocktail waitress in plumes. The name of the game for this launch is that the music and text are sent to the local community, who does what it will with it…and here Andy Rush and about 20 friends did a fully costumed rendition of the craggy “tunes” that form part of the novel. Due to acoustics, or articulation, one or two of the tunes would have been enough for me…but it was sort of a “suspension of disbelief” theatrically. Atwood wrote extensively about being in Kingston on her own blog (although the local paper somehow couldn’t find her appearance at the Community Harvest Working Group – or any of the other readers– newsworthy enough to cover that week!) Ms. Atwood’s blog, with pix of both events: marg09.wordpress.com

Ahem. Thursday night was a conflict for me between Art After Dark, the Artists on Art lecture at the Agnes, and the readings of Joseph Boyden and Michael Crummy (moderated by local writer Steve Heighton) . My hubby reported back that the guy readings were a dynamite event. ..and since I was exhausted from art talk all day, I "only" managed to see Kevin Viner’s Parisian photography at Robert Macklin, Bruce Millen and Molly McClung’s work at Studio 22, the Chameleon/Kingston Glass Studio show, have a quick glance at Modern Fuel’s films (based on the work of local residents with Bear Thomas) in Market Square and zip up to Modern Fuel’s Chronotopic Village and Dream Temples show in Modern Fuel. Fortunately, each and every show was high quality. The nibblies weren't bad either...Viner’s silver gelatine prints were both subtle artistic portraits of “current and contemporary views on familiar themes “ and largely showcased the classic grandeur of Paris with a soupcon of contempo eye (a hand of the artists sticking out from a garden portrait, a balto bar, a piece of graffiti on a wall.) Since my kids had just given me a ticket to Paris for a birthday gift…I felt the show was devised just for me.

Studio 22’s show I think was the one I’ve most enjoyed so far, because there was a simplicity and uniformity of works chosen from only two artists. It also, of course unwittingly, was a perfect segue from the black and white Paris photos at Macklin’ s. At Studio 22, Bruce Millen’s Quietude (nearly monochromatic photographs of ice and icy landscapes) were soothing yet provocative, particularly works such as Holes in Perception and Zipper 1. Molly McClung’s new works in stone, Mythography, was a myth moving through stone –transporting you in a 3d fashion through themes you didn’t even need to be familiar with to enjoy. Have out of town visitors who aren’t that adventurous but like quality? I’d say to take them to this one…and to Macklin and Whitton…then to the Agnes. “Downtown Kingston” to the rest of us really can emcompass a trip past City Park! I also stopped by the Kingston GlassWorks/Chameleon Nation OKWA show, which was packed with well wishers. Unfortunately, a couple of works such did not travel with them to the Kingston Glass Works event, but it was a rather surreal treat to see people blowing glass while dozens of other folks VERY carefully wove their ways through the glass work and paintings

At Modern Fuel Artist Run Centre, Chronotopic Village, curated by Wanda Nanibush, may be one of the most successful shows there, with works from First Nations artists “recontextualizing Indigenous time based media” “engaging audiences in multiple and diverse time spaces.” (I couldn’t say it myself, and would be glad seeing those words in larger type somewhere. My eternal complaint.) Still…it was a hypnotic and yet thought provoking, stepping “out of time” in much the same way as the Diane Landry’s “umbrella piece” at the Agnes does. Nadia Myre’s Portrait as A Line (shown both as a rear projection and an embossed canoe) were two of my favourites.

Then it was back to WritersFest events (and more cultural consultations) for a few days, interspersed with Theatre K’s beautifully fluid and sensual Forms of Devotion and the impressive (no pun) First Impressions show by Kingston printmakers at Rebecca Cowan’s studio. At WritersFest, in addition to being charmed by constantly-glowing and hard working writer/organizer Merilyn Simonds (and her great outfits!), I enjoyed seeing all sorts of people (mostly women) venturing forth for tips on writing. My favourites were hearing local writer Susan Olding’s excerpts from Pathologies and Lorna Crozier’s takes on memoirs (a rather risky business when you’re talking about your family…), listening to the reading and writing of Gil Adamson (the Outlander) and seeing (dapper) old friend Bill Richardson cheekily and semi-sexily introducing the Speakeasy on Saturday night. It was fascinating how some readers’ work really changed with a jazz backup of Trio Without Words, led by the brilliant sax player Jonathan Stewart. Leon Rooke was the only one to leap off the page in something approaching sound poetry…and he was a relative oldster! I think we need a spot in town for writer cabarets…maybe the new Arts And Letters club location at the RCHA will turn into that. (Cam Shafer’s “blazz” -blues and jazz - events there on Fridays may lend themselves to this sort of thing.)

Sept. 27 – Oct 4 September just kept going, didn’t it? The week included the Sept. 30 performance Machine a Foudre by Diane Landry, courtesy of Agnes Etherington Art Centre. At that piece Landry stitched on a map, with a huge video project of her hands working, while the sound of the machine was amplified. Okay, I’m a dolt. Off I dozed. Repeatedly. But to a very interesting soundscape! Then we went to the gallery and I kicked myself for not seeing her fabulous installation The Defibrillators first, because it’s so brilliant and contextualizes her whimsical yet strong political sense. (Fortunately, her installation is on until mid-December, because it is not to be missed). I particularly love anything where well dressed people can be seen getting on their knees to peer underneath a bed! And don’t bypass the backrooms, particularly the one behind Landry’s performance videos, since it contains a pretty potent yet humourous link between women and washing machines.

Also had a great night “among the young folk” sitting cosily in a chair, reflecting on my own arthippy youth as those gangbuster Gertrudes tried out their Montreal set at The Mansion. I wasn’t the oldest in the crowd, just second-olderst…and you gotta love 10 people with bangos, horns, a theramin, and everything else! “Nerdgrass” Josh Lyon calls it. A Youth Tonic, I think.

Good news came midweek too. 1) the disappointment of Chameleon Nation’s forced disappearance was alleviated by an announcement that the uber-dedicated Ashley Fortune and Kate Graff will be working with Sandra to curate and manage the gallery part of Sandra Whitton Gallery. Sandy is featuring the boldly colourful paintings of Sharon Thompson through the month. 2) Just found out that there will be an event during the first two weeks of February called Artignite, designed to showcase arts events happening both on campus and in town, encouraging “cross overs” from both the civilian community and the academic world. Maps, please! At least these won’t require thousands of dollars in police surveillance… (although a good coat, parking money, or taxi might be required). You have to submit an application to be included in this big co-promotion, however. More info:

At the end of the week, I was pretty impressed by the 75 year old nimble fingered Oliver Jones and ever-brazzy (a new word, but fitting) vocalist Ranee Lee, even if jazz is not a big taste of mine. (I’m such a fan of lyrics - I have a weird impatience with trying to “find them” among all the brilliant pyrotechnics. Sorry….silly….status quo. I’m working on it.)

The capper of First Week in October is one of those events that only the inner circle of Kingston theatre seems to attend, and I bemoan it every time. The Herman Voaden National Playwriting Competition readings.…This 7th incarnation of the biennial Playwriting competition, that brings two very strong scripts to town, with strong professional casts and one (free) reading each, are always on my calendar. These top-notch works solicited from across the country almost always go on to bigger productions in other cities, and are nearly the only time Kingston can witness such a strong combination of visiting talent with such powerful writing. Maybe the Queen’s Artignite thing will help to get locals more familiar with Queen’s locations. Maybe the Drama Dep’t will have to give up on using their own free space and go into “the centre of town.” Maybe? Gas Girls was a lively yet unsettling piece set in Zimbabwe, about 2 young women who have to work in the sex trade just to make money to live, by Donna -Michelle St. Bernard (who had worked with the playwrights unit of Toronto’s Obsidian Theatre...) The second piece, Tom’s A -Cold by David Egan, starred Shane Carty and Matthew Gibson in a time and perception-twisted tale of two men abandoned in the Arctic by their shipmates, many of whom had also turned to cannibalism to survive after they had been trapped in King William’s Land. Two years from now maybe the Voaden show will combine with the similarly biennial and national contest of The Kingston Prize and the cumulative impact of “visiting art” will perhaps have the audiences they both deserve!

ON TO OCTOBER.
Things to be thankful for in early October, fellow gluttons:
Oct 5-11 Oct. 7 –it’s Members Night at the Agnes (to see how they’re reworking the art rental/gallery space and mingle some more in the Landry show); Oct. 8 –we’re being torn between the Opening Gala for the Kingston Prize (which runs until Oct. 25 in the lobbies of the Grand, open between 12:30 and 5 daily) and the talk/closing reception at Union Gallery for Abject Nature (which you don’t need an invitation to attend. ) Later that evening, it’s back to the Mansion for a little “lower art” to hear Reuben DeGroot and his pal and mine, singersongwriter Corbin Murdoch from Vancouver. Then, honest to God, I’m getting out of town. Probably to Canadian Stage, the Gardiner Museum, and the AGO.

Pss. If you want to get ready for some fisticuffs, arts style, I dare you to go to the Kingston Prize (in addition to some of the great studio tours) on Thanksgiving weekend, then attend the reception for Macklin’s cheeky Salon des Refuses on Oct. 14th, and follow it Oct. 15th’s at RCHA with Arts And Letters Club’s talk Wither Portraiture Globe and Mail’s Gary Michael Dault (who now lives in the region) entertains the topic of the viability of portraiture in our modern world. Consider it a performance art triatholon!

Whew. Did Kingston really just survive all that? Did I? Did you?