SPRING 2018
ALBERTA COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN FACULTY ASSOCIATION
NEWSLETTER GUIDELINES
EXECUTIVE BOARD 2017-18
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president Natali Rodrigues interim vp/treasurer Justin Waddell ACADFA OFFICE 547 OFFICE HOURS TUESDAY/WEDNESDAY/THURSDAY 10AM–5 PM
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secretary Ashley Scarlett professional affairs rep Martina Lantin interim nac chair Justin Waddell grievance advisor Jeff Lennard communications officer Vacant academic council rep John Calvelli
The opinions expressed in this newsletter are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the Alberta College of Art & Design Faculty Association.
sessional representative Mark Giles
©Alberta College of Art + Design Faculty Association and contributors 2018
(non-voting)
board of governors rep Ian Fitzgerald office manager Patti Dawkins
Ideas and proposals are welcome at any time!
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We sometimes work on items over an extended period.
Cover Image Retiring Faculty Don Kottmann, Derek Besant, Mireille Perron, Charles Lewton-Brain
Retiring Faculty S c ho o l o f Visual Ar t , Draw ing Don Kottmann
Don Kottman circa 1975 courtesy of Luke Lindoe Library
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of Vi s u a l A r t, D rawi n g Don Kottman....cont’d On the occasion of Don Kottmann’s retirement, we asked him who he would like to write about him. He said he wanted his former students who endured “the endless crit” to send a comment. We received the following:
Dear Kottmann, I graduated from ACAD over a decade ago and in these ten years I have thought of the ‘endless crit’ every so often and I can now see that your emphasis on approach rather than end as a form of endurance was the point: artists are often in a state of some version of the endless crit. Maybe that’s why I always felt that you were learning too, that your teaching was one way of getting your own brain working in the same way we were, it had palpable authenticity. This lent a type of grittiness to the marathon approach that worked to eventually strip things down past the basics of aesthetic, subject matter or craft, something outside the judgement of fulfilled or unfulfilled intent of the student as success/failure of the work. What instead began to emerge beyond these concerns was the sustained instruction of how to really look at things. It was the process of refining the ability to perceive.
This earnestness doesn’t mean that it wasn’t fun. I always enjoyed having your sense of humor mixed in with the rigorousness of the whole thing. I remember the day you brought a tiny shivering Daschund puppy to class (named Otto, of course) who would become the cute foil to your sometimes bombastic persona. After all, one does need a certain amount of charisma to persuade people to sit in a room for six hours staring at the same work! Don Kottmann, congratulations on your 44 years. You were a great teacher. You helped me figure out how to think about work as a very young artist. You made my education more interesting, more in-depth and more valuable. I’m glad to have worked with you. I’m also happy to still be signed in to the endless crit. All my best wishes for the future Don. Sincerely, Elaine Cameron-Weir, Drawing 2007
Don Kottman with “Red Squall” 86 X 70.5 in 2017 acrylic paint on raw canvas in the exhibition “A Dazzling Decade” Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of Vi s u a l A r t, D rawi n g Don Kottman....cont’d Back in 1994 when students had to line up to get into the classes they wanted, Don Kottmann’s class always had the largest line up. As a drawing major, lining up for Don’s drawing class was like camping out for tickets to a rock concert. My classmates and I arrived early to the main mall often before tables were even set up. There were students from other departments jockeying for classes, and Don’s class filled first. With good reason! Don brought us into the visual — this was a visual art school after all — and yet the concerns of many teachers were cerebral and conceptual by comparison to Don. Don didn’t have a classroom. We met in the hall on the fourth floor where the AV department is now located. Back then ACAD felt more open, more free. Don capitalized on the free spaces to showcase our work. Our work could be openly viewed by anyone passing through the halls; his class was open to the public. So open in fact that during crits, Don would drag in a passerby to get their feedback. These crits lasted all day and often we failed to get through all the work. Don was insistent that you look at a work until you grew tired of it; until you thought you saw all of it; look at it until the boredom of looking overtook you. At this point when the class would be disengaging Don would tell you what he saw. Looking until you were bored was like the warm up act to the main show: What Don Saw. Listening to Don engage a student’s work was seeing it anew. It was seeing the work through the eyes of a wizard. Don would point your eye
to what he saw. “That brush stroke on the upper left, next to the blue mark. You see that? Do you see how real it gets? It has real space between the two marks, it takes on a real form. The form is round. It floats in a pictorial space with the weight of a real object.” It was through Don’s eyes that we learned to see. In our other classes there was more emphasis on how to talk about our art, dangerously becoming bullshit. With Don there was no chance you could fake your work and expect to get by on words alone. As we learned through Don’s long look, we learned that visuals were indeed a deeper space than words alone could describe. We learned of our own and each other’s interior spaces. Don continually challenged us: “You think you’re modern? You think you’re so current? You’re this close to living in a cave (finger snap).” Silas Kaufman, Drawing 1996 Illustration 2008
Dear Don: I apologize for the fact that this is a mere transcription of the original. I started writing on the computer, but the only way to talk about Don Kottmann is physically down the arm onto the page in layers one on top of the other.
Pay close attention to the corners and margins you taught me. I think now you may be right about that: in a world where each and every day a little of our authenticity is skimmed off, the corners and margins are where we keep it real. And, to quote Chris Frey, a guy I quote often, “Don is the real deal”. You are an artist, we didn’t need you to win the “Joan Mitchell” award to see that, it was a nice touch though. For those of us who were lucky enough to be your students, it was when you came down off the wall and walked among us that we will remember you most: as a teacher. OK, the Christ resonance may be a little much. In retrospect I think your genius as a teacher was to watch us carve out our own space, and then demand that we fully occupy it.
Everything went up on the wall, sketches, scribbles, what we foolishly thought was finished work, and then you were open for business. A Don Kottmann crit wasn’t so much talking about art as being airlifted behind enemy lines. But 40 years later here we are, and we both got out alive. For now.
Teacherartistthinkerpoetcolleague we will all carry our Don Kottmann stories and memories forward with us. What would a psychometric personality algorithm make of you, I wonder? I think the teacher in you would appreciate that I end with a question. Bill Austin
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of Vi s u a l A r t, D rawi n g Don Kottman....cont’d A student is lucky if, in a lifetime, they encounter one or two GREAT teachers. Don is a GREAT teacher. The only way I can begin to describe a class with Don is this: he teaches the un-teachable. How does one impart a respect for art as something sacred- as a ritualistic and spiritual exchange…while at the same time being shot through with a healthy dose of irreverence and abandon? I don’t know…but Don does. Maybe it is in the magic of the “Endless Crit” (I have since learned that the Endless Crit is actually life- but I am referring here to what happened in class). On the first day, Don asked me how many drawings per week it would take to “break me”. I said “40”, and he said “50 for next week it is then”. Turns out, most of the good stuff happens between drawings 40 and 50. As a drawer, Don taught me to seek out “girth”. Girth, as a Kottmannism, is not simply circumference or depth (although those may help)- it is something that you need to see to fully understand. As a starting point, he would often invoke (and very convincingly gesticulate around) the haunches and shoulders of cavepainted bison- the way the natural bulges in the rock come together with the painted anatomy. I always loved watching this performance-I felt like I was seeing Don in his truest form. Figure out how to do that (invoke both the cave paintings and the
performance) in a 2D medium and you are well on your way-but be warned, it is not easy. For a perfect execution, look at Don’s Lazarus Green from 2014. Get it now? Don, I hope your retirement years are enlightening and filled with inspiration. You have given me so much more than you could ever know. May all your paintings have girth. Sincerely, Nick Austin
“I remember my first painting class with Kottmann. He came in and said, if any of you want an art teacher you better leave now. I will not teach you art, what I will do is coach you. So if you don’t agree with that leave now or drop my class. He was so intimidating that first class but I loved his honesty and his passion. I stayed in that class and took many others over the years. Kottmann was instrumental in my growth as an artist. He was and still is the best coach I’ve ever had!” Susan Ross, Painting 1984
As a Painting Major, Don Kottmann was an important piece of the puzzle for my education at the Alberta College of Art in the 1980’s. The intensity of the six-hour studio classes, much of them painting from a live model, were filled with encouragement, counsel, caution, censure, and pragmatic idioms. He literally ‘kicked the bucket’ to punctuate the importance of ‘space’ within a painting. As a classmate reminded me, he warned of the dangers of ‘Lazy Brush’, that tendency to dip your brush from one colour to the next without cleaning it. This seemingly glib truism presented a much larger idea of stopping, looking, assessing, and deciding, before acting. The long, at times interminable, critiques could draw out invaluable and unique observations. A memorable one occurred when Don forced us to haul our paintings out of the painting studio to the Jubilee walkway. This relocation led a student to describe the ‘air’ of the various works, from frigid and still to a strong, warm, chinook breeze. No matter how the relationship is described, Coach/Player, Instructor/ Student, Mentor/Apprentice, the overriding canons of Don’s teaching were passion and generosity. Not an easy, uncultivated passion, but one borne out of hard work and critical interrogation. In giving his time he was fully attentive, critical, supportive and unapologetic. In sharing his journey and relentless explorations in painting he showed us the way to our own paths. Thank you, Don. Dale Vanden Berg, Painting, 1985.
The first day of 2nd year at ACAD - my first day as a painting major - I walk into Don Kottmann’s class. Little do I know I’m walking into a total immersion classroom. Within minutes I realize he talks a different language, one that’s totally foreign to me. A romance language involving a lot of passion and gesturing and hopping about. So I start taking phonetic notes, hoping I’ll be able to decipher the words later. Hard to take notes when you’re painting 1 minute, 2 minute, 5 minute paintings, faster than you can think, with Don on a roll. Everyone in the class is equally flummoxed, more so as weeks go by. Don asks me to share my notes, hoping it might slow the seething revolt. By the end of the term, I look at my notes and wonder what it was I didn’t understand. Total immersion in the language of art – it really works! The next year, I’m in the 3rd year painting studio when Don bursts in. “Meg, I need you in the classroom now!” Down I go, to find a sea of puzzled, annoyed faces of students who have no idea what Don is talking about. “Translate” he says. So as he teaches, I explain to the class what he’s actually saying. I bet by the end of their year they wonder what it was they didn’t understand too. Meg Van Rosendaal, Painting, 1989
“One of the best tips he ever gave me in painting class was to “beware of Lazy Brush” which I think of every time I pick one up. He was a great cheerleader and a very positive influence for so many generations of us.” Anne McKenzie, Painting 1984
Ret i r i ng Fa cu l t y School of V i s u a l A r t, D rawi n g Chris Cran Experimental. Traditional. Challenging. Tense. Discordant. Slippery. Humorous. Insatiable. Intellectual. Imaginative. Critical. Cultish. Down-to-earth. Charming. Funny. Godfather. Board member. Teacher. Mentor. Magnanimous. Supporter. Dad. Ridiculous Aesthetic. Isolating. Distortive. “Cheap trick.” Engaging. Optical. Illusory. Anonymous. “Mute apparatus.” Witty. Challenging. Coded. Seductive. Compelling. Vanishing. Representation. Abstraction. Vintage. Appropriated. Uncertain. Unstable. In-flux. International. Painter. Personal. Cultural. Perceptual. Cognitive. Illusory. Disarming. Inventive. Humourous. Influential. Notable. Mentor. Talent. Scout. Impresario. Ambassador. Booster. Insightful. Generous. Affable. Encouraging. Gregarious. Ubiquitous. Go-to guy. Charming. Engaging. Playful. Celebrity. Narcissist. Collaborator. Delightful. Prankster. Self-deprecating. Buffoon. Irrepressible. Jocular. Mischievous. Consummate. Skillful. Masterful. Craft. Exquisite. Painted. Confounding. Obstructive. Interfering. Disruptive. Mimetic. Masterful. Persona. Narration. Figurative. Lavish. Mesmerizing. Interplay. Wideranging. Complex. Intriguing. Private. Introspective. Serious. Public. Stunning. Inventive. Noble. Legacy. Jester. Gestural. Hard-edged. Geometric. Strident. Radiant. Colour. Twists. Turns. Engaging. Commendable. Enterprising. Greatest. Outstanding. Exemplary. Attentive. Daily. Painting. Routine.
Artist. Educator. Advocate. Picture-making. Polymath. Mimic. Transformative. Redirect. Dismantle. Unique. Inventive. Playful. Virtuoso. Historical. Aware. Skillful. Rendering. Irresistible. Meta-presentation. Penitent. Husband. Interrogator. Wife. Quotidian. Domestic. Artful. Appropriation. Humour. Self-reflexive. Good-natured. Inept. Funny. Final. Comfortable. Nonsensical. Nuclear. Wide-ranging. Possibilities. Pictorial. Genres. Unapologetic. Portrait. Screen. Stripes. Layers. Physiognomy. Seductive. Large. Brush. Abstractions. Sensuousness. Toggling. Delicious. Pleasurable. Noticeable. Perceptual. Committed. Confusing. Playful. Epistemological. Doubtful. Mute. Perceptual. Ambiguous. Devices. Interference. Focused. Meaningful.
Words appropriated or adapted from the following writings/reviews. Chris Cran: Sincerely Yours Josée DrouinBrisebois, Ryan Doherty, Nancy Tousley, William Wood and Bruce McCulloch National Gallery of Canada • Seriously Funny: Chris Cran at the National Gallery of Canada Canadian Art Rosie Prata August 25, 2016 • Chris Cran: Inherent Virtue Southern Alberta Art Gallery Sept 25 to November 22, 2015 • IN MY OPINION: Chris Cran love fest: Major Retrospective for Calgary artist Galleries West Magazine Jeffrey Spalding C.M., RCA August 19, 2015 • Taking the Polymath Test: Chris Cran and the Pleasures of Looking Border Crossings Magazine August 2015 Photo by Jeff Lennard, altered by Patti Dawkins
Ret i r i ng Fa cu l t y School of Craf t + E me rgin g Me d i a , Jewe l l e r y Charles Lewton-Brain Charles Lewton-Brain: Artist, goldsmith, innovator, educator, problem solver … alchemist Quiet this metal! Let the manes put off their terror, let them put off their aqueous bodies with fire. Let them assume the milk-white bodies of agate. Let them draw together the bones of the metal. Ezra Pound “The Alchemist: Chant for the Transmutation of Metal” (1912) Caveat: In writing this essay, I simply refuse to use the term retire – for we all know that artists like Charles are much too engaged to even consider such an abstract concept. He is merely “stepping away” from the College. Charles Lewton-Brain has been described as an artist, goldsmith, educator, and tireless innovator. Alongside an active studio practice and full teaching load, he has lectured and taught workshops internationally, created his own publishing company (1994), and co-founded the world’s largest educational internet site for the jewelry, gemology and the metals field – Ganoksin.com (1995). His craftsmanship has been recognized by his peers – an elected member of the Royal Canadian Academy, a distinguished Fellow of the Society of North American Goldsmiths (SNAG), a Fellow of the Gemmological Association
of Great Britain. In 2012 we all celebrated when he was awarded the prestigious Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts which spoke to his studio practice (from performanceoriented body art to fine jewellery), his role as an educator (at ACAD and worldwide), and his staunch belief in Canadian craft (and his work with the Canadian Crafts Federation and the Alberta Craft Council).1 In the past three decades Charles has witnessed many changes at ACAD – both good and bad – and his institutional memory will be sorely missed. He arrived just after the Alberta College of Art (ACA) achieved autonomy (1985) and saw the addition of “Design” to our title (1995). It is fitting that the final designation “University” (2018) will mark the year he steps away from the College. At ACAD we perhaps know him best as a friend and colleague, a passionate advocate for the Jewellery + Metals (J+M) department (he served as head for nineteen years), and an articulate voice of reason at those seemingly interminable committee meetings. One example of the depth of his commitment was his regular attendance at the decade of monthly meetings that led up to the creation of the MFA Craft Media. Charles’s work ethic is a daunting model for students (and colleagues for that matter) – it was developed in Pforzheim Germany where he trained 1 Should you be curious about these or his other achiev ments you might want to check out http://brainpress.com/LewtonBrain.html
Photo by Dwayne Norman
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of C raf t + E m erg i n g M e d i a , Jewe l l e r y Charles Lewton-Brain...cont’d to be a master goldsmith with Klaus Ullrich, himself a celebrated designer, master goldsmith, and master silversmith. Not surprisingly, what inspired him as a student continues to inform his practice and motivates his students. In his words, What Ullrich and his contemporaries did was say that an accidental effect could be controlled and in fact utilized in a design and compositional element. This was against all the traditions in the field in Europe and was possibly a reflection of Pollock and other painters who chose the marks of process as compositional elements. (…) This approach was a revelation for me; to listen to the material; to use the marks of working the material as conscious choices in design; to let nature show in the work.2 Charles is an inspiring teacher, his students have gone on to be recognized nationally and internationally as makers, as educators, as innovators, and as creative thinkers. A former undergraduate called him the “absolute Guru of metalsmithing” while another declared, “I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who knows so much about anything/everything.” He has served as a mentor for so many – and I include myself in that category – for without his intervention, it is unlikely that I would have been so involved with the J+M students, 2 Charles Lewton Brain. The Origins of Fold Forming. Brain Press, 2008
attending critiques, writing catalogue and exhibition essays, or teaching the History of Jewellery + Metals. This is a multifaceted individual. He is an artist, performer, innovator, educator, problem solver, and arguably an alchemist. Anyone who has watched Charles fold forming – the innovative process he introduced to the world – will attest to the latter identity. For there is no doubt when he sets to work that he has indeed mastered alchemy as described in “The Alchemist: Chant for the Transmutation of Metal” by Ezra Pound or defined by the OED as the “seemingly magical power of transmutation or extraction.” On fold forming, Alan Revere, the American goldsmith confirms that, “As amazing as it may seem, nobody ever worked with metal this way in the more-than10,000-year history of the craft.” Revere explains the magnitude of the process as, [A] series of techniques that allow rapid development of threedimensional surfaces and structures. The dynamic and fascinating shapes created through this system are unachievable by any other method. The technique can be used to create complex high-relief forms and to resemble chased, constructed and soldered forms. All are produced from single sheets of almost any metal in a matter of minutes.3 3 Alan Revere, Professional Jeweler Magazine, June 1998
In 2012, Robert Sirman, then director and CEO of the Canada Council for the Arts suggested that, “Artists are alchemists and [these] laureates are masters at transforming everyday experience into gold.” Just consider the implications, both figurative and literal, when one of those laureates was Charles! In his renowned Cage series, Charles Lewton-Brain (goldsmith and conceptual artist) sets out to question the genre. What is jewellery? From the concept to the finished product he relies on his skills as a craftsman and an innovator. Each work begins as a meticulously constructed framework of welded/fused stainless steel wire that is then electroformed, literally grown in a copper-acid bath, and finally dressed in heavy gold electroplating. Alchemy indeed. The irregularly shaped gold cages vary in size and scope. For his larger performative works it is the body of the wearer that is confined yet on display. And, while these cages might frame an ear or even a neck, one hesitates to label them earrings or necklaces. At the same time, in the more traditionally scaled works (necklaces, bracelets, brooches, rings) Lewton-Brain continues to challenge expectations; for instance, here we see him redefining the meaning of precious. The treasured stones that are being held captive in these gold cages are not what one expects to find in fine jewellery – for these are raw rubies, polished river rocks, and even frosted sea glass.
In my heart of hearts, I have always felt that ACAD needed Charles far more than he needed ACAD, and yet theirs has remained a remarkably strong relationship lasting for more than three decades. It seems incredible, given that I still feel like a recent arrival, but I have known Charles for half of his time at ACAD, and thus I feel somewhat justified in ending on a personal note. We will miss you, and while I support your decision, I find myself selfishly lamenting that surely your departure comes too soon, too early. I can only hope, that as you step away from ACAD you do not, in fact, stride. Au revoir Charles Jennifer E. Salahub
Pendant, stainless steel, electroformed copper, 24k gold, Kananaskis mountain river pebble
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of Vi s u a l A r t, D rawi n g Derek Besant Congratulations to Derek for his many years of teaching at ACA/ACAD. Many people that have gone through this institution have benefited in many ways by having Derek as an instructor. He was as passionately devoted to teaching as he is and has been to his entire artistic practice. I saw Derek’s work before I met him prior to my formal art education in the late 70’s - his Toronto mural, in the corporate setting, and at the Calgary/ Toronto gallery that represented him at that time, Mira Godard. I was drawn to Derek’s imagery, his imagination and his painting and drawing abilities. Seeing Besant’s work was significant; I was being inspired by what was around me, locally and throughout Canada, as I was preparing to get into Art College (ACA). Derek has been a friend, a teacher and colleague for the past 39 years. I am certainly not alone in stating this; fellow teaching colleagues, artists in the community and former students would say the same. In my education at ACA (now ACAD) Derek was one of many that were there for me as I bounced around exploring many, many media and disciplines. Above all there was a trust
I received along with strong technical information, life guidance and encouragement. I believe Derek saw that I was in this for the long haul and that it was just the way it was; that I was all over the map in my exploration and it was the necessary way to discover my creative directions. As a student and a teacher I had similar interests as Derek so he was definitely a model for me - drawing, anatomy, interdisciplinary studies. It was Derek and a few other faculty that made it possible for me to teach at ACAD, which I was very grateful for. The energy and discipline to his practice inspired me and fed me and many others as to what a practice could be and where you could take it. How to be an international, professional artist, based in Calgary, Alberta. Throughout the years following many of my exhibitions and activities I would get a follow up response from Derek in the form of an indepth, poetic, insightful letter or email. It always meant so much that someone would go out of their way to respond in this way. I am sure I am not the only one that received those responses. This says a lot about Derek’s commitment to his students, fellow faculty and colleagues in the art community.
Below, an excerpt from correspondence to MD by DB after visiting the exhibition “Traffic”:
“We stayed on a bit to try to see the works without as many people, so got a glimpse of how they “talk” to one another. Traffic. I always think of sound. And with your artwork I always link it to that performance you gave in the mall at College, with a layering of spontaneity and notes bumping up against one another, crowding, pushing, allowing, releasing… And the one small 3D piece beside the crate counter, therein lies the clue too, as far as how you are really
Drawing Anatomy class 2016 Fall Photo by Derek Besant
interested in objects, shapes, form, surface. The patinas across many of the TRAFFIC pieces, echo how pigment on a brush might drag across plywood, concrete, metal or cardboard… like noise like a car crash like washing windows like cleaning up oil like sandpaper on aluminum siding like chopping blocks when the lights go out... like the grey cut-out forms of that small work, are compacted into a kind of picture plane, but threaten to be objects.” Mark Dicey, March 2018
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of C r i ti ca l + C re at i ve S t u d i e s Mireille Perron Mireille Perron: Une Belle Ratoureuse Amy Gogarty How can you describe a colleague who appears in your life like a coup de foudre, a flash of lightning, and who alters the course of your subsequent life and career? That is exactly how Mireille Perron appeared in my life. We both started at ACAD on the same day in September, 1990. It was my first real teaching job, and I was a nervous neophyte. Suddenly, the other “new” teacher, Mireille, appeared—we looked at each other, gawking at the identical haircuts, identical (obligatory) black tights, black skirts, black brief cases and said, “Oh no, my clone!!” In my case, it was “I wish!!!” While I struggled in a new job, Mireille was an experienced teacher, a model of organization with a raft of fabulous tricks up her sleeve. She had endless ways to challenge, engage and inspire her students, and, lucky for me, she was happy to share. If only I could have imitated her beautiful Québécois accent, her performative style, I, too, would have had students eating out of my hand! In her first class, she would teach students how to say her name: “Me-Ray.” I could always tell who had skipped the first class when they came up and asked me if I were Mirrell. If only! It didn’t take long for students to tell us apart, but as we both started off teaching enormous first-year history classes, we had much in common. And when she moved with her partner, Bill Rodgers, to a renovated déppaneur a few blocks from my house, our comradeship was cemented.
I remember something she often performed to get students interested in theory: “I say “I am a theorist,” but, with my accent, people think I am saying “I am a terrorist!” Only Mireille could juxtapose such radically different ideas to make sense, to make us think about how theory can and does explode our conventional ways of thinking. Mireille promoted the theory classes at ACAD—her passion for and understanding of abstract ideas, her ability to bring them to life with concrete examples, and her numerous innovative assignments made theory real for students. Many returned from their first terms at grad school to tell us how well prepared they felt after our classes for dealing with advanced ideas, and that was its own reward. Mireille always wrote generously about colleagues’ work. Her essays were models of playful, original thinking and creative structure. She extended this generosity to students as well, often writing as critically and thoughtfully about their work as about professional artists. Engaging her students in visual art projects as participants, not simply assistants, was an important part of her pedagogy and process. Her art projects often contained pedagogical elements along with humour and surprise. Who but
Mireille making lids for Medalta Census Project during residency, with master jiggerman, Basil Leismeister, Medicine Hat, 2006
Ret i r i n g Fa cu l t y S ch ool of C r i ti ca l + C re at i ve S t u d i e s Mireille Perron...cont’d Mireille could send strings of letters down rivers in the former Yugoslavia (Anecdotal Waters or the Drifting Nomads, with Paul Woodrow, 1992), include hand-knitted bathing suits as a tribute to her mother in an installation (The Beautiful Pranksters/Les Belles Ratoureuses, Nickle Arts Museum, 2000), or make and distribute crock pots as a social project to document civic pride in owning Medalta ceramics (Medalta Census Project, Medicine Hat, 2006)? She was able to deploy any new technique she encountered as long as it furthered the purpose of her work. Mireille was integral to ACAD’s commitment to craft history, theory and practice, making it central to the college’s curriculum. Early in the new century, Mireille, Ruth Chambers, who taught at the University of Regina, and I lamented the lack of quality writing about ceramics, a field Mireille had mastered as a young artist, and one that continued to shape her thinking. The three of us worked for over five years collecting essays and projects that exemplified the idea of ceramics as a form of social practice. Utopic Impulses: Contemporary Ceramics Practice was published in 2007 by Ronsdale Press in Vancouver. The book was quite successful and celebrated the diversity and richness of (mostly) Canadian ceramic talent. It has appeared in a number of university curricula, and I continue to recommend it to anyone interested in ceramics today.
Not everyone realizes that this brainy, amazing woman is also a fabulous athlete. For many years, she was part of an all-woman hiking team that would challenge significant mountain peaks every summer. I never went on any of these hikes, but the stories are legion. Invariably, participants would report that Mireille was always at the front of the pack attacking the mountain with seemingly boundless energy. She is also a terrific swimmer, who swims several times a week whenever possible. And a gardener—her garden is tiny but perfectly formed, as she has mastered the nearly impossible task of forcing the short Alberta summers to produce vibrant flowers, vegetables and other horticultural treats. I retired to Vancouver in 2006, so I have not been there to witness Mireille’s more recent triumphs. A poster advertising her Laboratory of Feminist Pataphysics (LFP) graces my studio wall. In it, a cartoon version of Mireille, dressed in a lab coat, sits at a desk with paint brush and paper. She is a muse who inspires me daily with her energy and off-beat humour. Fortunately, her retirement means yet another adventure for me, as we are currently scheming to spend a month residency together at Medalta International Artist Residency in Medicine Hat. No one needs worry about losing her for long—her release from a regimen of marking and meetings will lead to yet more exciting and innovative projects, which will surely keep Calgary watching!
Mireille with her installation at Stride Gallery. LFP Presents Ateliers of the Near Future, 2010 Photo by Amy Gogarty
Mireille Perron Labratory of Pataphysics Lab Coat (Front), 2018 Photo by Patti Dawkins
Mireille Perron Labratory of Pataphysics Lab Coat (Back), 2018 Photo by Patti Dawkins
S es s i on a l Fa cu l t y S ch ool of C r i ti ca l + C re at i ve S t u d i e s Derek Be a u l i eu
20 years of housepress / no press derek beaulieu On October 26, 2017 I was invited to guest lecture at Simon Fraser University’s WAC Bennett Special Collections Library. That facility collects my papers and archives – and celebrated the fact that I have spent the last 2 decades dedicated to the production and distribution of small press editions of poetry, prose, criticism and visual art. In addition to my hour-long lecture and Q&A, Special Collections staged an exhibition of 20 volumes from the presses’ history, one per year. Through those two imprints I have published 636 different editions since 1997, so clearly the exhibition was highly selective, but it presents a single edition from each year; a map of what Canadian poet referred to as “an apprenticeship to language.”
housepress / no press at 20: a talk by Calgary poet & publisher Derek Beaulieu In Special Collections, Bennett Library - Thursday, October 26, 2017
Co-presented by Bennett Library and SFU English
Calgary-based author of nine books of poetry, five volumes of conceptual fiction, two collections of criticism and over 175 chapbooks, Derek Beaulieu has been praised for having produced some of the most radical and challenging work in contemporary Canadian writing. He has also been active for two decades as a literary publisher with his acclaimed micro-press housepress (1997-2004) and its successor, no press (2005-present), as well as other publishing projects. His talk will focus on this aspect of his literary work - the poet as publisher. Both Derek Beaulieu’s personal archive and that of housepress are housed in the Contemporary Literature Collection in Bennett Library’s Special Collections & Rare Books.
Derek Beaulieu will be speaking in Special Collections & Rare Books on Thursday, October 26th, 2017 from 12:30 - 1:30 pm. Special Collections is located in room 7100 on the 7th floor of the W.A.C. Bennett Library, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby. Free! Refreshments will be served.
(Note: Derek Beaulieu will also appear at 7:00 pm on October 26th as part of a panel discussing the Concrete/Visual, to be held at Publication Studio/Selectors’ Records, 8 E. Pender St., Vancouver. Other panelists include Judith Copithorne (visual/concrete poet), Jamie Hilder (artist/critic of concrete), Kathy Slade (visual/text-based artist), and Shyla Seller (SFU Library archivist who worked on Derek’s fonds). Moderator: Clint Burnham.)
For more information contact Tony Power 778-782-6676 or power@sfu.ca www.lib.sfu.ca/special-collections
Fa c ul t y S ch ool of C r i ti ca l a n d C re at i ve S t u d i e s John Calvelli The Design of Temporality John Calvelli Although it is customary to think of time as passing, one moment after another and leading to “future,” temporality is a much more complex phenomenon than that, and is designed from the standpoint of human history. This document will attempt to articulate some ways in which temporality has been used within a Euro-American culture framework, and propose a model for how to conceive of temporality today. ?
15 MYA SCIENTIFIC TIME: TIME BEGINS 15 MYA AT THE BIRTH OF UNIVERSE. THERE IS AN END OF THE UNIVERSE, AT AN UNDETERMINED TIME.
Our customary notion of time follows the scientific conception, that it began with the birth of the universe and it will end in the vastly distant future, with the universe’s demise. 2.4 MYA HUMAN TIME: TIME BEGINS 2.4 MYA WITH THE CREATION OF THE FIRST TOOL. THE FUTURE IS OPEN.
We customarily call “human” the tool-using animal. We are a primate in the family of hominids, directly descended from Australopithecus africanus, which followed the apes.The first tool-using animal was Homo habilis, referring to the first species, habilis, of the genus Homo, who appeared around 2.4 million years ago. Tools belonging to Homo sapiens are first found around 300,000 years ago. Although humans have wrought havoc with each other and the world, we generally have considered our future to be an open one. Only with the introduction of atomic weapons in 1945 and the strain of the Cold War did we first consider it possible for human future to end, in “mutually assured destruction,” or M.A.D.
The Design of Temporality
John Calvelli
The economic historian Robert Heilbroner, in his book Visions of the Future, divides history into four periods: the distant past, yesterday, today, tomorrow. (6) However, he also divides the period of the distant past into the archaic past of hunter-gatherers, and the past that begins with the birth of civilization in Mesopotamia. It looks something like this: DISTANT PAST (PREHISTORY)
DISTANT PAST (HISTORICAL)
YESTERDAY TODAY
HEILBRONER’S TIME: HUMAN HISTORY IS SEPARATED INTO 3 MAJOR PERIODS, YESTERDAY BEGINS 250 YEARS AGO
The distant past is separated into the archaic period of hunter-gatherers (represented by the dotted line on the far left, with the arrow extending back towards prehistory), and the period beginning with the onset of civilization (represented by the long and thin solid line). The smaller thicker solid line represents, in proportion, the period of “yesterday” beginning 250 years ago with the industrial revolution. With the dotted line on the far right begins today, leading to the future. Heilbroner’s hypothesis is that, from prehistory until the Industrial Revolution, humans did not have a vision of the future. Time was characterized as cyclical, with little or no sense of progressive change leading to a future. The Industrial Revolution changes this conception of temporality in a dramatic way. The future begins to be conceptualized as potentially better than the past. Archaic time is cyclical. Our temporality was for millennia shaped by the cycles of day and night, the passage of seasons, and the passing of generations. The Greeks call this teleological time: the end is present in the beginning in a cyclic repetition. This changes with the advent of Christianity and its salvation-based temporality. Time is measured beginning with the birth of a presumed messiah, Jesus Christ, and leads purposely and progressively toward an end, his presumed Second Coming and the Day of Judgement. The influence of this religious temporality, originating in the Mideast and migrating to Europe, interacts with global historical forces over the next two millennia. For most of us today, we live in a time Page 2 ! of !6
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which simply passes, and in passing, goes forward. However, it has been shaped in specific ways which have produced and will continue to produce specific kinds of effects. 2000 CE
1 CE
45 19 0 0 19
75 17
50 16
50 15
6 47
PROGRESSIVE TIME: HOW TIME BECAME NEW
In 476, following the Fall of Rome, the Latin term modernus, “of today,” began to be commonly used to refer to the post-Empire period. Although there were changes of various sorts (technologies, plagues, the incremental growth of markets) there was little compulsion to move time forward in a march of progress. It took until the Renaissance and the Reformation for a sense of a “new time” to begin, marked off from what went before. It was Vasari who first coins the term rinascita, Italian for “renaissance” in his Lives of the Artists of 1550. The term “Middle Ages” then emerges, referring to the period between the recent era and the “Antiquity” of the Greeks and Romans. (Osborne 9) The German term neue Zeit emerges around the Enlightenment period beginning around 1650 in order to distinguish it from the previous eras of the Renaissance and Reformation. Eventually, it begins to take on connotations of an age that is not only different from, but better than what went before. Neue Zeit changes into the compound word Neuezeit, to suggest not only a time which is better than previous eras, but one that is irreversible. (10) After another century, the emerging acceleration of the Industrial Revolution, which begins with an industrial-capable steam engine introduced in 1765, is almost directly followed by the 1789 French Revolution, with a new term entering the vocabulary: Neueste Zeit, a “newest” time that doesn’t even need to be dependent on a past. (11) In the decades just prior and following the turn of the 20th century we enter modernity proper—or in French, modernité—and with it the birth of modern art and the avant-garde. In German, it is referred to as neueste Zeiten, the newest time. The
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John Calvelli
apotheosis of the Modern era follows the Second World War, and what is left is to be of the “just now” and what comes after, the then. (12-13)
NOW The Past
The Future NOW TIME: A LIMITED PAST AND A SEEMINGLY OPEN FUTURE
Today we find an eviscerated time, a protuberous “now” wedged between a barely existent past and a seemingly open future. If we take a closer look, however, it is not the future we see ahead but, instead, a highly restricted future place right in front of us made up of closely spaced “just nows” or even “and thens” with little relation to either the past or the future.
THE TIME OF NOWS
In avant-garde temporality, we seek to be contemporary, of the “now.” In order to best assure this, it is best to be ahead of one's time—not so far ahead that we are not of our time, but far enough ahead that we are in the position of bring the future to the present. To do so, we must be supremely conscious of the just past; by doing so we can gauge more accurately what should be the new now, the now emerging from the future. At first (as we see in early modernism) a small step could create a great commotion. As the modern became institutionalized, much larger steps had increasingly less effect; alternatively, smaller or less significant steps seemed greater than before, but only for a time… With the emphasis on future creation, the past became eviscerated. We saw this happen in what became known as postmodernism, when the past became pastiche. At the same time, the future came under threat.
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The Design of Temporality
John Calvelli
In the early 21st century the reports published by the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) started to become increasingly dire. (Field, et al.) Environmental degradation was no longer simply an aesthetic or a health issue, but one that, through human-caused catastrophic climate change, could increasingly put the human species at threat of extinction. The future, infinite, open and sovereign for over a century, became a relative notion. Depending on how the diverse and often divisive countries and corporations of the world acted, we could have more or less future. Following our two phases of the Distant Past and our industrial Yesterday, we were left with what, in his 1995 book, Robert Heilbroner called Today. Today requires a new kind of temporality. It won’t be served with an ongoing series of nows, even if those nows project themselves toward a distant future of life on Mars. We need a temporality whose future is commensurate with a past. If what we now work with is this:
The Past
The Future
What we need to design for ourselves is an expanded temporality, like this:
The Past
The Future
William Faulkner once wrote: “The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past.” (Faulkner 1942) In fact, it is the only thing that will assist us in building a future that can be sustained.
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Works Cited Faulkner, William. Go Down, Moses, and Other Stories. The Modern Library, 1942. Field, et al., Christopher B., et al. IPCC, 2014: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. 2014. Hawking, Stephen. “The Beginning of Time.� Stephen Hawking, http:// www.hawking.org.uk/the-beginning-of-time. Accessed 1 Feb. 2018. Heilbroner, Robert L. Visions of the Future: The Distant Past, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow. Oxford University Press, 1995. Osborne, Peter. The Politics of Time: Modernity and the Avant-Garde. Verso, 2011.
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Goodbye Shelley Ouellet! Good Luck! Send us a postcard of your Montreal adventures! You will be missed.