PAST EXHIBITS

Becoming Canadian: A Flag Story

An exciting new exhibition, Becoming Canadian: A flag story opens at Touchstones Nelson: Museum of Art and History on Friday, November 27th from 7-9pm. On loan from a private collection, this exhibition documents through the use of historic flags the story of becoming Canadian. The exhibition spans nearly a century from the earliest official Canadian flags of 1870 to the adoption of the National Flag in 1965 covering the gradual shift in the Nation’s sense of identity from colonial to Canadian. 
 

The exhibition features rare examples of early flags as well as selected memorabilia and propaganda that accompanied the evolving symbols of identity that lead to our current red maple leaf.

Tanya Pixie Johnson: Lines in Blood and Milk

As a white African raised in pre-revolution South Africa, a segregated and violent society, Johnson sought out the traditional sacred ceremonies of the indigenous peoples, participating in, witnessing and being initiated into the spiritual practices. The work of Lines in Blood and Milk integrates facets of the artist’s spiritual exploration through intention, dream, ceremony and paint, presented in forty-nine oil, acrylic and mixed-media paintings arranged in an installation-like environment. Employing a personal symbolic language, the artist claims the process of creation is as much a part of the journey as the spiritual experiences. Aware of issues of cultural appropriation, the artist presents the work not as a didactic portrayal of traditional ceremonies, but a truthful exploration of ceremonial ways, creation, and the means for its continuation, through a personal experience and expressed in the form of paint and image.

Peter Velisek

A curated exhibition featuring the paintings of local resident and international painter Peter Velisek. The exhibition will include work from the two areas of subject matter that reflect Peter’s daily life experience: rural images from his life as a sustenance farmer in the Slocan Valley and urban images from his annual trips to his home town in the Czech Republic. A possible pairing with a second Expressionist painter from the region is being considered.

The Art of Doukhobor Textiles

2008 marks the 100th anniversary of the Doukhobor settlement in the area. The Art of Doukhobor Textiles highlights the achievements of function and beauty in the making of various textiles. The exhibition features objects from the collections of Touchstones Nelson and the Doukhobor Discovery Centre, Castlegar, including historical rugs, linens and fabrics, clothing and household items. A selection of textile tools will also be on display.

John Cooper & Friends

A retrospective of the work of local resident and international colour theorist and plein air painter John Cooper. The exhibition will include work from the 1960’s to the present, comprised mainly of paintings and supplemented with constructed and painted sculptures and trophies and a multi-media component featuring four performance-based films John has made over his career. The exhibition will be accompanied by the work of four to six plein air painters whose work has been influenced or inspired by John’s work and passion for colour theory or plein air painting. The artists and works will be selected by the curator in consultation with the artist

Midsummer Bonspiel

A heritage/historical exhibition surveying the history of curling in Nelson, from the first Midsummer Bonspiel in 1945 to the conclusion of this sports tradition with the last Bonspiel in July 2008. The exhibition will feature historical artefacts, archival images, film footage and related ephemera from the Touchstones Permanent Collection and Archives, the Nelson Curling Club and local and regional private collectors

David Eustice: Project for Calendar Studies: Days, Months, Years

Project for Calendar Studies is comprised of twenty multi-media/process works that grew from an investigation into the relationship between form, content, and process. The work was created out of doors, using sustained exposure to a variety of natural and artificial elements to facilitate the printing of the primary images. The work is divided into two groups – canal work and roof work, with both groups sharing aspects of time-reckoning: notations, words, symbols, and relationships through which we account for the passing of time. The canal work was developed through a process of submerging the canvas in a tidal canal in Brooklyn and recording the passage of time and the rise and fall of the water levels. The roof work was developed through the application of a raw iron-filings left exposed to weather conditions. The canvases were then imprinted with additional imagery and surface treatment either on location or in the studio.

In partnership with Oxygen Art Centre; 2008 Artist in Residence.

Kootenay School of the Arts at Selkirk College 2008 Graduation Show

A group exhibition of contemporary craft and design featuring the 2007 graduating class from this regional institution of art and craft education, recently amalgamated with Selkirk College.

Inkameep

The drawings featured in this exhibition were created by children of the Osoyoos Indian Band who attended the Inkameep Day School, near Oliver, British Columbia, on the Nk’Mip Reserve. Between 1932 and 1942 these students and their teacher, Anthony Walsh worked together to create drawings, paintings, stories and plays that honoured traditional Okanagan language and culture. The arts became a way for the students, aged six to sixteen, to depict their everyday realities and their evolving sense of identity, growing up in mid-twentieth-century British Columbia. Their world was complex, layering Okanagan traditions and stories, old and new ways of life, an evolving agricultural economy, and North American popular culture.

Seeds in Disguise

Explore the ordinary… Seeds are all around us: we eat them; we plant them; they parachute from dandelions; they catch in the dog’s coat or on your socks; they drop from the trees; and sometimes they even hang around your neck. This exhibition features ornamental seeds “disguised” as beads in jewelry, trinkets and ornaments.