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1 Painting over another

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Found

Published: 07 October 2010

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A common enough story - during appraisal it's discovered that 1 painting has been concealing another. In this instance a portrait of Sir Alfred Munnings reading a book, hidden (it is speculated) for fears that a jealous husband would not be so impressed....

Read full article here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-news/6209440/Secret-portrait-of-British-artist-hidden-behind-another-canvas-by-admirer.html 

The Thorncliffe Antique Show

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Miscellany

Published: 04 October 2010

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Saturday, an early morning searching for garage sales, a few but none of merit. And I think to round the day off with a few thrift shops when I remember that there's an antique show at the Thorncliffe Community Hall on Center Street, and so I make my way there.

Less discouraging than the garage sales, and sometimes you have to elevate yourself a bit above the typical rubbish and have a look at some real treasures. The antique fair, small compared to others that come through town, 2 small rooms, maybe 50 or 60 dealers, many of whom I know from the flea markets. For the flea market vendors this is it, a chance to show off their rare and best treasures, but I don't really want to visit with them, I see them every other Sunday. 

Of the 60 or so stalls there half are easily rubbish. The same tat you'd find at the flea market, a few stalls it's even worse, simply old people clearing out their rubbish and confused about what an "Antique" is. 

There are, however, a few worthwhile stalls and vendors I don't see so often. One has a collection of North American Artifacts, stone mauls, arrowheads, another has specialized in Victorian jewelry, some old brooches and pendants with the woven hair of the dead inside, interesting rings, some bronze bookends (and I need bookends), Millet's "The Gleaners" cast in bronze, $30.00, a more appealing art nouveau set with a naked woman hoisting the eternal flame, $150.00, good but not that good, books, but none worth owning, I make three passes over each of the rooms, find a couple of good watches, I treat myself (it's been years since I've bought a decent watch) and consider it an early retirement gift.

And that's it. Reasonable prices, modest selection, they could have been a little more picky about the dealers they invited, but if I've bought a watch it can't be that bad...

Art City Shorts

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 20 September 2010

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It's an arts & culture week for the boy. On Wednesday we went to see "Radiohead 2" - directed by Denise Clarke, today a grey and rainy day and so I decide to take him to see "Art City Shorts" at the Uptown Screen (Downtown Calgary). 

I like shorts, and the blurb describes it as a "select" group of shorts from around the world.

I'm thinking something like "World's Best Commercials" or "Festival of Animated Shorts" and am kind of looking forward to a pleasant surprise.

And surprised we were.

Now there are at most maybe 8 other people in the theatre with us, which is a good thing, it marks the possible quality of the film. Great films don't necessarily attract wide audiences. And so we're a bit early and we kill time in the lobby (a great, period lobby) and then find our seats and wait for the show.

The boy, he asks me about it and I dismiss his questions with "I don't know anything" - he'll be impressed, I know.

The film is introduced by a member of the Art City group, who explains that there will be 6-8 shorts in the film and it will last about 45 minutes.

And there's a brief flash on the screen of the film, before it begins - "visual art, architecture, and design" or words to that effect, and for a moment I'm worried that maybe this won't be his cup of tea, but I take solace - I enjoy architecture, design, visual art, and so at least one of us will be happy...

It opens with a hand, hanging down and dripping obviously fake blood, then cuts to an elevator going up through a building, then back to hand again, to some tiles on the ground, back to hand, no speaking, just the images. And we think it's sort of the opening credits thing and after 2 or three minutes of this the next film is introduced. From Iran or the middle east someplace.

Black and white, if it's artistic it has to be black and white: a bathtub, draining. Filling with water. Letters in Arabic appear on the tub, small, tiny subtitles below in English, more characters, tub fills with water, washes characters away, no speaking. 

The boy begins to laugh, yet another one of dad's arts and culture adventures gone terribly astray, and I'm laughing as well. 

Other shorts, 2 men, one cutting another's hair, then wrestling in a room, one on top of the other shouting "You're going bald! You're going bald!".

More random films, we stay, it's only 45 minutes after all, we watch them all. An animated one with clay, perhaps 1, 2 minutes long tops, purple claymation figure sprouts rainbow fungi, then a brief flash of the "Funded by the National Film Board of Canada". It's as if the filmmaker is somehow mocking the sponsorship that made this piece of crap possible.

I'm aghast. I mean, the NFB has produced some great stuff, this isn't it. Not at all, not by a long shot. What was the proposal for this grant? 

It's quickly become the "WTF" film festival. More shorts. Completely random assemblages of film, current media, all "Art" in the way that art should be spelled with capital "F". One film, a particularly inept montage of media clips culled from countless hours of bad TV, recalls to the boy the quote by Banksy from "Exit through the Gift Shop" when Banksy realizes that Mr. Brainwash isn't in fact a filmmaker, he's just a moron carrying a camera ...

Now we have a laugh, me and the boy, after the film (a few patrons walked out), we laugh about the high "Art" tone of the pieces, the lack of adjectives to describe them, we laugh at the idea that these films were somehow "Selected", implying that somehow other films were rejected, and what could have been more rejected than the films we just saw, and I try to get him to put a finger on the best and worst film, but there's no finger he can put and that's it.

The WTF film festival, sponsored by Art City, no longer showing at the Uptown but don't be sad, you didn't miss a thing. 45 minutes could be far, far better spent watching peoples submitted pet clips on You Tube.