The Bowman Arts Centre and the University of Lethbridge Art Gallery are pleased to announce a joint workshop and research project. It is a tradition amongst artists to create new pieces ‘after’ the works of other artists who have inspired them, or they have resonated with. How can the faculties of observation, memory and writing inform this tradition?
Visual arts and writing have many similar characteristics. Both trace and record the activity of the hand and body in an attempt to communicate with an observer. Both have a set of internal rules, and both rely on compositional conventions to try and make their messages clear. Many times the two disciplines pollute each other in a myriad of ways.
Artists are invited to take part in the project, Notebook. This project invites artists to explore the University of Lethbridge Art Gallery’s extensive collection, and respond to the work at a series of workshops held at the Bowman Arts Centre. Interested artists will be given access to a research database of the collection, and will then have an opportunity to go the University Gallery on May 29, from 10am – 3pm, to view the works in person. They will be provided notebooks, and an opportunity to make notes, not sketches, about the work they have chosen. These notations, and the artists’ memories, will form the foundation of a series of workshops held at the Bowman Arts Centre in the late summer/early fall. Armed with their memories and notes, the artists will work with their peers in re-imagining their chosen works. The whole project will be one of translation; from the visual, to the written, and back to the visual.
Both lunch and notebooks will be provided at the University, and lunch and standard sized paper will be provided at the Bowman workshops. There may also be an opportunity to exhibit the works when the workshop concludes. Artists must contact the Bowman Arts Centre to sign up for the project by May 12. All future correspondence, with further dates and relevant information, will be sent only to those artists who have confirmed. For further information, or to confirm your participation, please email Darcy Logan at darcy
artslethbridge
org (darcyartslethbridgeorg) with the word “workshop” in the subject line.
Sincerely,
Darcy Logan
Curator and Gallery Coordinator
Bowman Arts Centre
