UPDATE: The gallery is closed Saturday, September 2, due to unforeseen circumstances. The scheduled Make Art event is also cancelled. We apologize for any inconvenience.
EXPERIENCE | ENGAGE | EXPERIMENT
Explorative Make Art Series | Summer 2023
INTERGENERATIONAL | DROP-IN | FREE EVENT
Wednesday, June 28 – Saturday, September 2 | CVAG Plaza | 580 Duncan Avenue
2 – 5:30PM every Wednesday during the Downtown Courtenay Summer Street Markets
11AM – 4PM every Saturday
Participate in facilitated interactive art stations inspired by the current exhibition, Together Apart | Under One Roof, featuring the work of Canadian artists Aganetha Dyck, Diana Thorneycroft and Reva Stone.
- See the exhibition
- Learn about the artists’ concepts
- Work with materials related to their practices
- Reflect on what you have made and seen
IMAGINING + EXPLORING ROBOT BEHAVIOURS | REVA STONE – bringing curiosity and ideas together to explore robotics and create hybrid machines using old and new technologies
Reva Stone’s REPOSITORIES SERIES investigates the technological transformation of the machines we use and how these transformations have impacted how we conceptualize ideas and thoughts. In order to talk about social, cultural and technological changes, Reva decided to equip each machine with small, embedded computers, HD computer screens, lights, sensors, custom software, and video clips. The physical form and original purpose of each obsolete machine led the artist to make decisions about what the content of each work would become. As a result of these alterations, each device has become a repository of knowledge that includes both a history of the past and an imagined future. Reva Stone’s machines can be seen in the GEORGE SAWCHUK GALLERY inside CVAG.
Inspired by the REPOSITORIES SERIES created by Reva Stone, the STREAM students at CVAG have initiated Imagining + Exploring Robot Behaviours.
CVAG and the STREAM students invite the community to join them in experiments using old and new technologies to create robots that produce drawings, make sounds, have sensor responses and new behaviours.
EV3 Robot Kits are combined with defunct mobile devices to generate machines with behaviours that respond and perform.
Using robotics supplies provided onsite at the make art station, participants share in explorations with the STREAM students and CVAG interns by setting goals | completing tasks | sharing different viewpoints | discovering what ideas work and those that don’t | inventing work-arounds | expanding ideas | unbuilding + rebuilding | imaging + creating.
HYBRID CREATURES | EXQUISITE CORPSES – inspired by Diana Thorneycroft’s drawings and sculptures
Diana Thorneycroft’s drawings and sculptures intertwine the human and animal body “as they do things that are normal and absurd, juxtaposing what is familiar with the bizarre”. Diana’s drawings of hybrid creatures were done daily using colour pencils and arose spontaneously as a way of processing the COVID-19 pandemic. Her sculptures and drawings are on display in the gallery in GATHER:PLACE and the HUB.
The Victorian era collaborative parlour game ‘picture consequences’, in which body parts were drawn, mixed, and matched was adopted by the Surrealists in the 1920’s and named Exquisite Corpses and became a way of enriching artistic practice through spontaneous collaborative drawing and collaging.
Visitors are invited to participate in making Hybrid Creatures | Exquisite Corpses.
On the pages provided at the make art table there are “body parts” that are details of drawings found in the books in the HUB gallery that were created by Ecole Puntledge students. Pick an image that inspires you to add another part to the creature. Use the pencil crayons and markers to draw on one or more pages. The pages will complete a community collaborative mix and match exquisite corpse book that will be shown on the CVAG website.
AFTER AGANETHDA DYCK AFTER DR. EDUARD ASSMUSS
During an extended artist residency in Europe a number of years ago, artist Aganetha Dyck encountered a book written in 1865 by Dr Eduard Assmuss, a researcher who studied insects and bees in particular. Fascinated with the illustrations done by the scientist, Dyck purchased the book. Since that time Aganetha has made it her daily practice to sit at her drawing table, and using black ink on paper she has made a drawing of “The Bee”. Inside CVAG, in the SOUTH GALLERY, you can see some of the drawings Aganetha Dyck has made of “The Bee” over the years.
Following Aganetha Dyck’s example, quality paper, black ink pens and dark graphite pencils are available for visitors to make their own drawings of one of the bees shown in images available at the make art table.
WONDER + CURIOSITY SCAVENGER HUNT – Together Apart | Under One Roof
Artists Aganetha Dyck | Diana Thorneycroft | Reva Stone shared a large studio space for three decades, while their individual creative practices remained distinct. That they are artists together — yet apart — is evidenced in the trajectories of their artwork shown inside CVAG. An agile curiosity, fluid playfulness, a sustained ability to wonder and to question is evident in each artist’s work. Their work reshapes and reconstructs facets of the familiar world around us and in that process, perceptions are altered and perspectives changed.
The Wonder and Curiosity Scavenger Hunt card, available at the make art table, has small images that show details of three different works of art created by each of the artists.
Visit the gallery presentation spaces to look at the work of the artists.
Find six or nine of the works that are shown on the card.
Use the gallery map in the exhibition booklet to find the name of the gallery space and number/name of the artwork.
Write these down on the card.
Provide contact information and enter the draw for a gift card for SHOP:MADE.
Take home the take-away booklet to read and learn more about the artists and their ideas.
TIP/NOTE: Diana Thorneycroft’s three works are all sculptural. Her drawings in GATHER:PLACE include mature content and imagery.
COMMUNITY COLLABORATOR
Computers and EV3 robots supplied by North Island College (Youth Academy at NIC).
CVAG spaces are accessible and programs are barrier free (no cost) — DONATIONS are appreciated and contribute to ongoing community interactive programming.
PUBLIC HEALTH CONSIDERATIONS — we ask that visitors choose not to visit if they are experiencing symptoms of colds and flus. Hand sanitation dispensers are available at CVAG. Wearing a mask is at the discretion of the visitor.
PLEASE NOTE — The artwork exhibited in GATHER:PLACE Gallery and the George Sawchuk Media Gallery contains content related to themes of the pandemic, warfare, and nudity.