Visual Arts News

SPRING 2012

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IN THE SPRING ISSUE:

OBSOLESCENCE AND BEAUTY: THE OBSESSIONS OF ROBERT BEAN

Artist and NSCAD University professor Robert Bean's got a thing for the past. Just don't call him nostalgic.

Fascinated by the authentic, he recently curated of The Making of History and Artifacts (1888-1926), the photography of John Cooper Robinson from Meiji-Taishō Japan, an exhibition at Halifax’s Mary E. Black Gallery (October 7 – December 6) in conjunction with Photopolis: The Halifax Festival of Photography.

“I think photography is a lazy medium,” says Bean. “It takes a lot of courage to stand in front of a blank canvas and put paint on it. Photography is much more forgiving.” - SHANNON WEBB-CAMPBELL

Read more: The full review is featured in the Spring issue of Visual Arts News

Image (right): John Cooper Robinson, Woman mine-worker. Gold Mine, Sado Japan n.d.

(Copyright: Stuart Cooper Robinson)

SPRING EXHIBITION SPOTLIGHT

MATERIAL WORLD

January 21 - May 6, 2012 / Art Gallery of Nova Scotia

Curated by David Diviney, Material World's artists explore and reinvent objects from consumer culture, embracing divergent strains of sculptural practice. Artists Thierry Delva (NS), Gerald Ferguson (NS), Phil Grauer, Irene Neal, Robin Peck (NB), Elspeth Pratt, Lauren Schaffer, Ron Terada and past Sobey Art Award winners Michel de Broin and Brian Jungen re-imagine "things" from the world around us. The artists take pleasure in the making, undoing and recreating of the material objects that shape our lives and environments, exploring our relationships to these items.

PROFILES / ARTICLES

The unapologetic artwork of Andrew McPhail; The obsessions of Robert Bean; Visiting Atlantic Canada's floating cinemas

REVIEWS

Artists including Cindy Sherman and Sylvia Plath take on the paper doll; Revisiting Susan Wood; Micah Lexier and Kelly Mark go head to head; Newfoundland's Art Ex Festival

RESPONSES / FIELD NOTES

A psychogeographic journey through Nocturne: Art at Night; Mammalian Diving Reflex explores its teenage side; J.J. Kegan McFadden's ruminations on waiting