Two great talks to accompany the Andy Warhol exhibition are coming up this week. Links to register, below!

Blake Gopnik on Andy Warhol

Tuesday August 10 at 7pm, via Zoom (register, here)

Join esteemed art critic Blake Gopnik for a conversation with author and journalist Kate Taylor about his definitive biography of Andy Warhol. In Warhol, Gopnik takes on Andy Warhol in all his depth and dimensions, from his working-class Pittsburgh upbringing as the child of immigrants to his early career in commercial art to his total immersion in the “performance” of being an artist, accompanied by global fame and stardom—and his attempted assassination. In this biography, unprecedented in its scope and detail as well as in its access to Warhol’s archives, Gopnik brings to life a figure who continues to fascinate because of his contradictions.

Blake Gopnik, one of North America’s leading arts writers, has served as art and design critic at Newsweek, and as chief art critic at the Washington Post and Canada’s Globe and Mail.

Kate Taylor was born in France and raised in Ottawa. Her debut novel, Mme Proust and the Kosher Kitchen, won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for best first book (Canada/Caribbean region) and the Toronto Book Award. A recipient of the National Newspaper Award and the Atkinson Fellowship in public policy journalism, she is a long-time contributor to the arts pages of The Globe and Mail, where she currently serves as lead film critic and writes a weekly column about culture. She lives in Toronto.

Andy Warhol: Ladies and Gentlemen

Thursday August 19 at 7pm, with Curator Kenneth Brummel (register, here)

Join curator Kenneth Brummel, art historian Kirstin Ringelberg and artist and activist Ravyn Wngz for a conversation about Warhol’s Ladies and Gentlemen 1975 portrait series of New York’s Latin and African-American drag queens and trans women.

Kenneth Brummel is associate curator, Modern Art at the AGO. Prior to joining the AGO in 2014, Kenneth Brummel held curatorial positions in several major art museums in the United States, including the Cincinnati Art Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City.

Kirstin Ringelberg (they/them) is Professor of Art History in the Department of History and Geography at Elon University. Most recently, Ringelberg co-edited, with Cyle Metzger, the special themed issue New Work in Transgender Art and Visual Culture Studies for the Journal of Visual Culture (August, 2020) and co-authored the introduction, “Prismatic views: a look at the growing field of transgender art and visual culture studies”

Ravyn Wngz “The Black Widow of Burlesque” is a Tanzanian, Bermudian, Mohawk, 2Spirit, Queer and Transcendent empowerment storyteller. She is a co-founder of Black Lives Matter Canada, and on the steering team of Black Lives Matter Toronto Chapter, a group who are committed to eradicating all forms of anti-Black racism, supporting Black healing and liberating Black communities.

Matthew Wong: Blue View opens at the AGO August 13. Ahead of the exhibition, AGOinsider shares the trajectory of this Toronto-born artist’s career and his deeply personal meditations on the mood and colour blue.

What is the colour of solitude? For self-taught painter Matthew Wong, blue seems to be the answer. Matthew Wong:Blue View is the first museum exhibition of the Toronto-born, Chinese-Canadian artist’s work; it goes on view beginning Friday, August 13 for AGO Members and Tuesday, August 17 for Annual Passholders and the public. The show contains 40 works in total: 31 paintings and nine works on paper, all made within the last few years of his life. Organized with the support and guidance of the artist’s family, the exhibition is curated by Julian Cox, AGO Deputy Director & Chief Curator.

Wong was born in 1984 in Toronto. An only child, his childhood and adolescence were split between periods in Hong Kong and Toronto. He attended The York School and went on to graduate from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor with a BA in Cultural Anthropology in 2007. He eventually found his way to photography, prompting him to enroll at the City University of Hong Kong’s School of Creative Media. Although his interest in academia and photography waned during his studies, he graduated with an MFA degree in 2013. His interest shifted towards poetry, drawing and then painting in the years after school; the last two becoming ingrained in his daily routine. Wong taught himself how to paint through research, experimentation and discussions with fellow artists and art world figures. 

Like many artists of our digital era, Wong shared his art on social media. He commented on Facebook, posted on Instagram and blogged on Tumblr, quickly attracting the attention of the art world. By 2016, his work was featured in group exhibitions in Hong Kong, China and New York. Further acclaim followed soon after with his self-titled solo debut exhibition at Karma Gallery in 2018. Art critic Jerry Saltz described it as “one of the most impressive solo New York debuts” he had ever seen. In his brief career, Wong spent roughly five years working as an artist, the last three in relative solitude in his Edmonton, Alberta studio.  

It’s in this studio, between 2017 and 2019, where he created the works featured in Blue View. The colour blue, shown in its many saturated tonalities, permeates Wong’s compositions of nocturnal landscapes, still lifes and interiors. Building on the painting techniques of an array of his artistic predecessors – Georges Seurat’s Pointillist stipples, Vincent van Gogh’s Post-Impressionist dashes, literati painting’s washes of colour – Wong created a point of view  distinctly his own.

“I do believe that there is an inherent loneliness or melancholy to much of contemporary life,” Wong once said when asked about his work, “I feel my work speaks to this quality, in addition to being a reflection of my thoughts, fascinations, and impulses.” Whether the artworks in the Blue series depict real or imagined scenes, they suggest an artist grappling with a deeply melancholic inner life.

Wong died by suicide at age 35 in October 2019. He was diagnosed with clinical depression and Tourette’s syndrome in his childhood and identified as being on the autism spectrum in his adult years, just before his passing. At the unveiling of his posthumous solo exhibition at Karma Gallery in New York, art critic Roberta Smith referred to Wong as “one of the most talented painters of his generation”.

This blog post has been excerpted from the full article on AGOinsider, which you can read here.

Dear Volunteers,

Thank you all for your patience while we re-opened the Gallery and Andy Warhol for Members’ and Annual Passholders!

We are excited to provide volunteers with visiting access, a first step in our re-opening plan. In order to continue to having safe operations on site, all tickets, (including those for staff and volunteers) must be booked in advance.

Starting today, volunteers are invited to book any of the following:

• 2 Special exhibition tickets for Andy Warhol. (There is a maximum of 2 exhibition tickets per volunteer) – one of these tickets will be for you, another for your guest. Warhol tickets include general gallery admission – so feel free to wander and see what’s new in the permanent collection galleries.
• Not planning to see Warhol? You can book up to 4 General Admission tickets (I.e. to visit the permanent collection galleries) in one visit. One of these tickets will be for you; and 3 for your guests. 
• For either option – you do not need to provide the name or contact details of your guests. The booking will be made under your name.

For both options, please:

Call the Contact Centre on 416-979-6608 or email [email protected] and make sure to:

1. Specify if you are booking ticket(s) for Andy Warhol (which includes General Gallery Admission), or General Admission only 
2. Please include the Date and time you would like to attend
3. Provide the name and email address for where to email the tickets. (This can be a name other than yours). The tickets will be sent out as PDFs that can be shown on a smartphone or printed in advance of your visit.

Please provide 3 business days’ notice in advance of your visit so we can email you your tickets.

Some to things keep in mind:

• You can bring your volunteer badge for discounts in shopAGO or AGO Bistro, but it is not needed for entry into the Gallery. You will not be asked to show your badge along with your ticket, and badges can’t be used to gain entry into the building. You will need to use the main entrance to visit, not Jackman Hall, which is closed. The volunteer lounge also remains closed.
• When visiting, please remain in the public areas of the Gallery. The Volunteer Lounge and other back of house areas are restricted at this time for the safety of those who are required to work on-site.
• For any Volunteers who have a membership or Annual Pass, we encourage you to continue to use your membership to book your tickets, online, in advance of visiting.
• The Contact Centre is busy! We are grateful for your assistance in booking in advance.

We know it’s been a long time; we are looking forward to seeing you!

Trish Popkin (she/her)

Manager, Visitor Welcome

Hello Everyone,

We are closing in on our second week of re-opening. It is incredibly gratifying to walk through the galleries and see employees in person, some whom I have not seen in many months. And it is simply wonderful to have our public back in the building. Things are going very well and ticket sales are strong, given the COVID-19 restrictions on how many people can be onsite. We are carefully following all health protocols.

Also, I am loving grabbing lunch from the Bistro! I am eating my way through the new menu and enjoying every bite.

Starting tomorrow, I will be taking a two week vacation with my family. We are going on a road trip – all the way from Saskatoon to Vancouver! I’ll see you when I’m back at the AGO on August 16^th.

Take care and stay safe,

Stephan  

Kinngait Studios in Nunavut has been at the forefront of contemporary Inuit art for more than 60 years. We talked to William Huffman of the West Baffin Eskimo Cooperative about what makes it so successful.

Five successive generations of acclaimed Inuit artists have brought their work to life at Kinngait Studios, in Kinngait, Nunavut, some 2,292 kilometres north of Toronto. Among them is Shuvinai Ashoona, a third-generation Inuk artist based in Kinngait. A major force in the emergence of its contemporary drawing practice, Ashoona works daily at Kinngait Studios. In her recent works, now on view in the AGO exhibition Shuvinai Ashoona: Beyond the Visible, she merges ink, graphite and colour pencil to create large-scale works in both vertical and horizontal formats. Measuring an astonishing 268 centimetres wide, the recent acquisition Curiosity (2020) gives viewers a fanciful bird’s-eye-view of her hometown, including buildings and roads, a portrait of an Inuk family, a walrus, several seals and the curious tentacles of seven giant pastel monsters. 

To better understand Ashoona’s work and the prodigious legacy of the studios, AGOinsider caught up with William Huffman of the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative.

AGOinsider: Kinngait Studio is operated by the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative. Why has the co-operative model been so successful?

Huffman: For the last 60-ish years, the co-operative has been at the centre of artmaking in Kinngait, providing space and means to hundreds of artists over its lifetime. That itself is an extraordinary and expensive thing! When you account for the fact that the place is predominantly fly-in, and all the equipment and supplies used by the artists are flown in, every piece of paper, or pencil, all of it must come from the South. It’s the community ownership of the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative that has fostered success. It’s governed by an all-Inuit Board of Directors, and practically all Kinngait adults are in fact shareholders, which means that at the end of each year, profits are distributed back to the community in the form of annual dividends. And in addition to the operation of the studios, the organization also maintains a local retail grocery and hardware store, a restaurant, a few rental properties and manages various utility contracts. It’s a really sophisticated business model and an unique social enterprise, and something in which the community, particularly our member artists, have a deep sense of pride and respect. It’s truly their organization. The recipe for success has been the community’s sustained involvement in decision-making, its clear vision and generally progressive leadership. 

This blog post is an excerpt from a larger, more detailed story in AGOinsider. Read the full story, here.

How do you preserve art made from rotting fruits and vegetables? Sjoukje van der Laan, AGO Assistant Conservator, Contemporary Art, and Interpretive Planner Nadia Abraham answered this question with Ron Benner’s installation Anthro-Apologies (And the trees grew inwards – for Manuel Scorza)(1979–80) in a recent Close Looking talk.

Acquired by the AGO in 1994, Anthro-Apologies is a large installation. It features gelatin silver photographs, presumably of a farmer’s hands: two placed against the wall and two on the ground. Piles of fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts, spices and other  remnants Benner gathered in Peru sit atop the lower two photographs.

First exhibited in the late 1970s and again in 1995, this work was last on view at the AGO in 2017 for Toronto: Tributes + Tributaries, 1971–1989, the group exhibition curated by AGO Curator, Indigenous Art, Wanda Nanibush. While the exhibition was open, Nanibush described  the ephemeral qualities of Anthro-Apologies as echoing ideas surrounding preservation in art that were circulating during the 1970s and ’80s.

The fruits and vegetables in Anthro-Apologies are very much real. They decompose, decay, grow mold and even attract fruit flies. This presents a unique challenge in its conservation and further amplifies the concept of the work. For van der Laan, her routine considerations for proper conservation are heightened because of food’s perishable nature. “Our focus is to preserve and conserve the work’s original concept and present it in the most original way to the public,” she explained. “When we installed the work in 2016, we were lucky Ron was able to come in for the installation. We took that opportunity to have an in-depth conversation with him about how he sees the artwork and his wishes for the future.” The AGO Conservation team aims to slow down, not stop, the process of deterioration. Each time the work is being prepared for exhibition, the conservators will evaluate what can be displayed as is, what needs to be replaced and what can be discarded.

Watch the full Close Looking virtual conversation between Abraham and van der Laan here.

Hello Everyone,

We made it! The AGO is open again for our public and I couldn’t be more proud. It has been wonderful to see so many familiar faces this week that I have not seen for eight months. We are off to a great start with strong interest and attendance and a very safe and welcoming environment.

Following a terrific opening day on Wednesday, I am ending my week on a very high note. Today, all of Leadership Team is gathering together for an off-site retreat – the first time we have all been together for more than a year and a half. I am incredibly grateful to LT for everyone’s commitment and hard work. LT has met literally every day throughout the pandemic and often multiple times a day. It is great to have the opportunity to say “thank you” in person. I couldn’t do my job without them – and you.

Take care and stay safe,

Stephan

Black through bronze

Internationally acclaimed contemporary artist Thomas J. Price makes his AGO debut with a towering public sculpture that centres the Black experience

Last summer’s global uprisings for Black lives sparked a wave of public awareness and inspired widespread calls for social change. Since then, protests resulting in toppled colonial statues have been commonplace in the headlines. While removing these symbols of racism is a step in the right direction, the real question on the horizon is: what should be erected in their wake? Through his important public practice, leading contemporary artist Thomas J. Price is answering this question. This week on the corner of Dundas and McCaul Streets, in collaboration with ArtworxTO, the AGO is proudly revealing Within the Folds (Dialogue 1) – an original nine-foot bronze cast sculpture made by Price.   

Read more in AGOinsider (linked here)

Serene emptiness

Explore the AGO’s recently acquired serigraph series The House on Piccadilly Street in our upcoming exhibition

How do the feelings of comfort and claustrophobia come together in a piece of art? This complex combination is explored in the upcoming focused exhibition, Kim Ondaatje: The House on Piccadilly Street, opening July 24 at the AGO.

The scenes depicted in The House on Piccadilly Street were inspired by Ondaatje’s Victorian home in London, Ontario. Though the screenprinting series was made between 1967 and 1969, the vacant rooms devoid of people may feel familiar to us today. As we’re spending more time indoors during periods of social distancing and self-isolation due to the pandemic, the emptiness depicted by Ondaatje reflects the emotions of the new normal felt by many people, like a sense of time is slowly lost.

Read more in AGOinsider, linked here.

Dear Volunteers – I’m sorry to share the sad news that long time volunteer, Ruth Mallett, has passed away. Most recently, Ruth was a member of our information guide team – but she had been a Gallery volunteer for over 28 years. If you know Ruth, you know she loved patterns (and sewing) and her love of fashion was celebrated in the colourful oufits she wore weekly. No one was better accessorized than Ruth!

Ruth enjoyed sharing her scrapbooks of AGO activities over the years, leaving them out for many to view in the volunteer lounge (including her beloved community outings with the AGO-on-the-Go volunteers). We will miss Ruth, greatly and share news of services, below:

MALLETT, RUTH NORENE 1938 – 2021 It’s with great sadness that the family of Ruth Norene Mallett announces her passing, on Sunday, June 27, 2021, at the golden age of 83. Ruth will be fondly remembered by her loving family members and friends, and the cherished memories of Ruth will be greater than the sorrow and pain felt today. Ruth was well-known for her great sense of creativity, her charitable spirit of giving, quick wit, love of cooking and spending time with extended love ones, and so much more. She will be deeply missed by her many sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews, cousins, friends and neighbours. Visitation and funeral service will be held to honour Ruth at Ogden Funeral Home, 4164 Sheppard Ave. E., on Friday, July 23rd from 6-8 p.m. and Saturday, July 24th at 1:00 p.m. for immediate family and invited guests. Family and friends may send condolences to www.ogdenfuneralhome.com

https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/thestar/obituary.aspx?n=ruth-norene-mallett&pid=199513085