Current Exhibition
Overnight visit to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, organized by Varley Art Gallery
March 20 – 21, 2010
Join Us!
Please join us as we celebrate the opening of The Automatiste Revolution at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York. The Albright-Knox houses one of the world’s best contemporary art collections. It is an opportunity not to be missed!
We will enjoy tours of the American counterpart exhibit curated by Holly Hughes as well as a tour of the gallery itself.
On Sunday, we will enjoy a guided tour of the new Burchfield Penney Art Centre, including lunch at the Birchfield Penney, and tour Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fontana Boathouse and Martin House Complex.
Price including tax (per couple in shared standard room): $500
Price including tax (per individual in a standard room ): $300
Includes:
Private Coach transportation over the full two days, with pick-up/drop-off at Varley Art Gallery, 216 Main Street, Unionville and Union Station, Toronto (pick up at Front Street) , buffet breakfast at the Bijou Grille on arrival in Buffalo, over-night hotel accommodation and continental breakfast at the Holiday Inn Express (601 Rossler Dingens St.), admission and tour of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, admission and tour of the Birchfield Penney Art Centre, lunch at the Birchfield Penney Art Centre, tour of the Frank Lloyd Wright Fontana Boat House, tour of the Frank Lloyd Wright Martin House Complex.
Space is limited. Book early to avoid disappointment!
Itinerary:
Saturday, March 20th
7:00 AM sharp – Coach pick-up #1: Varley Art Gallery, 216 Main Street, Unionville
8:00 AM sharp – Coach pick-up #2: Union Station (pick up at Front Street)
10:00 AM – Brunch at the Bijou Grille
12:00 PM – Arrive at the Albright-Knox, Gallery Tour
1:00 PM – Visit The Automatiste Revolution and the counter-part exhibit
2:00 PM – 4:30 – (Self-guided) Enjoy the Albright-Knox, visit the cafes in the Elmwood Village
5:00 PM – Check-in to Holiday Inn Express hotel. (Self-guided) Evening and dinner on the town. (Taxi ride to the Waslden Galleria is approximately 15 minutes)
Sunday, March 21st
6:30 – 9:30 AM – Continental breakfast buffet at Holiday Inn Express
9:45 AM – Check-out and bus pick-up
10:00 AM – Tour of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fontana boathouse
11:00 AM – Tour of the Burchfield Penney Art Centre
12:00 PM – Hot lunch at the Burchfield Penney
2:30 PM – Tour of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Martin House Complex
4:00 PM – Depart for home
6:00 PM – Coach drop-off #1: Toronto Union Station (Front Street)
7:00 PM – Coach drop-off #2: Varley Art Gallery, 216 Main Street, Unionville
Reserve your seat:
To reserve your place on the bus, and your accommodation, we will require that you provide payment in advance of our departure. This must be provided to us in the form of cash or credit card payment. Cheques (payable to Town of Markham) are also accepted.
Things You Need to Bring:
1. Canadian Passport (We will not let you on the bus without one).
Please let us know if you will be carrying another valid form of travel identification instead. See the following website for more information: http://www.getyouhome.gov/html/lang_can/index.html
2. American funds for Saturday night activities, and shopping.
3. Comfortable walking shoes.
To Register:
Please call Varley Art Gallery Visitor Services Representatives at (905)477-9511 ext. 221 or email Francesca Amato-Gauci: famato-gauci@markham.ca
Varley in Unionville: Selections from the Permanent Collection
Laughing Kathy, oil on press board, c. 1952-3
A selection of drawings and paintings from the Gallery’s permanent collection form this installation featuring works from the last two decades of Varley’s life and celebrate his connection with Unionville. Research points out that in the early 1950s Varley’s personal life stabilized after he met Kathleen and Donald McKay and was invited into their home. While living with them, first in Toronto and then in Unionville, Kathy took him on several painting excursions in Ontario and also to British Columbia, to Creston and the Kootenays in the interior. Varley’s landscapes from this period continue to display his keen observation of the immediate surroundings and his attention to detail. His palette changed though and he began using more war, earthly colours, abandoning his favourite use of green and purple. Kathy became a true inspiration for Varley and he painted numerous drawings and paintings of her over the years.
Inner Landscapes: The Portraits of James MacDougall
March 14, 2010 - May 2, 2010
Curated by Tara Marshall
For Stratford based painter James MacDougall, it is the inner landscape of people rather than the Canadian landscape that holds his interest. For almost forty years MacDougall has been painting skilful, sensitive and psychologically-revealing portraits that speak to the continued validity of people as subject. MacDougall’s interest in people as subject is particularly fitting . As a retired doctor he spent much of his life being concerned with the physical, inner-working of people and now as a painter he is concerned with showing his subjects’ personality and inner psychological state. For MacDougall the painter/sitter relationship runs parallel to the doctor/patient relationship; the doctor shares a level of trust and intimacy with his patients which is similar to that shared between the artist and sitter. Within the breadth and depth of MacDougall’s paintings multiple stories are revealed.
Brenda Joy Lem: Homage to the Heart
March 14, 2010 - May 2, 2010
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- Brenda Joy Lem, Car Ghosts 2009
Silkscreen on paper
Curated by Linda Jansma
The art of Brenda Joy Lem embraces narrative and storytelling to convey a host of issues from racism and memory to ancient ritual and spirituality. This new body of multi-media work will include silkscreen prints, digital projections, and sound installations. With themes of family, memory and oral history, she digs deeper, emotionally, into family life and the intricate threads that connect the generations. Homage to the Heart “emphasizes the theme of the heart, openness and the capacity to love.”
Organized by the Robert McLaughlin Art Gallery and the Varley Art Gallery.
Accompanied by a colour catalogue.
The Automatiste Revolution: Montreal 1941-1960
Oct. 23, 2009 - Feb. 28, 2010
Pierre Gavreau, Colloque Exhuberant, 1944, oil on masonite
On Exhibition at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York
March 19 – May 30
The first showing of the Automatistes have been seen as a group in a broad international context. Featuring sixty paintings and works on paper, complemented with Abstract Expressionist works from the Albright-Knox’s Permanent Collection.Curated by Roald Nasgaard
This landmark exhibition of 60 works from across Canada will be one of the most extensive exhibition of this iconic group of artists. For the first time the Automatistes group of artists will then be presented at the pre-eminent gallery for post war art in America, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in March 2010.
The Automatistes were the first Canadian artists to produce work that contemporary with New York and Paris. “Outside of Quebec their recognition is regrettably disproportionate to their importance to Canada and the USA and France” said John Ryerson, Gallery Director.
The Automatistes were founded by Borduas. The artist’s signed a manifesto in 1948 called Refus global that was one of the pillars of the Quebec quiet revolution. The signatories were:
Paul-Emile Borduas, Magdeleine Arbour, Marcel Barbeau, Bruno Cormier, Claude Gavreau, Muriel Guilbault, Marcelle Ferron, Fernand Leduc, Thérèse Leduc , Françoise Sullivan, Jean-Paul mousseau, Maurice Perron, Louis Renaud, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Françoise Riopelle
The Group disbanded with the death of Borduas in 1960. However, the Automatistes included poets, a playright, TV producer and sculptors whose works continues to influence the Quebec society and culture.
The legendary dancer and choreographer and artist Françoise Sullivan O.C. was recently at the Varley to discuss introducing her dance works to our audiences as one of the initiatives to draw on the breadth of cross disciplinary work generated by these artists.
An accompanying hardcover book of including 60 color plates by Automatistes historian author Ray Ellenwood and author and exhibition curator Roald Nasgaard , published by Douglas & McIntyre to be released in October. Mr Nasgaard recently authored the sold out hardcover edition “Abstract Painting in Canada” and curated the Varley’s acclaimed show “The Urge To Abstraction” in 2007.
Louis Grachos said, “We are looking forward to hosting this exhibition of avant-garde art by members of the Canadian Automatists group of the 1940s and ’50s. By exhibiting these works at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, our renowned collection of American abstract expressionist art will be seen in a broader international context that will complement these remarkable works by Canadian artists from the same time period.”
Order your copy of The Automatiste Revolution: 1941-1960 by Roald Nasgaard and Ray Ellenwood for $60.
The exhibition and publication are supported by the Varley-McKay Art Foundation and private donors.
Related Programs & Events
Saturday, October 24: “The Automatistes: A Cross-Disciplinary Exposition” with remarks by Ray Ellenwood, Roald Nasgaard, Steven McCaffery, and Françoise Sullivan, O.C; and dance performance by Ginette Boutin. Light refreshments included.
1:00pm-2:00pm The Visual Arts: Lecture by Roald Nasgaard
2:00pm-3:00pm The Dance: Remarks and choreography by Francoise Sullivan, O.C. and Dance performance by Ginette Boutin
3:00pm-4:00pm The Literature: Lecture and readings by Stephen McCaffery
$25 Non-members/$15 members
About Roald Nasgaard, Curator
Roald Nasgaard is a professor of art history and, for the past decade, chair of the art department at Florida State University. His long and distinguished museum career includes fifteen years as chief curator at the Art Gallery of Ontario, during which he oversaw many projects, among them the seminal 1984 exhibition and book The Mystic North. His book Abstract Painting in Canada was called “beguiling,” “engaging” and “brilliant” by the Globe and Mail. He lives in Tallahassee and Toronto.
