The Green House Art Sale

Parking on Victoria Drive was impossible Thursday morning, so I turned right at 39th and found a shaded spot a couple blocks west. The walk to Amir's (my barber) would do me good, especially in the sunshine.

On my way back, a young woman was setting up a table on the overgrown lawn of a small bungalow. "A lemonade stand!" I rejoiced, and she smiled back "An art sale. Twelve noon. You should come." So I did.

The person who invited me is Nico McGiffin, the artist responsible for the invitingly even-tempered "I Love Lesbian" tags that stretch between Victoria and Fraser on Kingsway. Nico works in ceramics, but more recently has taken up painting. Below is a porcelain cast she made and glazed, and below that, a mixed-media work.

Nico's porcelain work attracted me for its lumpy purity, but later, when I got home, I noticed the way its lumps play with the artificial light above -- a celebration of the form's reflective surface through the assignment of its highlights. What attracted me to the picture was the subject's crown. A queen at sea, her raft a mass-produced palette. Our queen (Elizabeth II) will be dead soon, and we will be talking about what it means to be one.

Behold! A wood-cut:

Alyssa Thompson is at times a carving artist who works with wood and its byproduct: paper. I was attracted to this print (13/22) because the colour we associate with what a lamp does is the colour of the picture (my reproduction is much darker). Not just a lamp, but the diamond on which it sits, thus supplying us with three primary shapes: the more-or-less rectangular shade, the more-or-less circular body and the diamond-shaped mat (a square rotated 90-degrees). Moholy-Nagy might also see another form in the out-sized on-off chain, but I'll leave it at that for now.

Nadia Mahamoor's illustration of a woman sitting on a stool attracted me for its energy of presence -- specifically, the simultaneous force of hands and feet, the tension between getting up and sitting down, neither of which the subject is doing. Nor does this tension suggest any uncertainty on the subject's part, for she is in complete control of her situation. A portrait of human agency? I think so. Plus I like the way her bosom breaks from her chest, how delicately it is held by her dress. I like boobs like these.

Bella Roberts had three slip-cast pots on display. This one is my favourite:

I have a succulent for this pot -- and I can't wait to plant it!

It is encouraging to experience events like the Green House Art Sale, and from people so young (at least two of the artists are undergrads at Emily Carr University). I hope to see more activity like this. More refreshing than lemonade.