first impressions FIRST LOOK CHAI DUNCAN For Chai Duncan, the medium matters less than the exploration process. His work is varied and includes short narrative and experimental films, encaustic drawings, installations, and found objects encased in wax and resin, just to name a few. Recently, he’s returned to photography. “I grew up in a family involved in the photography business and have always used a camera the way some people use a sketch book.” His most recent series of works involve juxtaposing porcelain bird statues with old nature pictures and paintings, then photographing the results. “There’s a naivety and sweetness to how nature is represented in the figurines,” he says. “There’s a pathos captured in the images that speaks of a nature lost and a longing for what may have been. Yet in reality, it’s just fake on fake.” He has a sense of play and mystery in that creative process, often not knowing what will happen or where explorations will lead. He’s fascinated by the tension generated by the desire for a corporeal security and the reality that nothing in this world is permanent. “I'm interested in the illusion of security,” he muses.
ABOVE: Artist
Duncan earned an MFA from the University of Saskatchewan shortly before
Chai Duncan
moving to Lethbridge in 2006, where he teaches art at the University of Lethbridge. His recent exhibitions include a group show at Third Space Art Gallery in
RIGHT:
St. John, NB, and a video collaboration with Toronto artist Andrew Taggert for
Bunny Valley,
an exhibition called Emerging Landscape at the Nickle Arts Museum in Calgary.
Chai Duncan
Nouveau Gallery in Regina represents him, listing him as one of their new artists.
digital
In his studio surrounded by sketches, completed works, raw materials and
photograph
experiments in progress, Chai is never bored. “There’s always something that excites me and pulls me into the studio.”
— Katherine Wasiak
➤➤➤➤➤
PORTRAITIST AWARDED Joshua Choi, a painter based in Vancouver and Etobicoke, Ontario, has been awarded the 2007 Kingston Prize, given biannually for portraiture. His painting, titled Emily, was chosen from 30 finalists among more than 200 entries for the 2007 award, this year increased to $10,000 through an endowment from the W. Garfield Weston Foundation.
BC FUNDS ARTS SCHOOL With an influx of cash from the BC government — almost $50 million announced in November — work conSimon Fraser University’s new School for the Contemporary Arts. Design by Henriquez Partners www.gallerieswest.ca
tinues on one of the most ambitious creative revitalization projects in Vancouver. Breaking ground in a location that’s popularly known as “the old Woodward’s building,” Simon Fraser University is building their new multi-disciplinary School for the Contemporary Arts on the city’s East Side. Part of a larger redevelopment of the site that is expected to become a cultural magnet for the city, the School is set to move there in late 2009. The school has a 30-year track record in education for a variety of fine and performing arts disciplines, including dance, theatre, and visual arts, and this new site, designed by the Vancouver firm Henriquez Partners, will include a ground-floor contemporary art gallery that will have
an artistic and curatorial teaching component.
KELOWNA ATTRACTS OLYMPICS GRANT Noted BC artists Dana Claxton, Jayce Salloum and Henry Tsang have been commissioned to create new original work in contemporary media as part of a unique funding program tied to the Vancouver Olympics in 2010. The work is underway through the Alternator Gallery for Contemporary Art in Kelowna, which was awarded $107,000 for creation and development of the commission by the Arts Partners in Contemporary Art, a partnership between a group of funders including The City of Vancouver, the Canada Council, and the Vancouver Organizing Committee Galleries West Spring 2008 19