We’re not done with McLuhan yet: The Paris Review recently posted this interview with Douglas Coupland about his new biography of Marshall McLuhan. Latitude 53 fans will of course remember that Mr. Coupland participated in the National Portrait Gallery last summer.
You used an unconventional form for your biography of Marshall McLuhan such as MapQuest, an autism assessment test, use of Wikipedia as a source.
I did.
Was this innovative method a deliberate reference to McLuhan’s own idiosyncrasies? Or is it the reflection of a personal quirk?
Since starting the project I’ve felt like an unwitting manifestation of McLuhan’s beliefs about the effects of media: born 1961, TV child, Photoshop user, and so on. Having said that, I think I started the book at the crisis point in the history of biographies, and it’s a happy coincidence it happened to be Marshall.
theparisreview:
Douglas Coupland on Marshall McLuhan
One of the popular favourites from the National Portrait Gallery show this summer was Trevor Anderson’s short film “Absent Friends”, a darkly funny tribute to an Edmonton landmark and those who have jumped from it.
If you missed out on the show—or even if you saw it—you’ll be happy to know that Trevor is premiering “The High Level Bridge”—a new, expanded look at the same material—to the Toronto International Film Festival for the Short Cuts Canada program. It will also be screening later back at home at the Edmonton International Film Festival for all you local fans. Read more at dirtcityfilms.com
Janice Ryan has given the National Portrait Gallery the full treatment in today’s Edmonton Journal:
The exhibition is intelligent, witty and delightfully cheeky, offering ideas, perceptions, memories and experiences that are easy to access.
“This show brings it back to the people,” says Todd Janes, executive director of Latitude 53. “These portraits are not about politicians and chief justices. It looks at how the composition of Canada is changing … who our heroes are. It reignites a discussion about how we define ourselves.”
Read the article and make sure you see the show before it comes down—we’ll have it until next Saturday, July 17.
Along with Elizabeth Withey’s enthusiasm for Trevor Anderson’s video in the Edmonton Journal, a few other publications have pointed to the National Portrait Gallery as a highlight in the broad program of The Works. [SEE Magazine’s Mrs. Abraxas writes]: “Latitude 53 has the masterfully curated “National Portrait Gallery,” bringing together an eclectic brood of artists to explore ironic and iconic Pan-Canadian subjects.” And over on the Akimbo.ca Akimblog, Edmonton’s Amy Fung has this to say:
“Featuring artists ranging from local organizers Kristy Trinier, Fish Griwkowsky, Norm Omar, et al, to regional and national names like Terence Houle, Josh Holinaty, Kirsten McCrea, Jonathan Kaiser, and even writer Douglas Coupland, the exhibition is an exercise in standardizing a DIY initiative, and it looks to travel across the country picking up more contemporary portraiture along the way.”
Make sure you get a chance to see the show. After it comes down after July 17, we’ll be plowing into some exciting new summer programming, starting with the return of our famous summer event, Draw, this year bigger than ever. But you’ll hear more about that soon!
This weekend, the Edmonton Journal’s Elizabeth Withey wrote on some of her favourite pieces in The Works Art & Design Festival this year. What’s her top pick?
Perhaps my favourite piece of art at The Works is Trevor Anderson’s video, Absent Friends, at Latitude 53 Gallery on 106th Street (Site #21). Part of the cheekily titled The National Portrait Gallery, an excellent group show curated by Fish Griwkowsky, the video has a sarcastic tone and serious message that were totally up my alley. “This is the High Level Bridge,” a monotone, drippingly deadpan voice says at the start of the video. “It’s where people who live in Edmonton come when we’re finally ready to kill ourselves.” Provocative and succinct, the video uses humour to address the fact this architectural centrepiece is emblematic of suicide in Edmonton. “Everyone around here knows at least a couple of people who’ve jumped,” the narrator states. Given The Works’ tribute show in Churchill Square to arts writer Gilbert Bouchard, who took his own life in 2009 (his body was found in the North Saskatchewan River weeks after he disappeared), I’d call Absent Friends a well-timed, much-needed and refreshing comment on an issue that’s far too taboo. Thanks, Trevor.
The festival is over this Wednesday, but we’ll have the National Portrait Gallery, including Trevor’s fantastic video, for another week, until July 17th. Make sure you catch it before it’s too late!
Vue’s David Berry also wrote about the National Portrait Gallery in this week’s paper. He spoke to some of the show’s central characters:
As co-curator/artist Norman Omar put it in a brief talk not long before the show’s official opening last Friday, “Though its roots may have been in a reaction to what was going on the portrait gallery, we quickly realized there was something much bigger that we could do.” And it’s the fact that the group at the heart of this show (which, besides Omar, includes artists Fish Griwkowsky, Sean Borchert and Dara Huminiski, arts administrator Leanne Olson and public art director Kristi Trinier) recognized that and exploited it that not only elevates it beyond a simple but clever reaction—similar, say, to the way Make it Not Suck decorated the construction sites fine but suffered in a gallery space—but works as a statement that a certain cohort of Edmonton artists are finally coming into their own.
Highlights from the National Portrait Gallery opening reception. Photos by Fish Griwkowsky.
This was our first event of the summer proper—consider it a preview of the Patio season to come.
The official Portrait of Gallery does not show me. It does not show me anyone I know. Fortunately, there is this ulterior exhibition of a Portrait Gallery project as organized by a humble group of Edmonton-based artists collectively legitimizing the voice of a Canadian art culture. Appropriately enough the intention may have brewed from rejection, exclusion, and a burning desire to stake a claim, as naturally the misfits of society have convened here in one way shape or form. In its first reincarnation, The National Portrait Gallery project features Canadian artists exploring who we are, who we think we are, our communities comprised of friends, strangers, and icons in states of real and imaginary being. As a growing collection of works that will hopefully tour across this country and beyond, this National Portrait Gallery does show me individuals I know, and in so doing prompts the necessary myth making and subsequent archiving of stories and identities that will carry this country along.
Read Amy Fung’s monograph essay on the National Portrait Gallery over at Prairie Artsters—or come by the gallery for a visit and pick it up in a booklet with another essay by Todd Babiak and a comic by Mike Winters.
Among the nominees is Winnipeg’s Daniel Barrow. You can see one of his drawings right now in the National Portrait Gallery at Latitude 53.
Latitude 53 Video Podcast
Artist-curators Norman Omar and Sean Borchert talk to us about the National Portrait Gallery, June 11–July 17 at Latitude 53. They discuss how they got involved in the project and shed a little light on the work they’ve been preparing for the show. (Watch or download from Vimeo – See previous videos with Fish Griwkowsky or Kristy Trinier & Dara Humniski)
Come check out the show at the Opening Reception, tonight at 7!
