Calls for Submission

These two calls for submission came up in my email over the past month or so. Both themes are really provocative, and I intend on submitting work to both shows. I've reprinted both calls, in case anyone else might be interested..

Call For Submissions: Insomnia at the Red Head Gallery

DEADLINE: Postmarked September 8, 2006 ($20 application fee)

LATE DEADLINE: September 15, 2006 ($30 application fee)

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION:

Insomnia at the Red Head Gallery seeks work which explores sleeplessness as a physical, cultural, political or psychological state. Emphasis will be placed on the ephemeral, the multiple and the obsessive. All media will be considered but please keep in mind that we do not have equipment for video, audio or electronics and artists will need to make the necessary arrangements.

EXHIBITION DATES: September 27-October 7, 2006

Insomnia at the Red Head Gallery is part of Nuit Blanche Toronto, September 30 to sunrise on Sunday, October 1. Encounter the city in a unique way and explore Toronto through public art commissions, all-night exhibitions, live performances and creative programs featured throughout the city. This cultural rendezvous opens the doors to hundreds of museums, galleries, institutions and unusual spaces each featuring free art programs all night long. Visit http://livewithculture.ca for more details on Nuit Blanche Toronto.

ENTRY FEE: The entry fee is for Insomnia is $20 (Canadian) for a maximum of two entries per artist. The late deadline entry fee is $30. This fee is non-refundable and must be mailed with the entry. Cheques or money orders should be made payable to: The Red Head Gallery.

Submissions:

1. Send up to two (2) works in any media to the Red Head Gallery by September 8, 2006 (postmarked) with $20 (Canadian), cheque or money order.
2. Include a short biography and artist statement.

3. Include a price list if applicable: the gallery will take a 50% commission on all sales.

4. We do not have the resources for electronic or other media works. Work must be sent ready to install with any necessary equipment.

Works should be sent directly to the gallery. Artists in the Greater Toronto area should pick up their unsold work by no later than November 1, 2006. Artists from outside the Toronto area should include return postage. After November 1, 2006 the Red Head Gallery cannot be held responsible for unclaimed works.

If you would like your work returned, please include a self-addressed package with sufficient return postage. Works must include return packaging and proper postage. The Red Head Gallery is not responsible for lost or damaged material.

Founded in 1991, the Red Head Gallery is one of Canada's most respected artist co-operatives, showcasing a broad range of contemporary visual art by emerging and established artists.

Contact: Mark Schilling, Director

The Red Head Gallery
401 Richmond St. W, Suite 115
Toronto, ON M5V 3A8

416.504.5654 | art@redheadgallery.org

For information on the Red Head Gallery, please visit:

http://www.redheadgallery.org

Call for Submissions: Do Hands Make us Human

Hang Man Gallery

Hands are expressive of many things... Hands can be beautiful or ugly, smooth, rough, wrinkled, gentle, powerful, weak, helpful, hurtful, strong, playful, blunt, seductive and creative. And ultimately our hands make us human. For artists, hands can define both who we are and what we do in our work.

The Hang Man Gallery is calling all artists to consider your hands, the hands of your friends and family and those of strangers. Are they beautiful or ugly? What do they say about a person? How do people who work with their hands feel about them, and is that different from those who don't work with their hands? What do they say about our potential for kindness and cruelty, playfulness or seriousness? How important is touch? How have hands been portrayed historically in art? As an artist, what do your hands mean to you? How do they allow you to connect with the world around you?

We are asking artists to go beyond a straightforward representation of hands to answer some/any of these questions and express your point of view through painting, drawing, photography, mixed media, sculpture - whatever is the best medium for you.

SHOW DATES: September 26th - October 15th

FEE: $30 with a maximum of 3 pieces.

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS:

Please drop off your finished work(s), ready for display, on Tuesday, September 5th or Wednesday, September 6th at the Hang Man Gallery (756 Queen St. E near Broadview) anytime between 11am and 5pm. The programming committee will contact artists by September 13th with its decisions.

Additionally, please include the following with your submission:

- Short statement of how the work relates to the theme (maximum 100 words)

- Bio / CV

- Contact information

For more information please call the gallery: 416-465-0302, or contact James MacLean (jmaclean1@rogers.com) or Robyn Drage (info@robyndrage.com), or visit our website:www.artistsnetworkofriverdale.org/hangman/

The Hang Man Gallery is the gallery face of the Artists' Network of Riverdale, a non-profit incorporation that strives to help professional artists become more self-sustaining through their art. As well, we aim to educate and grow enthusiastic art collectors. Lastly, it is our goal to establish South Riverdale as an arts destination.

Next Show: Square Foot 2006

From Russia with Love

Here are a few newer drawings from the From Russia with Love series I've been working on for the past few months. I have completed 30 drawings so far, and will need to have 72 finished
to fill the storefront space I'll be exhibiting them in.

Each portrait is of a Russian "Mail Order Bride," as drawn from internet websites- two in particular which deal in "matchmaking" American and European men with predominately Russian and Asian women. I started this project after I saw a startling fashion feature in, of all places, Vice Magazine, featuring "Mail Order Brides" modelling their own clothing. Accompanying each photo was a short interview with each girl about what their professions and what they do for fun, etc. The common denominator between these girls, all but one in their early twenties, was their utter FIXATION on finding a man to marry. Their tone, in some cases, was rather shocking...as one girl put it, "Russian women know how to sacrifice and how to serve..." or something along those lines. As women, we can all understand this to some degree...but any contemporary western woman would find the frankness of such a STEPFORD-ian statement unsettling.

Speaking of which, as I drew my first portrait of this series (not knowing where I was really going with the idea), I was reminded of that infamous scene in the Stepford Wives when Katharine Ross' portrait was drawn by an "artist" in Stepford's Men's Club- all the while not knowing that it was a part of a study to build her subservient human-robot replacement. It was funny how unconciously, my drawing style and composition seemed to mimic the dreamy, yet subtly malevolent quality of a lot of illustration from the early 1970's..and more specifically the drawing of Katharine Ross in that film.

Previous work of mine has involved the serial portrait- yearbook portraits and soldiers portraits in WWII-era printed matter in particular. One way to look at portraits of this nature is that they are almost like human catalogues. The concept of the "human catologue" certainly rings true in the case of websites cataloguing foreign women as a hot commodity for men from more affluent countries. By drawing these portraits, I am attempting to subvert the idea of these women as being a part of a human catalogue, while returning to the idea of their commodification through their presentation within the context of a storefront installation and a bookwork "catalogue" multiple.

Affordable White Wash work for sale

Well, the White Wash show has been taken down, and is now over and done with. Millions of thank-yous go out to Rob, Bre, Giselle, and Dave of Bobbyfive for their generous help with the show...not to mention their kindness and enthusiasm. I look very forward to showing again at Bobbyfive, in their Holiday Show in December.

There are two multiples in particular from the show that I still have plenty of for sale, which are really quite neat and VERY affordable. The first is the White Wash pin set/multiple (pictured, bottom), which includes a White Wash mailer (each multiple's mailer has the image of a different US WWII Airman featured as a part of my installation piece Formation) and two UNCLEAN/IMPERFECT pins. These can be bought through me for $5 each. Secondly, I am selling sets of hand-carved UNCLEAN/IMPERFECT soap (pictured, top). Sets of two can be bought for $25 each. Orders and inquiries can be directed to me via email at cleanteen@hotmail.com.