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CBC
08-05-2025
- CBC
Group of Seven painting 'comes home' to Cape Breton in recognition of miners' struggle
A 100-year-old painting by Group of Seven artist Lawren Harris is on exhibition now in Sydney, N.S., just in time for the anniversary of the event that led to the killing of coal miner William Davis. The famous painting is called Miners' Houses, Glace Bay and the exhibition's official opening was May 2 at the Eltuek Arts Centre. Melissa Kearney, the centre's artistic director, told Information Morning Cape Breton she was awestruck when she first saw the piece at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 2016. "[My] first instinct was everybody back home has to see this painting, because it so quite literally stops you in your tracks in its significance of this place and our history and the images, the symbolism, the icon of company houses and it being on the edge. Everything from the lighting to the homes themselves just screams Cape Breton Island." Miners' Houses, Glace Bay is on loan from the Art Gallery of Ontario until June 28. It's got its own exhibition space in the centre, which is a refurbished convent that dates back to 1885. Kearney said the painting represents Harris's final depiction of an urban industrial scene before his shift to northern landscapes. Harris was in Cape Breton reporting for the Toronto Star newspaper during a lengthy coal miners' strike in 1925 and was inspired to start the painting here, before returning to his studio in Toronto to finish it. "In his career, [Harris] felt so bent and moved by what he saw that I think that was a breaking point for him as an artist and so [it is an] extremely significant painting for Canadians and especially for us," Kearney said. After Harris left but before the strike was over, miner William Davis was shot and killed by mining company police. The event is recognized across the province every June 11 as William Davis Miners' Memorial Day. Kearney, whose grandfathers and great-grandfathers were miners, said the painting evokes a number of themes. She said the houses can, at first glance, appear to be gravestones on the edge of a cliff, a sight that's not uncommon on Cape Breton Island. She said it's also reminiscent of the old coal mining life. The painting is devoid of people, but Kearney said she assumes they are all working, either in the homes or in the mines underground. Kevin Edwards, a member of the Men of the Deeps coal miners' choir and a former miner himself, saw the painting for the first time at the opening and said he was amazed. He said one of the choir's goals is to maintain the history and culture of those who worked underground — the life-and-death struggles of the industrial way of life — and the painting serves a similar purpose. "For me, it has a very eerie, subtle feel to it, knowing the background and the history of it. It means so much not only to the coal mining industry, but to the labour movement and basically human rights," Edwards said. "That single event back in 1925, Bill Davis and others were injured or killed and maimed … and it meant so much, but they had the courage and the strength to go and to stand up against the police and the hired goons … and it's very, very meaningful." Lachlan MacKinnon, a history professor at Cape Breton University, said the painting helps tell the story of the coal miners' strike and Davis's death and the impact on the labour movement. "That was a really important moment in our island's history, because of the way that local workers, local coal miners and their families came together to challenge the ways that they were being exploited by their employer at the time," he said. The painting may appear bleak to some, but it portrays much more and still resonates, even though the coal mines closed in 2001, MacKinnon said. "In a sense, you see the kind of the starkness of the moment. It evokes that sense of poverty, of exploitation, of sort of living on the edge in a way, which certainly the coal communities in the 1920s were," he said. "On the other hand, I think that there's something that evokes solidarity. The images of the houses, their similarities one with one another, the way that they're crowded together and sort of the vibrant colours, I think evokes sort of a sense of togetherness, of drawing close and sort of resiliency, which I think resounds quite well in a place like Cape Breton, where those values and those ideas continued long after 1925 and indeed after the closure of the mines altogether."
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump Is Losing in a Landslide in Canada
TORONTO, ONTARIO — Donald Trump is losing an election in a landslide — in Canada. After a decade under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Canada was ready to move on from his center-left Liberal Party. It seemed inevitable that my homeland was about to elect a new conservative government and perhaps redefine the idea of what it means to be Canadian — an identity that mostly starts with the premise of not being American. If Trump had said nothing about Canada — if he hadn't bullied, belittled, and threatened to annex the country — the Conservative Party would have won a massive majority. If Trump and the chainsaw-wielding Elon Musk hadn't engaged in adolescent taunting of Canadians, for no apparent reason other than frat bro hazing of what they imagined to be a defenseless target, the relationship between the two countries might have been mutually reimagined. Instead, incredibly, unbelievably — but also inevitably, as any sane Canadian would have told you — Trump's bully boy behavior resulted in virtually universal revulsion. The trash-talking, Trump-like leader of the Conservative Party best resembled Wile E. Coyote after Trump's assault; the politico who had long claimed Canada broken was suddenly lost for words as the bottom fell out of his campaign. In a matter of days, there was a 25-point swing in favor of the governing Liberal Party, now led by a no-nonsense plutocrat banker named Mark Carney. No marketing genius could have come up with a way to unite Canadians more rapidly than Trump's threats and tariffs, affronts by a supposed marketing savant who is turning America into a globally toxic brand. WALKING THE STREETS of Toronto on a rainy, cold early spring day, under a billboard forecasting 'Chances of Canadian Weather: 100 percent,' the most remarkable thing about the city is how unremarkable it is. The frantic chaos of Trump's America unceasing news cycle is countered with civic calm here. A pro-Palestinian protest marches along University Avenue toward City Hall, with no terror of students being disappeared by government agents wearing masks. The hip-hop exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario proceeds with no fear that the tender feelings of sensitive white men will be bruised by divergent historical and political narratives; a blonde bride poses with her groom on the circular stairs in the main atrium, oblivious to how threatened she is supposed to feel by the large poster on the wall with a set of oversized teeth and braces spelling out 'Black Power.' In a mall on Toronto's main drag, the rebranding of America is well underway. Teen shoppers bypass American stores without a glance, the flags and lapel badges and Canada Goose fleeces abounding, as customers in Eataly ask specifically for products that are not made in the United States. My favorite pho joint in Chinatown is bustling, until I pull out a wad of American cash to pay for my lunch, and I'm met with a hush and looks of disapproval. ('Dream big little one,' the sign above the urinal says.) The evidence of economic slowdown in Canada are already evident, but the malaise is contradicted by the excited, ethnically diverse and inclusive kids equitably lining up to shop at a new Chinese fast-fashion pop-up. In a hotel downtown, on the top floor of a formerly Trump-branded tower, the bar once called America has been rechristened to avoid the association, the lone vestiges of the president's bad-taste version of luxury evident in the tacky black marble and gauche deco interior. Customers in bars all over the city are specifically asking for non-American brands of alcohol, bartenders and waiters say, a glimpse of the solidarity that is binding the nation together. In a nearby liquor store, there are no American brands on offer. When I ask the clerk if there have been any complaints, he looks surprised by the question. 'No one has complained,' he says. 'People are starting to appreciate Canadian whiskeys.' A few bleary-eyed day drinkers on the sidewalk outside are talking politics, like everyone else I meet, as they share a bottle. 'At least Trump talked to Mark Carney with respect,' one drunk says approvingly. 'Trump called Carney Prime Minister, so at least that's something.' Another drunkenly agrees. 'C'est la vie,' he says. 'NO WAY CANADA can win a trade war with America,' Vice President J.D. Vance declares on television, as he visits an American military base in Greenland — yet another society menaced by the Trump administration. But here's the thing: There is no war in Canada. Canada is not at war with America, nor is it at war with reality or empathy or the basic elements of human decency that also define Canadian identity. DEI — or Donald, Eric, and Ivanka as it has been called on Canadian television — is part of the political debate in Canada, of course, but the underlying sentiments of the diversity, equity, and inclusion movement are still the character traits taught in Canadian kindergartens: do your best, tell the truth, respect others, don't be a bully, the rules matter — along with the lyrics of O Canada. On one level, what Canada is going through is a divorce, it strikes me. What Vance doesn't seem to grasp is that no one wins a divorce. Both parties are poorer, if not happier, the bonds of trust and affection and history that tied the couple together broken beyond repair. And here's another cruel reality of divorce: The abusive partner is still an abuser after the split. The empty threats, the irrational demands, the self-pity, the lying, the cheating, the wild mood swings, all the unattractive characteristics are still staring back in the mirror the morning after the marriage is over. But the most elemental disagreement between Canada and America seems to be about the modern world. For years, conservative America has been engaged in an angry argument with history, with originalists on the Supreme Court selectively retelling the past to serve their ideological interests. For an old man like Donald Trump, instead of yelling at the television and changing the channels with his remote, he now possesses the power to end life on earth and thus the world cringes in fear as his discontent with the present and longing for the past turn the world upside down. There are historical plaques all over the city, celebrating Canada's heritage, but no one seriously wants to travel back in time to a fantastical golden age, or live in a fantasy where all the woes of the world can be wished away by a magical red hat. THE SNOW IS SLANTING across Toronto on April 2, Trump's 'Liberation Day,' as the event is broadcast live from the White House on Canadian TV, with the president turning reality itself into a perverse kind of reality television. The anxiety of the newscasters is evident, but it slowly emerges that Canada is being spared the worst of the new global trade tax regime. Tariffs on cars and steel and aluminum remain, but the rest of the world is now experiencing what Canada has been enduring for months: global trade rules unilaterally discarded and huge new Trump taxes described as an act of kindness — truly transcendental gaslighting — as the crowd in the Rose Garden scramble to catch a tossed MAGA hat. 'Trump likes to be fluffed,' a Canadian commentator says, after listening to Trump praise the Smoot-Hawley tariffs that helped worsen the Great Depression and call to mind the 1880s as a golden age — a rambling proudly incoherent discourse that seems to reject the realities of the 21st century. The sun finally comes out the next morning — no Trump tariffs apply to that yet, it would seem — and the city again moves forward. The toll on Canadian workers and the economy are immediately felt in jobs lost and lives changed. But all the Canadian political parties agree that there is no turning back. The preexisting relationship is over, as Prime Minister Carney says; the marriage is finished. Unlike so many cratering American institutions — law firms, universities, soulless groveling tech billionaires —- Canada stands up to the bully as best it can and calls bullshit. No matter who wins the Canadian election, there is already one clear loser: Donald Trump. In this new era of American lawlessness, treaties like the one Trump negotiated with Canada and Mexico are tossed aside with the same shameless ease that the president once displayed stiffing subcontractors. Trump has now set himself up to dispense and collect tariff favors like a mafia don, the corruption and inscrutability practiced with impunity — and, of course, immunity. The president treats the world like it is a ship of fools — certain that he's smarter than everyone else. Canadians, politely minding their own business until a few short weeks ago, now behold their neighbors with a mixture of horror and disbelief and fear, dreading that this is the kind of arrogance that always goes before the fall. More from Rolling Stone Anti-Trump Protesters Assemble in Every State and Cities Worldwide How Trump's CDC Purge Will Affect Reproductive Health: 'Women Will Die' This Scientist Wants Us to Combat the Climate Crisis by Thinking Like a Woman Best of Rolling Stone The Useful Idiots New Guide to the Most Stoned Moments of the 2020 Presidential Campaign Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal The Radical Crusade of Mike Pence
The Guardian
29-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘Maybe people see Edward Hopper, or a spaceship, or something else': Martin James Burton's best phone photo
While in Toronto on a work shoot, Martin James Burton decided to take the opportunity to visit the Art Gallery of Ontario. The photojournalist, who is based in Lewes, East Sussex, England, had some lunch before heading in to see the art. While there he happened upon these three strangers. 'The people in the picture are sitting waiting either for nothing to happen or for something to happen. There is a feeling of the surreal to it and an odd sense of anticipation,' Burton says. 'The man with his head turned towards you draws you in, and the huge bright, blank screen is like a giant softbox lighting the subjects perfectly.' Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion Burton remembers his excitement at taking the shot: he immediately knew that he had captured something unusual. He also saw a resemblance to the painting Nighthawks, by American artist Edward Hopper, which portrays four people in a downtown diner at night. 'I've always thought that photography has its own individual place in art, but when a photograph resembles a particular painting or style, it may give it an extra kudos – particularly if it's not preconceived,' he says. Burton is happy, though, for others to interpret the image as they wish. 'Maybe they see Hopper, or a spaceship, or maybe they see something else. It's up to the viewer to make of it what they will.'
CBC
14-02-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
In a sprawling retrospective, artist Joyce Wieland's true patriot love suddenly feels like prophecy
Powerful art can feel prophetic. Works created decades or even centuries ago can shed light on contemporary issues with frightening clarity. So while the retrospective Heart On, which opened last week at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, is a worthy tribute to late Canadian artist Joyce Wieland, it also feels like an uncanny take on today's breaking news — with the Toronto-born Wieland serving as a kind of oracle. Feminism, environmentalism, nationalism — the themes that most marked Wieland's career — are front and centre throughout the 100 works, spanning four decades. Then, there are more specific, strangely prescient anxieties on display: Arctic sovereignty, American imperialism, even plane crashes and plastic waste show up, between flags and phallic symbols, in her signature mix of materials, which includes quilts, embroidery, found objects and film strips. On one wall, stuffed plastic letters spell out "Man has reached out and touched the tranquil moon," a particularly poetic quote from Pierre Trudeau that might have visitors considering the men currently trying to colonize Mars. In a work from 1973, a page of lipstick prints declares "The Arctic belongs to itself," a message as pressing as today's calls for "Land Back." Nearby, a pair of chain-linked quilts read "I Love Canada" and "J'aime Canada." They were made in 1969, the same year the country was officially declared bilingual. Today, however, the work strikes a new chord as the nation faces threats of being made the 51st state. The relevance only intensifies for visitors who lean in closer to read the tiny embroidered message at the centre, written in English and French, that says: "Death to U.S. Technological Imperialism." It's enough to spark a diplomatic incident — or would be, if it didn't have so much competition these days. "It's great for the show that it's all still so relevant," muses Georgiana Uhlyarik, the Fredrik S. Eaton Curator of Canadian Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario and co-curator of the exhibit alongside Anne Grace, curator of modern art at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. "But it's also kind of sad.… She envisioned a better future." This woman's work Heart On is the culmination of four years of research by Uhlyarik and Grace, who not only curated key pieces of Wieland's work, but travelled to Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal, consulting with communities that studied her, supported her work and some that knew her personally. "We wanted to tap into the knowledge of her living collaborators," says Grace, especially since Wieland didn't have children. Born and raised in Toronto, Wieland was orphaned at a young age and raised by her siblings. She would study graphic design in school, an unconventional field for women at the time and an influence that became apparent in her more vibrant pop art works. She was employed in package design, then animation, where she met her future husband, acclaimed Canadian avant-garde filmmaker Michael Snow. The couple moved to New York in the 1960s, and, as is so often the case, it took leaving the country for Wieland to reflect on her Canadian identity, which contrasted with American attitudes (her aforementioned Warhol-esque plane crash paintings spoke to a media obsessed with disaster long before the 24-hour news cycle). It was in the U.S. that she developed her experimental film practice — what she called her "filmic paintings" — which continues to enjoy a following worldwide. Several are dropped into the exhibit, mixing with her other media rather than sequestered in a viewing room. She also commissioned friends to help craft what is perhaps her most famous work: a pair of quilts from 1968 that read "Reason over passion" and "La raison avant la passion," taking aim at another Trudeau quote. The piece would go on to play a starring role in Margaret Trudeau's autobiography, in which she describes, during one particularly "frosty argument" with her husband, ripping the letters off the French-language quilt that hung in their residence and throwing them back at the PM. After moving back to Canada in 1971, Wieland continued a studio practice, and made a somewhat mainstream feature film, The Far Shore, inspired by artist Tom Thomson. Her life and career were cut short by Alzheimer's, and she passed away in 1998 at the age of 67. Soft power So where does that leave her legacy? Is she Canada's answer to, say, Louise Bourgeois, Frida Kahlo or Tracey Emin? "It's a bit like a secret club," says Uhlyarik, of Wieland's fandom, which includes a new wave of young artists who describe themselves as "obsessed" with her. It's a strange, particularly Canadian position: Wieland is unquestionably an icon of the 20th-century art world, yet she's far from a household name. But then, who is (Tom Thomson, Emily Carr and the Group of Seven aside)? Perhaps this is the perfect time to add a few more names to the Canadian art canon, now that we're all trying to shop local? It should be noted: Although she struggled to navigate an art world dominated by men, especially with her blatantly femme brand of feminism, Wieland did get her flowers in her day. She was named to the Order of Canada in 1982 (a year after then ex-husband Snow). She was the first living woman to get a retrospective at the National Gallery in Ottawa with the 1971 exhibition True Patriot Love. The show — which held space for deep thoughts, domestic arts and dirty jokes — drew protests for its government funding, as well as the ire of critics, who called it a "cheap patriotic claptrap" and "a burlesque of national symbols." "She had a complete disregard for hierarchies and was fearless in her approach to materials," says Grace. "Her strongest political works were made with a sewing machine or embroidery needle. And remember, this was decades before craftivism." Today's museum visitors may need this reminder, time and time again. If much of Wieland's work seems familiar to people who don't know her name, it is because she was a pioneer. Long before Subversive Cross Stitch kits, yarn bombing and the current reappraisal of fibre arts, she was playing with the tension between craft and credibility, subverting stereotypes and demanding nuance. And doing it with authenticity and care. "She seduces us with shiny plastics and soft materials, things that seem simple on the surface and reveal something more subversive," says Grace. "They encourage us to look closely and think deeply." It may also be the exact approach needed at this time. Heart On leads a crash course in the most pressing issues of the present moment. Couched in soft, seductive textures and Instagrammable pastel walls, the exhibition calls us to confront patriotism and our complicated past. The cost of not doing so may be too high. In Wieland's own words from 1971: "Canada can either now lose complete control — which it almost has, economically, spiritually and a few other things — or it can get itself together."
Yahoo
08-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Why renowned Canadian artist Joyce Wieland was so fascinated by Quebec
Self-described cultural activist Joyce Wieland created art ranging from semi-abstract paintings to film as a way to express her feminist politics. Nearly 30 years after her death, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Art Gallery of Ontario are presenting Joyce Wieland: Heart On, an exhibition bringing together some 100 works until May 4, 2025.
