ALBERTA: Alex Janvier, September 6 to 18, Canada House Gallery, Banff

— BY Rob Alexander

Alex Janvier’s work is remarkable and unmistakable—though the 73-year-old artist of Dene Suline and Saulteaux descent has his influences, namely Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee, his style is very much his own. Janvier combines a palette of rich, natural colours—found along a river bank, in a deep forest or a field of wildflowers—with abstraction, negative space and long, sinuous lines like winding streams and cirrus clouds.

— BY Jennifer McVeigh

The title of this exhibition is a demanding one - imposing nearly impossible expectations. At a time when the definition of photography is being stretched to near disintegration by the use of digital technology, how can one show possibly address the wide spectrum of practices happening in the province today? How can the work selected represent a whole generation of artists?

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ALBERTA: The 2007 Alberta Biennial of Contemporary Art; June 27 – Sept 9, 2007, Art Gallery of Alberta, Edmonton; Oct 27, 2007 – Jan 6, 2008, Walter Phillips Gallery, Banff

— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

As soon as you enter the first display area of the 2007 Alberta Biennial of Contemporary Art, you’ll know that you’re in for a fun, but challenging time. The first piece is a series of quirky, super-horny elk — animals sprouting huge racks of antlers all over their bodies — created by Edmonton’s Paul Freeman. Typical of Freeman’s most recent work, the images are purposefully contrarian and inherently puzzling.

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— BY Wes Lafortune

The Solstice arrived early at Calgary’s Virginia Christopher Fine Art. The exhibition by Calgary-based painter Peter Deacon covered more than seven metres of the gallery’s wall space, a multi-media piece comprised of 37 panels.

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— BY Dina O’Meara

You don’t walk into a landscape by Sean Randall, you manoeuvre your way through his vision of fields, scrub and bright skies, attracted by the artist’s use of texture and colour to build a sense of perspective the closer you come to the canvas.

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— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

The Art Gallery of Alberta has chosen to launch their brand-new Kitchen Gallery space with a deconstructive show of David Cantine’s postmodern still-lifes. Called Unflat — a retrospective celebration of work from a 30-year career — is a great companion to the Flat show down the hall. Both exhibitions are celebrations of the city’s historic abstract painting tradition.

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— BY Amy Fung

The mysterious abyss of light and shadow where the horizon meets the break of light is at the center of David Edwards’ latest work. Luminescent and austere, the glow consistent throughout Land Forms suggests an unfathomable possibility against the surrounding shadows. Moving beyond the turbulence of painting in a war-ravaged and disconnected world, the Zimbabwe-born, Vancouver-based Edwards is not interested in creating a narrative - rather, all of his pieces stand alone as nostalgia confused with realistic depiction.

— BY Wes Lafortune

Angel Vincench’s artwork speaks eloquently for those who are unable. Behind the Abstract (Abstracto parece pero no es- It seems Abstract but it is not) is an exhibition of paintings by the Havana-based artist, recently shown at Axis Contemporary Art in Calgary.

ALBERTA: Marie Lannoo: Sight Unseen, Oct 21 to Nov 25, Newzones Gallery, Calgary
— BY Wes Lafortune

This collection of new paintings by Marie Lannoo does not represent objects. Instead, it’s a nexus of techniques and emotions that transcend the convenient categories often placed around creativity. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Charles Malinsky: The Journey – We’ll Meet Again, Sept 9 to Oct 7, Herringer-Kiss Gallery, Calgary
— BY Wes Lafortune

Painter Charles Malinsky is on a spectacular journey. From his birthplace in Canada to his adopted home in Spain, Malinsky weaves tales using figures that at one moment seem familiar, and then suddenly evade us like apparitions disappearing into thin air. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Lylian Klimek, New Green, June 6 — Sept 3, 2006, Art Gallery of Calgary, Calgary
— BY Nicholas Roukes

H.G. Wells's lesser known book, Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth (1904), presents a scenario in which a "new scientific wonder" escapes control and produces runaway genetic mutations — giant leeches, plants and cockroaches, and a new race of giant people (continue...)

ALBERTA: Contemporary Canadian Ceramics, May 13 — July 9, 2006, Esplanade Art Gallery, Medicine Hat
— BY Amy Gogarty

Esplanade Art Gallery curator Joanne Marion and Les Manning, director of Medalta Artists in Residency program, jointly selected the works in Contemporary Canadian Ceramics. While not aspiring towards a comprehensive survey, the exhibition represents all geographical regions of Canada and demonstrates a diverse range of approaches. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Tim Okamura, Urban Portraits and Brooklyn Mythology, May 18 — 28, 2006, Axis Contemporary Art, Calgary
— BY Wes Lafortune

Artistically speaking, Tim Okamura may just be the Caravaggio of our time. Selecting many of the subjects for his realistic portraits from people he meets on New York city streets — much like the famed Baroque artist filled his canvases with ordinary people he knew in Rome — (continue...)

ALBERTA: Marcia Huyer, Spaced Out, Apr 20 — May 20, 2006, Harcourt House Arts Centre, Edmonton
— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

Marcia Huyer successfully deconstructs both the idea of gallery space and the ideal viewer stance in Spaced Out at Harcourt House Arts Centre. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Liz Ingram, Amy Loewan, Lyndal Osborne, Laura Vickerson, Human/Nature, Mar 17 — May 6, 2006, Triangle Gallery of Visual Arts, Calgary
— BY Kay Burns

When looking at aspects of nature, it is impossible not to be aware of the inherent patterns that emerge in organic forms: veins on a leaf, ripples on a sand bar, the arrangements of petals on a flower. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Dieter Schlatter, Mar 25 — Apr 6, 2006, Canada House Gallery, Banff
— BY Dylan Cree

Dieter Schlatter's assembled landscapes juxtapose nostalgic cliché with present-day techne. Combining oil painting with photographs taken during his extensive travels throughout Canada's western provinces, the Swiss-born artist articulates the aftermath of human intrusion on the environment. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Scott Plear, New Work, Mar 4 — 17, 2006, Agnes Bugera Gallery, Edmonton
— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

Vancouver-based painter Scott Plear is not afraid of contradiction or breaking new ground in his ongoing series of vibrant abstract expressionist canvases. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Mark Mullin, A Sudden Change in Pressure, Mar 2 — 25, 2006, Paul Kuhn Gallery, Calgary
— BY Kay Burns

Imagine, if you will, flying on a 747 jet at 37,000 feet and, due to some kind of atmospheric fluctuation (perhaps the meeting of cold and warm fronts), the plane unexpectedly drops 300 feet. You and the other passengers experience turbulence and a sudden change in pressure. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Charles van Sandwyk, The Wind in the Willows, Feb 17 — Mar 31, 2006, Arts on Atlantic Gallery, Calgary
— BY Dina O'Meara

There's something magical about the art of Charles van Sandwyk. His watercolour etchings and fine line drawings appear as if from a different age, one where fairies played hide-and-seek in the back garden, and children listened, hushed and wide-eyed, to tales of voyages to far away tropical isles. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Femke van Delft, Missing: A Guerilla Mapping Project, Feb 9 — Mar 11, 2006, Harcourt House Gallery, Edmonton
— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

I have to admit I was apprehensive prior to seeing Femke van Delft's politically sensitive multi-media exhibition, Missing: A Guerilla Mapping Project. This show doesn't boast a "feel-good" theme. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Popular, Dec 13 — May 21, 2006, Art Gallery of Calgary
— BY Kay Burns

During a recent trip to Edmonton, I overheard a conversation in the breakfast room of a hotel. Two women who didn't know each well, but were perhaps attending the same conference or some other function, decided to sit together at breakfast. These two acquaintances spent the entire meal discussing their favourite TV shows. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Dennis Budgen, A Fine Line: Works by Dennis Budgen, Nov 17, 2005 — Jan 7, 2006, Triangle Gallery of Visual Arts, Calgary
— BY Caterina Pizanias, PhD.

A Fine Line: Works by Dennis Budgen is the final exhibit in the year-long series celebrating Alberta's Centennial at the Triangle Gallery of Visual Arts. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Ryan Sluggett, Monsters and Their Niches, Nov 24 — Dec 22, 2005, TrépanierBaer, Calgary
— BY Wes Lafortune

As an artist, Ryan Sluggett is part philosopher, part storyteller. With paint brush, pencil crayon, pen, and spray can, he expresses his views about the world not in cold academic terms but with an almost childlike awareness. (continue...)

TORONTO: Toronto International Art Fair, November 3 — 7, 2005, Toronto Convention Centre
— BY Douglas MacLean

At the centre of Canada — and jokingly at the centre of the universe — Toronto is the only Canadian city that can support an event of the size and scope of the Toronto International Art Fair. For a fair to thrive, critical mass is essential, but so are its location and dates. Moving the fair into the bowels of the Toronto Convention Centre this year was a negative. Changing its timing to dates when other important international art fairs were being held was a double negative. Nevertheless, an estimated 1,200 people attended opening night. Over the next four days, however, attendance was somewhat thin and, although a few booths sold out, sales in general were less than remarkable. (continue...)

ALBERTA: Wyn Geleynse, Curtain, Oct 13 – Nov 12, TrépanierBaer, Calgary
— BY Kay Burns

The current exhibition at TrépanierBaer shows a definite departure for London, Ontario, artist Wyn Geleynse.

Previously Geleynse’s work consisted of installation environments incorporating objects and/or images as context and surface for film or video projections. Past works play with the relationship between the projected image and the material they are screened on. (continue...)

ALBERTA: R.F.M. (Robert) McInnis, A Retrospective of Figurative Paintings, until October 26, Front Gallery, Edmonton
— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

One of the unspoken joys of live theatre is the freedom it allows always curious human beings to break taboo and stare in an abashed and unbroken way at strangers for wonderfully long periods of time. (continue...)

ALBERTA: What is Visible, Robert Lemay’s 20th anniversary show, until October 15, Douglas Udell Gallery, Edmonton
— BY Gilbert A. Bouchard

Our postmodern era’s love of historic juxtaposition has proven to be a challenge for visual artists.

Suddenly freed from traditional constraints of highbrow art conventions, artists can now move between graphic realities and genres, copying and commenting from any and all visual art references — from sketches taken on a trip to Europe’s historic great galleries to lowbrow comic books and advertisements to images lifted from the TV. (continue...)