PrairieSeen x YEGallery Public Art Walk

Happy Friday everyone!

For those of you who may have missed the Facebook posting, YEGallery has teamed up with PrairieSeen to host a public art walk. I will be leading the walk through the downtown core and stopping at a number of public works, most of which have been featured already on this blog. This is a great opportunity to get out and see some of these works in real life. You'll also get the chance meet some fellow art enthusiasts! We'll be meeting at 6pm in front of Isla Burns' 'Caraval' (At the Northern side of City Hall) 

Here is a link on the PrairieSeen with any extra details. Hope to see you all there!

http://prairieseen.tumblr.com/post/61800647016/prairieseen-x-yegallery-public-art-walk 

Lionel Thomas, 'Migrants'

Artist Info: Lionel Thomas was a British Columbia-based artist who was best known for his public art sculptures and murals. Thomas was present in the Canadian art field for the better part of the 20th Century, graduating from the John Russell School of Fine Arts and the Ontario College of Art and Design in the 1930s and moving to Vancouver by 1940 to teach at the Vancouver School of Art. He had a number of group and solo exhibitions over his career and worked as an artist well into the 1970s. He died in BC in 2005 at the age of 90.

'Migrants' was created by Thomas in 1957 for the previous Edmonton City Hall. The bronze sculpture work was originally part of a fountain that sat outside the building and shot a stream of water into the air. The work was inspired by Thomas' visits to Stanley Park in Vancouver where he would spend time watching the geese. The sculpture consists of 9 geese - 5 sitting and 4 flying - and is supposed to represent progress. Apparently, the sculpture was not well liked when it was revealed. Many Edmontonians did not see the representation of the Canada Goose and instead began calling the work the 'spaghetti tree'. Over the years the public warmed to the fountain and demanded that it be incorporated into the current city hall building constructed in the 90s. While the piece is no longer a fountain, the geese sit as a sculpture on a bed of rock on the West side of the building.


My Thoughts: I have been wanting to discuss this sculpture for a while because I had been asked about it a number of times. Upon telling a few older Edmontonians about YEGallery I was asked if I have written about the spaghetti tree. It took be a little while to figure out exactly what they were talking about because I have never seen anything other than geese in the sculpture. I thought it was interesting how the name 'spaghetti tree' was originally a term of confusion but has now become the affectionate nickname for this sculpture.

While I haven't been living in Edmonton for long enough to know what the original fountain looked like, I like the way the sculpture is situated in the glass alcove of the current city hall. I think the angles of the window panes work well to contrast the curves of the geese as they take flight.

I have included a link at the bottom of what it originally looked like as a fountain. (You might be interested in knowing that the only search term that brought up what I was looking for was 'Spaghetti Tree')

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AQ_Mz9uUUP8/TaIYMzBVmHI/AAAAAAAACwI/Cs-Qn2y6MwU/s1600/003.jpg

Lynn Malin and Elizabeth Bowering Beauchamp, 'Recycles'

Artist Background:'Recycles' is a work created in 2001 by artists Lynn Malin and Elizabeth Bowering Beauchamp. The piece is situated in Beaver Hills House Park at Jasper Ave and 105 St and was commissioned as part of The Places initiative through The Works.

Lynn Malin has been working as an artist in Alberta for over 30 years. She has obtained a number of arts-related degrees including schooling at the Banff School of Fine Art and the University of Alberta. Her usual medium is paint – creating site-specific landscape works and focusing on nature. She often hikes or skis into remote locations to create inspiration for her upcoming works.

Elizabeth Bowering Beauchamp is currently an art history professor at Grant MacEwan University. While there is minimal information on her as an artist, she has been working in the Edmonton arts community since the 80s when she was an arts writer for the Edmonton Journal. Malin and Beauchamp often work together creating artworks that focus on nature, topography and human effect on the Albertan environment.

‘Recycles’ consists of bicycle-like structures below moving whirligigs that can apparently be activated by pedaling the bikes. The sculptures are created from a mix of new and reused metal objects. In a statement on The Works website the artists state that the hoped ‘Recycles’ would be an “interactive, kinetic sculpture celebrating a lively and festive downtown.”

My Thoughts: I am interested in the idea of recycling and wish there was more information about the intent of the piece and its comment on reused objects. I am not surprised that the work has to do with recycling as so many of the pieces by Malin and Beauchamp deal with nature and the environment. I wonder why they chose such a colourful and lively work to discuss the idea of environmental awareness. While I could easily pick up on the concept of a lively and bustling downtown, I would not have guessed the piece had an emphasis on the idea of reuse had I not already been familiar with the name. I wonder if this was not the primary purpose of the piece and the main comment the artists wanted to make was simply about the energy of the city.

Furthermore, I am absolutely blown away that these sculptures move. I pass this park every day on my way to work and I have never seen anyone pedaling the bikes or moving the whirligigs. In my own interaction with this work, it never occurred to me to try and sit on the bike and pedal. I assumed I would look silly – something I definitely wouldn’t want in such a busy park. I might try now that I know the sculptures are supposed to be interactive!

Have you ever tried to pedal the Recycle bikes?