Fox Drop by Kristy Lynn

Cosmic Honey, Books Series, Kristy Lynn

Last week was Kristy Lynn’s final week with us.  She decided to add a little printmaking to the mix and finished two editions in silkscreen. Her prints turned out great (you can see them at the studio in our Curio Shop). We were really impressed the the number of pieces she completed while at the studio. While I was going through the updates she made to her website I noticed the image above, a page from her notebook, which made me feel so happy about the our home and studio.

Woodcut by Genna Kusch and Tamara Sponder

Woodcut by Genna Kusch and Tamara Sponder

Genna and Tamara, both friends from Queen’s, came down to work on a number of projects for the week. They had started a woodcut at the studio two years ago and finally completed it, they also began an installation project which I am curating with them and finally Tamara worked on a series of etching for her Littlest Print Exchange submission.

Workshop with Trenton High School

Workshop with Trenton High School

Near the end of the week we hosted the second half of the Trenton High School Etching Workshop. During this half the students came to the studio to print their etched copper plates. We taught them about the etching process, the inking process and how to use the intaglio press. They each had the chance to work with two different colours and chine-colle. All the students left with at least 6 – 8 prints. We were contacted afterwards by the teacher with a biggest thank you email and an invitation to be the keynote speakers at the school Art Awards (so nice).

To top it all off we got some time in on my nieces new trampoline when Kyle and I (plus two of the residents) went to her third birthday party.

Links for this week:

- I am hoping to get as good as these kids on the trampoline.

- I want to write a convincing letter to Printeresting so we can get a free can of their Gamblin Ink.

- This post made me pretty excited about planting a garden this year.

- I really love the paintings of Jules De Balincourt!

What a great week!

-Chrissy

Share this post with others:

This week the Business of Art vault brought this question:

Where is contemporary art being made in Canada?

To this I say: Everywhere.

Contemporary art is being made all over the country. There isn’t one geographic area where it is all happening. What this question made me realize is that maybe there isn’t a great resource showcasing some of the amazing things happening in the Canadian art scene. I have compiled a short list of some of the awesome Canadian writers, bloggers, spaces and artists that I visit or support.

• The MOCCA: The mandate of the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art is to exhibit, research, collect, and promote innovative art by Canadian and international artists whose works engage and address challenging issues and themes relevant to our times. I always catch really great shows here when I visit Toronto, Ontario.

• Magic Pony: Magic Pony is dedicated to the exhibition and promotion of the best in young contemporary art. We operate as a studio, gallery and retail environment, combining elements of art, design and popular culture to create a unique shopping experience. This is an amazing place to find new and exciting young Canadian artists. Tt is always on my list of places to stop into while visiting Toronto, Ontario. 

• Toronto Craft Alert: A great resource for crafters and craft enthusiasts this site lists upcoming sales, calls for submissions, educational opportunities and featured articles about amazing crafters from all over. 

• The Hamilton Art Crawl: Hamilton is starting to make a name for itself in the Canadian art scene, making their monthly art crawl must see event.

• Forest City Gallery: FCG’s mandate is to serve as a forum for local, regional, national and international artists through the presentation of relevant contemporary practices in visual/media arts, performance, literature and music. A great space offering interesting exhibitions and events in London, Ontario.

• Modern Fuel: Modern Fuel aims to meet the professional development needs of emerging and mid-career local, national and international artists, from diverse cultural communities, through exhibition, discussion, and mentorship opportunities. This is a great gallery space in Kingston, Ontario showcasing many talented Canadian artists.

• En Masse: Montreal, Quebec based art initiative EN MASSE is best described as an ongoing exercise in irreverent, improvised collaborative drawing — a boundary-blurring cocktail of high and lowbrow culture, pop imagery fragmented like shattered glass in a spontaneous, multi-genre, black-on-white collision.

• Poppytalk Handmade: Poppytalk is a Canadian (Vancouver, British Columbia based) design blog collecting inspiration and dedicated to promoting emerging design talent. I visit this site regularly for inspiration.

• Booooooom: Amazing art blog from Vancouver, British Columbia artist Jeff Hamada.  Booooooom was created in the hopes of fostering a community of people excited to go out and be creative! This blog is great for learning about contemporary artists from Canada.

• Khyber Art Centre: The Khyber, est. 1995, is a non-profit, artist-run centre located in an historic, three-story building in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia. The centre presents contemporary art exhibitions, artist lectures, panel discussions, performances and offers art classes to youth.

• Urban Shaman Contemporary Aboriginal Art: Located in Winnipeg, Manitoba the Urban Shaman Contemporary Aboriginal Art is a nationally recognized leader in Aboriginal arts programming and one of the foremost venues and voices for Aboriginal art in Canada.

• Art Central: About Art Central is a visual art complex at the corner of Centre Street and 7th Avenue in downtown Calgary, Alberta. Art Central aspires to be the axis of the visual art scene in Calgary: the place where artists conjoin with galleries and art aficionados, the stimulus for the production of excellence, innovation, and new ideas, the place where art intersects with the community, enlarging its experience and enhancing its perception of art.

• UPPERCASE Magazine: Another great source of information surrounding talented people from all over, Uppercase Magazine is a quarterly craft, fashion, illustration, and design journal published by Janine Vangool in Calgary, Alberta. 

I would love to hear of any other places (as I am sure there are many) so please feel free to add your favorite Canadian art place, space or person to our comments section.

If you thought these links were interesting share them with a friend:

Kyle and I just finished a bunch of new work for our two-person exhibit at the John M. Parrott Art Gallery. For this show we decided to create a new body of printed work. Kyle took a very traditional approach working with copper plate etchings while I took a more experimental approach combining silkscreen with encaustic painting and collage with watercolour monoprints. For this post I wanted to write about the monoprint because I think monoprint is a pretty unappreciated technique.

I first tried monoprinting when I was attending Queen’s. Our second year print professor, Jan Winton, had us work in this process for several months. With the pressure to pull great prints that would later be judged by faculty and fellow students I was easily frustrated with this painterly print method. Having worked mostly with paint prior to this experience I expected monoprinting to be no sweat but there was more to it then just putting ink onto copper. I quickly started to appreciate the attention to colour required and the way positive and negative space needed to be approached. You really have to consider space, layers, collage and texture so much more than with a painting. The “surprise” element that comes along with printmaking was also something that took some time to get used to but also became a highlight to this process.

Since that class I have used monoprint sparingly in my work– introducing it from time to time to bring a bit more life to my etchings. However, for this latest series of work I used it as one of my primary methods. Instead of using ink I choose to use watercolours. While this process takes a bit more time I wanted the washy, transparent qualities you can achieve with watercolour paints. I took the prints cut them up and collaged them together, finalizing them with embroidery and stitching (sorry for the terrible image once I have others I will update this post).

I appreciate what can be learned from monoprinting as a beginner. During my second year I was unsure why Jan had decided to start with monoprint rather than something “cooler” like silkscreen but now I can see her reasoning. Printmaking takes so much more planning, consideration and attention. Each step significantly effects the end result. Since monoprinting is a much faster and more forgiving technique than most other processes it gives you the chance to play around in the print studio. This speed allows you t understand the printing inks, to use a printing press and to consider how colour, layering, pressure and paper play a huge roll in the final print.

If you are interested in learning about monoprint consider signing-up for a workshop (find out more by clicking HERE).

If you liked this post others might too:

This weeks The Business Side of Art question is: “Where can I access materials to help me with funding and the application process for grants?”

Sourcing funding is an important part of the art world since, like any business, artists need capital in order to produce work. For some artists and art organizations applying for grants can occupy more time than is actually spent making work or running the facility. Along with being time consuming grant writing can be extremely challenging. Being surrounded by artists regularly we have heard our fair share of grant secrets, success stories and failures. We have even experience some of these first hand. Our first two years were successfully funded by a provincial grant but our third year has seen no grants at all.

The hard and fast answer to this question is that there isn’t one right way to apply for funding. There are elements that can make you a more eligible candidate.  Having provoking and well documented work, creating an intriguing project idea, incorporating programs with the local community or addressing current national issues are just some of the ways you can help yourself receive funding. The thing to remember is that reading the guidelines carefully is the most important step. Knowing that your project/work fulfills the grant requirements is always going to help you get further in the granting process. Ensure you are clear about what you are planning to with the funding and be realistic. Most artist grants have a large number of applicants so make sure you review every detail of your application and request a realistic amount for your project.

While it can be surprisingly hard to find solid information about writing grants successfully there are a few online resources that will help you put together a grant application. I have listed a few below:

CARFAC ONTARIO

-CARFAC is a great resource for Canadian artists. Not only do they produce comprehensive publications they also host workshops meant to demystify many of the business challenges artist have.

S. JOSEPH LEVINE’S GUIDE TO WRITING A FUNDING PROPOSAL

-This guide is filled with great information and takes you through a grant application step-by-step. It gives you hints along with examples and is often updated with new information.

GRANTING AGENCIES (ex. Canada Arts Council)

-It is good to remember that the granting agency has staff that are there to help you write. If you plan well enough in advance these people are a great wealth of knowledge. You can call or write them with all your questions and they will provide you with answers that will help make sure you are writing what the granter is looking for. There are often grant writing sessions offered by granting agencies as well. These sessions will explain what programs are available, who is eligible and how to apply.

YES MONTREAL

-The YES Montreal website has many great resources but their Making Your Way Handbook (which is free) has some valuable information about grant writing, along with tips about pricing your work, making media contacts, etc.

If you know of other helpful resources that can be added to this list send me an email chrissy[at]sparkboxstudio.com

If you found this information helpful please let other people know by sharing it:

As per usual I am trying to stay on top of the blog. I am realizing that I may not be as good at multitasking as I would like to have myself think. With the upcoming exhibition at the John M. Parrott Art Gallery I have been trying to go back and forth between the studio and Spark Box admin, which is proving to be difficult.

Anyway, onto the post about residency award winner Sarah Ammons, who was awarded time to work on a series of etchings a few years back. At the time Sarah was in the middle of her BFA at Queen’s University. We love encouraging artists in their undergrad to participate in the residency program as it is an ideal way to meet artists and build new connections.

We were quite excited about having Sarah work in etching since prior to her stay we hadn’t had many printmakers participate in the residency program. Sarah’s etchings were manly based on portraits and in her words were a “reflection on her outlook towards life”. During her stay she completed a number of medium sized works and had the opportunity to learn our non-toxic process.

In anticipation of starting up workshops again I have decided to reflect on our most recent workshop at the new studio with a group of high school students from Belleville. Over the past few years we’ve worked hard to build a good relationship with the different schools around the area. We see art as a truly beneficial experience for any young person. Art provides youth with a place to express themselves in an open and nurturing space and we love giving a young person a chance to participate in an environment where they can freely be who they want to be.

This past fall we had the pleasure of hosting a two day etching workshop with a group of art students from Moira Secondary. Their teacher Rosanne Duke (a big supporter of the studio) she asked if her class could learn intaglio printmaking with us through the process of etching. We have done this workshop with Loyalist in the past and it has been a huge success so we jumped on the chance to share this very old process with her students.

This was the first big workshop we have held in our new space, making it a bit nerve-racking. With over 20 students we weren’t too sure how the space would hold-up, but to our surprise it turned out very well. We first went to their classroom to give each student their pre-grounded plates and the step-by-step instruction on how to carve their image. Then the entire class came to Picton to print their plates on our press. Each student had the chance to make an edition of four prints in two different colours. During the first half of the studio day students were timidly working with the inks and using the press but by the second half they were experimenting with different application processes and producing some really inspiring pieces.

If you are interested in learning about etching be sure to sign-up for our January Etching Workshop >> find out more here <<

This introductory course requires no previous experience with printmaking. Students will begin the lesson with fresh copper plates and learn how to transform them into a small edition of prints. This workshop will teach students a non-toxic form of etching and will include hard ground techniques, aquatinting and soft ground techniques. By the end of the course students will have an understanding of the basic principles of printmaking including the above etching processes along with working with printing inks and using a traditional etching press.

Picked up a copy of Prefix magazine last night at Chapters and found Spark Box in the Opportunities section. I knew that we might be mentioned but didn’t know it actually happened so that was a nice surprise. Prefix Photo is an engaging magazine, based out of Toronto. It is dedicated to contemporary photography and related arts. Characterized by innovative design and outstanding production values, Prefix Photo consists primarily of portfolio and essay sections, providing a complement of intelligent texts and breath-taking visuals. These features are accompanied by newsbriefs which provide information and opportunities for professional photographers, including new technological developments. Each issue of Prefix Photo presents the work of Canadian photographers, both emerging and established, alongside that of their international counterparts.

A past winner from the summer 2011 residency award was painter and textile artist Alison Thompson. Her stay at Spark Box ranged from working on her paintings, to discussing the cross-section of art and craft, to embroidery our vintage chair, to exploring the Prince Edward County scenery.

It was such a joy to have her at the studio, her positive energy filled the house. Her work perfectly reflected her personality – bright, cheerful, vintage and fun. The work produced at the studio expressed her interest in the world of craft and her passion for the world of art. Her embroidery work filled the desire to work with traditional women’s needle craft and her watercolour paintings of quilt patterns addressed her pursuit of the fine arts.