Galerie d'Avignon

Aaron’s iconic images from our everyday lives challenge us to evaluate what we see, and what we think we see. To call them simply paintings would be an understatement. He uses common everyday objects as subject matter and along with his deft handling of paint, creates evocative illusions of form, color and texture. It is because of these qualities that Aaron Fink is considered one of America’s contemporary masters.

In addition to his numerous museum exhibitions (solo and group) Aaron exhibits regularly in galleries across the United States and in Europe. His work has also been presented at the prestigious Art Chicago at Navy Pier, The Art Show at the Park Avenue Armory, New York and the FIAC (Foire Internationale d’Art Contemporain) in Paris.

‘’The materials of painting and sculpture are malleable but inert. When handled properly, they take on a life of their own and become the embodiment of human thought and expression. In painting there is the reality of the material and the flatness of the surface upon which it is applied in contrast to the sense of illusion that is created on that surface. This is the contradiction that consumes my mind as I work. It is the pursuit of possibilities unknown that I believe drives human creativity.’’

Aaron Fink

“ ….. So stepping up close to Aaron’s paintings, my experience became a whole new set of values and sensations of color, texture, scale, and surface movement and relationships.

Renaissance painting used certain mechanics to create depth, converging lines, receding color intensity, and receding size. None of these things are here. But the painting has an impressive sense of volume. The paint is on a two-dimensional surface, but it relentlessly asserts three- dimensionality.”

John G. Powers, Carbondale, Colorado, Sunday, June 28, 1992
Education

Aspen Institute, 1997
Yale University School of Art & Architecture, MFA, 1979
Maryland Institute, College of Art, BFA, 1977
Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, 1976

Positions

Artist in Residence, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass, CO. 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996

Awards

National Endowment for the Arts, Grant, 1987
Artists Fellowship, Massachusetts Council on the Arts and Humanities, 1984
National Endowment for the Arts, Grant 1982
American Academy in Rome, Prix de Rome-Alternate in Painting, 1979
Yale University, Ford Foundation Special Project Grant, 1979
Skowhegan Scholarship Award, conferred by the Maryland Institute College Art, spring 1976

(Montreal & Georgeville,QC) is represented in international public, corporate, and private collections and has an extensive bibliography. Her ongoing series is based on the Icarus myth. Many things fall from the sky: snow, hail, debris from outer space. Now we face the “fallout” from the U. S. missile defense system. There is, of course, also a Biblical “fall”. Interpretations keep a myth alive, deepening it and making the Icarus story intense, personal, and contemporary.

“…Bates réussit à lui conserver son intégrité régionale, tout en lui inculquant des qualités universelles…elle en cerne la réalité éphémère et changeante et nous livre le résultat de cet examen dans une oeuvre à la fois mouvante, exacte et entière.”
- Monique Nadeau-Saumier


“…the surface of a field is made to express in microcosm ….the universal energy found in nature that permeates all things.”
- John K. Grande


“…Bates has reaffirmed her reputation as one of Canada’s top experimental landscape painters.”
- Wayne Larsen





Icarus Series Summary

The ongoing series of paintings is based on the Icarus myth. Icarus made wings held on by wax, which melted when he flew too close to the sun. The wonderful flight precedes the better-remembered “fall” of Icarus. Many things fall from the sky: snow, hail, debris from outer space. Now we face the “fallout” from the U.S. missile defence system. There is also a Biblical “fall”. Interpretations keep a myth alive, deepening it and making the Icarus story intense and contemporary.


Though Icarus has been a long-anticipated theme, it has evolved from an interest in wind machines with their mechanical wings, to paintings of “falling birds”, and to paintings from high vantage points. Involvement with the anti-nuclear movement in the 1980’s precedes the present concern about the proposed missile defence system over Canada.
Though the paintings are not “messages”, the variety of possible interpretations makes this series personal and relevant, alive and contemporary.


The paintings show the flights of Icarus over various parts of Canada. Icarus I is in the “Perspectives” exhibit at the Centre culturel Yvonne L. Bombardier, Valcourt, QC until mid-October 2003. Two are included in the “Vues du paysage” exhibit at the Visual Arts Centre, Montreal, Sept. 5-27, 2003. Four will be shown from Oct. 22 – Nov. 15, 2003 at Galerie d’Avignon, Montreal as part of a solo exhibit entitled “VISTAS X: Soaring. “Icarus and Related Drawings” will form a solo exhibit at the Dawson College Art Gallery in Montreal in February-March 2004.


Studio work in the first half of 2004 will be based on a September 2003 research sketching trip to Georgian Bay. The Icarus over Georgian Bay Series will be shown at Michael Gibson Gallery in London, ON in later 2004. An Arctic trip is planned for July 2004, the Baffin Island locations of Iqaluit and Pangnirtung, to make sketches for the Icarus over the Arctic Series. The work will continue in 2005 in other areas of Canada.


- Catherine Young Bates

September 2003



Education
1995 Hugh O’Donnell Workshop, Connecticut
1995 Vermont Studio School, Johnson, Vermont
1986 McGill University, Master of Education (Art)
1958 - 1963 Baltimore Museum of Art, MD (painting, Keith Martin)
Maryland Institute of Art (graphics)
1957 Ontario College of Education, University of Toronto, ON
1956 University of Toronto, Honours B.A., Art & Archaeology

Awards
2001
1992




1978


1974
Elected member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (R.C.A. / a.r.c.)
Grant & Award for research ‘ Explorations of the self : Drawing & Writing ’
The Canadian Give The Gift of Literacy Foundation and the Lydia Burton Award, with Linda Shohet, The Centre for Literacy, Montréal, QC
Release time grant from Dawson College, Resource-Teacher Project, The Centre for Literacy, Montréal, QC

Canada Council Travel Grant, participant, 23rd Congress of INSEA (International Society for Education through Art). Adelaide, Australia.

Grant, Ministère des Affaires culturelles, Aide aux expositions, Montréal, QC
Purchase Award, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montréal, QC


Positions
1972 – 2001, Professor, Fine Arts Department, Dawson College, Montréal, QC
2001 Artist in residence The American School in Switzerland, Lugano, Switzerland
1997 Artist in residence The Leighton Foundation, Alberta
1992 – 1997 Member, Board of Directors, Galerie Arts Sutton, Sutton QC
1984 Conterpane - Poems and Drawings by Catherine Bates, published by Ken Hertz

Prior to 1984 Art Critic : The Montreal Star, Canadian Art Magazine & Art News Magazine.

Henry Wanton Jones was born in 1925 in Waterloo Quebec. Jimmy has worked in such diverse media as jewelry, collage, sculpture, and of course painting, which he studied with Arthur Lismer. Over the years, Jones’ work has evolved into the well-defined colorful and distinctive still lifes and equestrian nudes. John Ivor Smith describes these latter painitngs as “female nudes and their stallions, tender and lightheartedly erotic in a thousand luscious, ingenious variations.”



As well as being part of numerous private collections, Jones’ paintings are to be found in such prestigious public collections as the Musée du Québec, the McMichael Canadian Collection, the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Robert McLaughlin Gallery, the Confederation Center Art Gallery and the Ministry of External Affairs.

On an August evening when I visited Jan in her country studio, her peony paintings made me catch my breath because of the intensity of the energy and light I saw in them. Immediately I thought of Vermeer, the way he used light and shadow. Then I remembered the first time I had seen Jan’s work in 1998, encaustic paintings of vessels, round generous pots glowing with light on the inside, and some with light spilling from them. Light is the continuum her work, regardless of the image.

These paintings of the peony form – rooted in both her grandmother`s and her mother’s gardens, and now in her own garden – allows the artist to explore the mysteries and the meaning of light and darkness. None of this would be possible without her skill in handling paint, and her understanding that to paint light, one must paint the dark. Darkness shows us the meaning of light. The light and the dark together represent the realities in all of life, but the spirited energy in her work makes me feel the joy in the light.


Jane Lind, Author of Joyce Wieland Artist on Fire




Janice Mason Steeves
Née / Born: Regina, Saskatchewan

Éducation / Education
1997 Ontario College of Art and Design-Honours-Drawing and Painting
1984-1993 Studied drawing and painting with various instructors
1969 M.A., Clinical Psychology, University of Manitoba
1967 B.A., University of Manitoba, major in Psychology

Selected exhibitions / Expositions choisies
solo & group / individuelles & collectives
2002 Galerie D'Avignon, Montreal, QC
"Peony"-Abbozzo Gallery, Oakville, ON
2001 "The Journey Home"-Trias Gallery, Toronto, ON
2000 "Into Body"-Frederick Horsman Varley Gallery of Markham, ON
"OSA 2000:Representation(s)"-Lt. Governor's Suites, Queen's Park, ON
"Flora 2000: The Millennium in Japan"-Awaji Island, Japan
"Red Passages"-Abbozzo Gallery, Oakville, ON
1999 "In the First Person: Five Women from the Prairies"- Art Gallery of Mississauga, ON
"The Great Round"-Burlington Art Centre, Burlington, ON
"Spirit, Mind, Body"-John B. Aird Gallery, Toronto, ON
1998 "A Space for Light"-Carnegie Gallery, Dundas, ON
"Memories and Dreams"-Abbozzo Gallery, Oakville, ON
1997 "Art and Healing"-Artwest Gallery, Jackson, Wyoming
1994 Ontario Society of Artists, First Canadian Place,Toronto,ON
1993 Society of Canadian Artists, Aird Gallery, Toronto, ON
1992 Perry Gallery, Burlington Art Centre, Burlington, ON
"Iceworks"-The Gallery at Inniskillin Winery, Niagara-on-the-Lake, ON
1988 Oakville/Negawaya Art Exchange, Oakville, ON and Japan
Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour, Toronto, ON
Peony Series: 39 - oil / encaustic on panel - 48x48’’

Postes occupés / Positions
2000-03 President-Ontario Society of Artists
Chair of province-wide "WATER" exhibition committee
1998-00 Vice-President/Exhibition Chair-OSA
1994-96 Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour Executive
1990 Exhibition Chair-Burlington Fine Arts Assn.
1989 Publicity Chair-Burlington Fine Arts Assn.

Bibliographie / Articles, Publicaitons
1999 "Plugged In"-Mississauga Cable TV interview
"The Wild Women of the West"-Mississauga News
"A Sense of Place"-The Canadian Forum
"Two Artists, Two Minds, One Vision"-The Hamilton Spectator
1998 "Historic Vessels"-The Oakville Beaver
"A Space for Light"-Fusion Magazine
Hamilton Cable 14 TV re Carnegie Gallery
1997 TV 23 Interview-Burlington Art Centre
1993 "Portfolio"-The Oakville Beaver
1992 CIUT Radio Interview
"Baffin Island Majesty on Display"-Burlington Spectator
Cover Story-Niagara Falls Review
"Refreshing Art Exhibition at Inniskillin"-The Niagara Guardian

Selected Collections Choisies
National Bank Financial / Kilmer Van Nostrand Inc.
First Gulf / The Residences of the Artisan, Toronto
The Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour Diploma Collection
Bishop Strachan School / Halton Children's Aid Society
Trafalgar Capital Management

The process of working a concept into 3 dimensional reality is intriguing and challenging. Many steps are involved from the initial maquette, in which the thought is roughed out in wax, to the final full size bronze . The care and attention to detail that I put into gating and shelling the wax, melting and pouring the bronze, finishing and patinating the sculpture, accumulates and resides in the finished work. This creative process combining technical and artistic challenge is exciting and ultimately fulfilling. The head has been the central visual theme in my work for the past five years. My representation of the head is non-specific as to gender, time, colour or creed. As an object of contemplation it functions as a mirror of the viewers’ experience reflecting and evoking conscious and subconscious memories, thoughts and feelings. This series dwells on the positive and moves from the inward looking contemplative head to heads in communication.








Né / Born
1946, Ottawa, Ontario


Éducation / Education
1971 Master of Fine Arts, Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
1969 Bachelor of Fine Arts, Mt. Allison University, Sackville, N.