Archive of Craig Scott Gallery News, 2006-2008

For news updates, Craig Scott Gallery has moved, as of January 2009, to a private email-newsletter to all clients and persons who have subscribed to the newsletter. To receive such news by email, please click on SUBSCRIBE on the above menu bar. All that is required is your name and email, and clicking one box on your category of interest in the gallery...[read more]

Above are two recently produced works. To the left is Raymond Water’s “Terminator Seed US.Pat. 5723765 March.3, 1998” (Oil / BlackBoard paint with oil stick on canvas under Plexiglas) and to the right is Christian McLeod’s “Surfacing under a bourgeois spider II” At the end of July the gallery created a parallel website to archive various pieces of news and information...[read more]

Public Art, a leading art magazine in South Korea, has just come out with its May 2008 issue on the theme of SURREALISM and Maleonn is one of seven artists who are the focus of a 10-page editorial feature text-and-images essay “Magic Realism” on the global art scene: “Magic Realism,”, Public Art (South Korea), Issue 20 (May 2008), pp 56-65. Alongside three reproduced images of Maleonn’s work are five images of Michael Parkes, two images by Vladimir Kush, two images by George Tooker, one image each by Patricia van Lubeck and Peter Blume, and four images by hyperrealist Canadian artist Alex Colville. Although we prefer the terms fantastical or fabulist to describe much of Maleonn’s body of work (as indeed noted by the Public Art editorial with its article byline, “Looking for fantasy in daily life, feeling the marvelous in reality…the world of ‘magic realism’”), Maleonn’s work is also most definitely connected to the “surreal” art tradition...[read more]

Craig Scott Gallery presents a body of new work by Copenhagen-based Quebecoise sculptor, Julie Tremblay. Opening on Thursday, May 8, 6-9 PM (all welcome), "Reflections" consists of ten life-size and near-life-size figures that are hand-sculpted (in the manner of clay sculpting) from cast-off industrial sheet metal specially sourced by Tremblay in Denmark. As a collective, the sculptures form an installation, with some pieces floating below the ceiling, some suspended from walls and some free-standing on the floor...[read more]

A special portfolio of images of Jorge Martínez García’s intaglio prints is being published in the forthcoming issue (no 140: Vol 39, No 1, Spring 2008) of DESCANT, one of Canada’s leading literary and arts journals. The visual article is entitled “Interpreting Lowry” and includes a selection of works exhibited at Craig Scott Gallery in Martínez’ exhibition “Under the Volcano and Other Works: Interpreting the Writings of Malcolm Lowry.” Above to the left is the work “Espiritus del Mezcal (Spirit of Mezcal)” and, to the right, “Bajo el Volcan (Under the Volcano).”...[read more]

Peter Goddard makes Bikkers show his Critic’s Pick On April 9, Toronto Star Visual Arts Critic, Peter Goddard, selected Rudolf Bikkers’ MORPHOGENETIC FIELDS exhibition (opened April 10, running until May 4) as one of his two Critic’s Picks for the week: It's not outer space but inner space that's the great unknown worth exploring these days. Just look at the imagery in Rudolf Bikkers's show, "Morphogenetic Fields." Internationally known as a printmaker, and remembered by generations of young artists who take his classes at the Ontario College of Art & Design, Bikkers is now showing off his chops as a painter. In his fantastical floating worlds, cell-shaped ovoids recall space ships and gelatinous-looking colour plains suggest volatile solutions contained in a test tube...[read more]

“An artist of great graphic skill.” David Balzer, Toronto Life, March 2008. “Waters’s psychological complexity wouldn’t be possible without an almost faultless technique.” David Jager, Now Magazine, March 13, 2008. Critical accolades have been coming, fast and furious, for Scott Waters’ Time Heals All Wounds exhibition at Craig Scott Gallery. Starting with an advance notice by David Balzer in the March issue of Toronto Life magazine , highly positive reviews then followed, first in in the March 13 issue of Now Magazine by David Jager and then a second review by Balzer appearing in the March 20 issue of Eye Weekly . The March 22 issue of the National Post has another review, by Leah Sandals (in which the painting “3-D Terrain Map” is reproduced following the reproductions of the paintings “He Was a Real Dick” in Now Magazine and “That to Which I Committed Myself Wholeheartedly” in Eye Weekly). On March 17, Jian Ghomeshi interviewed Waters on CBC Radio’s show, Q. The Ghomeshi-Waters interview can be listened to online here. The works in the Time Heals All Wounds exhibition can be viewed here. ...[read more]

Raymond Waters’ VALUES exhibition at Craig Scott Gallery has been selected for the cover and the accompanying feature story of the February ’08 issue of MAG/Mass Art Guide. An essay by Monika Burman accompanies images of Martin Luther King, Jr., From Montgomery to Memphis (1972) 16mm (see image above to the right). A detail shot of King Kong (1933) 16mm (see image above to the right) graces the MAG cover while the full (5.5 feet x 8 feet) King Kong occupies a two-page spread...[read more]

In 2007, Maleonn continued with major solo shows, including "Labyrinth" at Craig Scott Gallery in May (a Feature Exhibition of the 2007 CONTACT Photography Festival) and "Cicada" at Shanghai's Zendai MOMA in March 2007. His inclusion in major group shows continues as well, including an ongoing exhibition in Shanghai and an upcoming exhibition in London in early 2008. Maleonn showcased at epSITE new venue opening in Shanghai From October 18 to November 27, 2007, four of the five works in Maleonn's Midsummer Night's Dream series were selected for pride of place display within a major group exhibition -- "Rising Prospects and Flying Blessings" -- in Shanghai at the newly opened EPSON Imaging Gallery (epSITE), which has moved from elsewhere in Shanghai to Shanghai's 50 Moganshan Road art gallery complex (M50). Curated by one of the most respected art scholars in China, Gu Zheng of Fudan University, Midsummer Night's Dream No 1 (image at upper left) graced the covers of the show's literature as the sole highlighted work. Maleonn selected for Victoria & Albert Museum Exhibition Four of Maleonn’s works from his “Days on the Cotton Candy” series have been curated into an exhibition at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, to take place from March to July 2008. Chinese Story Series Achieves Critical Acclaim Other significant group shows for Maleonn in the past year have included selections of works from his Chinese Story series...[read more]

One of the most exciting emerging artists of Asia, Thailand's Uttaporn Nimmalaikaew, will be having his second show in North America after his inaugural solo show at Craig Scott Gallery in Toronto ("Introducing Uttaporn Nimmalaikaew", Feb. 10 - March 4, 2007). Lowe Gallery in Los Angeles (Santa Monica) opens with Nimmalaikaew's new show, "The Painted Veil," on October 19, 2007...[read more]

The August 2007 issue of Muskoka Magazine has a feature article on Craig Scott Gallery artist, Ron Eady. Above are two encaustic 48" x 48" works in Eady's signature style, "Sanctuary" (left) and "Traveller No 1" (right), currently available to view at the gallery. ...[read more]

Craig Scott Gallery is pleased to announce that works by Toronto-based painter, Scott Waters, are now available through the gallery and that Waters will exhibit in a solo show in the new year (Time Heals All Wounds, March 6-31, 2008), with March the likely month. Waters' paintings on plywood attracted the attention of Border Crossings magazine in late 2006, resulting in a 7-page feature essay by Waters (as told to and written by Robert Enright) on his work and its military-life themes, with reproductions of 5 paintings, published in that magazine. Courtesy of Border Crossings, Waters' essay follows: "Enclosed Encounters of a Military Kind: Reflections on Life in the Canadian Infantry" by Scott Waters was originally published in Border Crossings, Vol...[read more]

Craig Scott Gallery artist, Ron Eady, is exhibiting new work in a solo show entitled "Man and His World," at Montreal's Galerie d'Avignon, 102 Laurier Ave. W., with the show running until May 18. (Call 514-278-4777 for hours or go to www.galeriedavignon.ca.) A major feature article (full page, including reproduction of three works) in the Montreal Gazette on Eady and his "Man and His World" exhibition can be read here: Henry Lehman, "Symbol of promise, tinged with decay," Montreal Gazette, April 28, 2007 The two images above (Traveller and Sanctuary) are 48 in...[read more]

From April 5 to April 29, 2007, Craig Scott Gallery presents “The Bach Variations”, by Jean Charles. The exhibition page for the show can be accessed here: “The Bach Variations by Jean Charles”.A Quill and Quire article on the ideas behind the paintings can be accessed here: Carlene Rummery, “Nancy Huston’s novel gets a unique twist.” The opening of the exhibition was preceded by a special music-literature-art evening hosted by author Nancy Huston on April 4, The Goldberg Variations at the Berkeley. See the following feature article on the exhibition by the Toronto Star’s art critic, Peter Goddard: Peter Goddard, “Golden age for Goldberg admirers: Legendary work still inspires,”Toronto Star, April 8, 2007. ...[read more]

Amir Shingray opened his KHARTOUM exhibition at Craig Scott Gallery on March 8 to jam-packed attendance from the moment the doors opened until they closed three hours later. For Shingray, Sudan’s capitol serves as biographical muse, topical focus, and metaphor for the state of humanity. Three post 9/11 works in his “Landmark” series and three “Istanbul” series works greet the viewer in the centre gallery before the viewer enters the main exhibition in the north gallery with its paintings and installations addressing the theme of "Nation Building" in the Sudan and more generally. Three of these Nation Building works address the continuing use of the gallows installed by the British colonial regime in Cooper (Khobar) Prison, and include one work that embeds a moving letter to the artist from, and a sketch of the gallows by, the former governor of the prison...[read more]

Further major recognition has come Maleonn’s way in addition to his May 2007 CONTACT Feature Exhibition, Labyrinth, in Toronto and his inclusion in the Frist Center for Visual Arts Exhibition, Whispering Wind: Recent Chinese Photography, from June to October in Nashville. Maleonn has been curated into Dragon’s Evolution, which is the inaugural art exhibition of the new China Square Art Center in the Chelsea Arts Tower (545 W 25th St) in New York City. The show is curated by one of China’s leading curators, ZHU Qi, and extends from April 20, 2007, to May 19, 2007...[read more]

Sponsored by RTC Health, TorontoOn Thursday, March 8, Craig Scott Gallery has organized a double event, an art opening (AMIR SHINGRAY’S KHARTOUM) from 6 to 8:30PM at 95 Berkeley in Toronto and, after the opening, from 8:30 until 11:30 PM an information, awareness and benefit event for MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES (MSF) in relation to its work, and analysis of the situation, in Darfur, Sudan, as well as across the border in Chad. The Darfur event is at The Berkeley (315 Queen East, at the southwest corner of Queen East and Berkeley), one block north of Craig Scott Gallery. Doors open at 8:30...[read more]

In the half-year since his highly successful inaugural show in North America (Transfigurations, Craig Scott Gallery, Toronto, May 2006), Shanghai artist Maleonn has generated a steady stream of recognition and accolades, and 2007 promises to see a steep trajectory continue. Three months after the Toronto show, Chinese Story No 2, one of the works on display during the show, sold for 144,000 $HK (over $US 20,000) at Sothebys Hong Kong’s Contemporary Asian Art Auction (extra-large edition). In its December 2006 issue, Contemporary magazine chose Chinese Story No 2 as a signature image in a section reviewing fairs and biennales. On November 11, 2006, Peter Goddard, Art Critic for the Toronto Star (Canada’s largest newspaper), compared two art fairs taking place in Toronto that weekend, the Toronto International Art Fair (TIAF) and the Toronto Alternative art Fair International (TAAFI). In his article, he chose Maleonn’s Priority (image above to the left) as the sole image for the article, referring to Maleonn’s “stunning” and “fabulous photography.” Of the (high) hundreds of artists at the two fairs, Goddard singled out Maleonn as one of five “names to watch.” In the first half of 2007, Maleonn will have two major solo shows, each show to include a selection of works from his most recent (multi-part) series called Portraits of Mephisto (See Portrait of Mephisto No 7, image above to the right)...[read more]

In May 2006, Craig Scott Gallery introduced Shanghai-based Maleonn to North America with his solo exhibition, “Transfigurations”, which was part of the 2006 CONTACT Photography Festival. Toronto (and beyond) took note and Maleonn has now been asked to mount a Feature Exhibition for the theme of the 2007 CONTACT Photography Festival. That theme is “The Constructed Image” and Maleonn’s contribution is “Labyrinth.” Selected works from two new Maleonn series, “Book of Taboo” and “Portraits of Mephisto,” and from a 2005 series, “Self-Portrait,” will make up the bulk of the exhibition...[read more]

L'Express, Toronto's French-language weekly, has published a substantial article profiling Anne Bertoin and the "Fractured Visions" exhibition at Craig Scott Gallery. The article (in French) can be accessed by clicking here: Eve Paresi, Anne Bertoin Peint le Destin Collectif. This review follows up from two reviews written by Gary Michael Dault, the first in the Globe and Mail and the second in Dault's weekly online artpost.info column "Walking the Line." See the preceding two News items in this section or click directly below for the two Gault reviews: Dault, Globe and Mail review - Focus on Paintings. Dault, Artpost.info Walking the Line #39 review - Focus on Sculpture. Also, on Friday, January 25, Line Boily interviewed Anne Bertoin on Radio-Canada's arts and culture daily show, "Les arts et les autres." The growing acclaim for Bertoin's work is matched only by the reaction of gallery-goers when they see the work in person. The show continues for two more weekends until Sunday, February 4....[read more]

Gary Michael Dault followed up his Globe and Mail review (Saturday, January 13, 2007) of Anne Bertoin’s “Fractured Visions” exhibition two days later with a more extended essay in his online www.artpost.info column called WALKING THE LINE. In this essay, he touches again on Bertoin’s paintings, but concentrates on her sculpture and notably “Samothrace” (the image to the upper left on this page). The following is the text of the Dault column, to be replaced shortly by a hyper-link directly to the essay. Click here for a link to the Tall Poppies website: Walking the Line #39: Samothrace. ...[read more]

Craig Scott Gallery presents four exhibitions in the first four months of 2007, from January to April. Details and advance images for each exhibition can be accessed by clicking on the name of the artist in the list below: Friday, January 12 – Sunday, February 4, 2007 (opening night Friday, January 12, 6-9 PM), Anne Bertoin, FRACTURED VISIONS Saturday, February 10 – Sunday, March 4, 2007 (opening night Saturday, February 10 afternoon/evening, precise time TBA), Uttaporn Nimmalaikaew, INTRODUCING UTTAPORN NIMMALAIKAEW Thursday, March 8 – Sunday, April 1, 2007 (opening night Thursday, March 8, 6-9 PM), Amir Shingray, KHARTOUM Thursday, April 5 – Sunday, April 29, 2007 (opening night Thursday, April 5, 6-9 PM); Special Preview Evening, Wednesday, April 4, Jean Charles, THE BACH VARIATIONS Contact the gallery at info@craigscottgallery.com for further information or, in the case of press requests, to receive a CD with higher-resolution images. After the April Jean Charles show, exhibitions continue at Craig Scott Gallery as follows (with opening and closing dates still to be decided; some titles may change): May 2007: Maleonn, CONTACT: The Constructed Image May 2007: John Currid, Lakers June 2007: Christian McLeod, Ascending Language June 2007: David Folk and Zachari Logan, Play Boys: A Two-Man Exhibition July – August 2007: CSg Summer Salon Season 2007 September 2007: Olexander Wlosenko, Cuttings to Drawings October 2007: Jorge Martinez, Under the Volcano and Other Works: Homage to Malcolm Lowry November 2007: Lorraine Pritchard, Jazz Painter January 2008: Samuel Chow, Video Painter ...[read more]

In the May 2006 issue of Mass Art Guide (MAG), the up-and-coming visual arts guide/magazine based in Toronto, Monika Burman reviews Maleonn's Transfigurations show at Craig Scott Gallery. Click here to read the review: http://www.massartguide.com/editorials/MAY2006CraigScott.pdf....[read more]

A popular local arts television show, "Toronto Living", covered the opening night of Maleonn's Transfigurations show at Craig Scott Gallery and the segment aired for a week on Rogers TV (Channel 10 in Toronto). The segment is now viewable through streaming video on the website of the Mass Art Guide, which also devoted an editorial review to Maleonn's show. The interview of Maleonn by host Manny Neubacher generated insightful commentary by Maleonn on aspects of his work, including the "Chinese Story" series (of which Chinese Story #2 is reproduced above, top right)...[read more]

On Thursday, April 27, Shanghai filmmaker and photographic artist Maleonn (Ma Liang) opened with his first solo exhibition in North America at Craig Scott Gallery, 95 Berkeley Street, Toronto, as part of the 10th annual CONTACT Photography Festival in Toronto, North America's largest such event. Over 150 people attended the vibrant event and had the opportunity to view 32 works by one of China’s great young artists.Maleonn’s show, entitled "Transfigurations," consists of 29 works from four series: Unforgivable Children, Chinese Story, My Circus, and Shanghai Boys, as well as three works from three other series. The series in the show involve complementary narratives about the evolution of Chinese identity where multiple contemporary influences (from various globalizations to China’s frenetic capitalism) intersect with deep historical currents (from traditional culture to the Mao period). Maleonn's photography – alternately playful and edged with menace and the macabre – juxtaposes with singular artistic power widespread feelings of dislocation and unease at the pace of change in today's China, on the one hand, and the welcoming of new horizons of self-expression and cultural vitality, on the other. The unique theatricality that is a signature of Maleonn’s works owes much to his family upbringing...[read more]

THE EXHIBITION Craig Scott Gallery (CSg) represents in North America the work of Chilean printmaker and painter, Jorge Martínez García. From April 7 to 26, 2006, the gallery will exhibit a mini-retrospective of Martínez prints in his signature neo-Baroque style, across a wide range of etching and engraving techniques. Entitled Poesy, the exhibit will centre on a series of eleven readings by Martínez of the work of the Greek poet Constantine Cavafy...[read more]