Western Canada's art magazine since 2002
2 January 2018 Vol 3 No 1 ISSN 2561-3316 © 2018
From the Editor
Portia Priegert
The start to a year can feel lovely in the way a blank canvas or a new notebook beckons, filling us with hope and possibility. But we may feel a bit daunted too by memories of good intentions abandoned along the way in other years. Of course, the festive hoopla is all rather arbitrary and the reality is that life goes on, moment merging into moment, as always. Still, it’s hard to avoid the collective fascination with looking both backward and forward at this time of year.
So this issue does glance back with a story about Undaunted: Canadian Women Painters of the 19th Century, which is showing at the Art Gallery of Alberta. Another story looks at Stone and Sky: Canada’s Mountain Landscape, an exhibition at the Audain Art Museum in Whistler, B.C., that features many historical paintings. Ideas about place continue to occupy artists and as I discovered last month while preparing our first annual books issue, many art books focus on this theme as well. Perhaps that’s natural for a settler society in a year that marked 150 years of Confederation. Paintings that portray the natural world remain popular with the art-buying public, at least judging by artists like Caroline Stanley, who is profiled in these pages. Another artist in this issue who also considers place, Andreas Rutkauskas, spent three years photographing vistas along the border between Canada and the United States. It's a more conceptual project, to be sure, but one with roots in the Canadian landscape tradition.
Meanwhile, here at Galleries West, we are looking forward. We have started a broad reworking of our web presence and expect to unveil a new look in March. We're still in the early stages so it's a good time to share any observations about things we could improve. We will keep publishing popular features, including the magazine's gallery guide and exhibition listings, as well as stories about artists working and showing in Western Canada.
We appreciate your patience and encourage you to let us know if you hit any technical snags during this revamp. Our goal is to serve you – and the rest of the Western Canadian visual arts community – in a comprehensive and timely manner.
Until next time,
CONTRIBUTORS THIS ISSUE: Beverly Cramp, John K. Grande, Paul Gessell, Mary-Beth Laviolette
