The Los Angeles County Museum of Art opened their Reading Room today.  The site offers ten exhibition catalogues, mostly from the 1960s, that 'definitively placed contemporary art from Southern California on the national map or furthered the dialogue between Los Angeles and New York.' 

Although seeing these amazing works on your computer monitor is not optimal, for someone researching the work of a particular artist, it's a far cry better than ordering back catalogues (if available) or turning to a site like Abe Books to find rare editions that may be available through used book sellers.   read more »

Space Place #3:

Hi blog-readers!

Here is a great chance for everyone to witness and interact with the development of one of Calgary's biggest development projects currently under way! Please click here if you need to get up to date on what's happened so far in this $100 million project in the East Village!

Cantos Music Foundation Presents:
July 23, 2009. 5-9 p.m. at the Grand Theatre, 608 1st St SW

Join us as five of the world's leading architects compete to design a major project  in Calgary - Cantos' new national music  centre at the King Eddy site in the East Village.
 read more »

Space Place #2

July 9, 2009

Hello interweb users! I hope you're enjoying a wonderful July day. Today's entry focuses on an arts and culture space that is getting a huge expansion on Mulberry street in Manhattan. I have no doubt that I have walked by this building before, unaware. It is wonderful to see a Chinese cultural hub experience such a massive growth in size! Here's a link to the article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/09/arts/design/09chinatown.html

Calgary also has a Chinese Cultural Centre! This Saturday the Centre is co-hosting a Stampede Breakfast with MLA Kent Hehr! Here is a link to the Calgary Chinese Cultural Centre's web site:

http://www.culturalcentre.ca/index.php?page=museum

Enjoy the article and happy Stampede! 

Bil

Last night I had the honour of toasting (and, OK, roasting!) Colin Jackson's accomplishments as CEO of the EPCOR CENTRE for the Performing Arts.  Colin's stint at the helm of one of the most important arts institutions in Calgary (and Canada) lasted 12 years.  I've known him for about half of that time, and have worked closely with him for the past 4 years.  As I was reflecting on what I would say, it occurred to me that, at 40, I was likely to be one of the “young” people in the room.  And at 62-ish, Colin is technically old enough to be my father... we are essentially one generation apart.  I point this out not to make him feel older (really though… the rocking chair can’t be too far away!), but rather as a jumping off point for thinking about the responsibilities of my generation as an older generation begins to hand over the torch.  read more »

Consider today's news from Alberta Ballet (here), recent news from Theatre Calgary (here), the ongoing work of Calgary Opera, Theatre Junction GRAND, ATP, OYR, DJD, Lunchbox... and then add to that impressive list the large number of emerging organizations in our fine city.  If it wasn't clear already, the picture is becoming sharper:

Perhaps more than any other city in Canada, Calgary is distinguishing itself as "the" place in Canada for new creation, more often than not with exciting collaborations at the heart of the work.  read more »

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Congratulations on the recently announced recipients of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Emerging Artist Awards! Calgary artists are Robin Arseneault (installation artist), Christine Cheung (painter), Anne Koizumi (film director and animator), Simon Mallett (theatre director) and Chad Van Gaalen (musician and multi-media artist). The Lieutnenant Governor and all Albertans should be thrilled with this investment.  

After hopping art galleries for Art Walk and the East Side Studio Crawl (an extension of Art Walk in Inglewood/Ramsay) on Saturday, I was back at the Calgary International Film Festival on Sunday. The Joe Media / NFB Best of Alberta Shorts Awards package screened at the Uptown Stage and Screen at 6:30pm. I got the very last ticket to the sold out show. (Don't tell the guy who was behind me.) Ten short films from across Alberta were screened (...ahem, mostly Calgary). The quality of the work over all was very strong and only the tip of the iceberg in the independant film scene in Alberta.The atmosphere in the theatre was of a congenial nature both on and off the screen. On screen, were numerous actors I have seen in the last year in both the community and professional theatre world of Calgary, such as personal favourite, Grant Reddick, in the film, Promise (2008), by David and Kirsten Bolton.   read more »

This just in - you may want to tune your radio dial to 102.1FM in Calgary before you read.

The Calgary Girls Choir has just won the CBC Radio Choral Competition in the Youth Choirs Category! The choir performed this afternoon as part of a "live-to-air" broadcast today, April 30. If you were unable to attend in person, tune in to CBC Radio Two tonight at 7 p.m. MST or listen via the internet (see below).

A huge congratulations from all of us at Calgary Arts Development to the Calgary Girls Choir, artistic director Elaine Quilichini and all the hard-working parents and volunteers behind the scenes!

Internet Listening Instructions

1. Go to http://www.cbc.ca/radio2/  read more »

Somehow the first month of my work term with Calgary Arts Development has flown by without a blog post. Not a single one. As a public relations student at Mount Royal College, I understand the importance of communicating with the public, so I figured it was time for me to jump on the blog train with reckless abandon. And there's no better time to start than now.

The other evening I had the good fortune of attending the dress rehearsal of Alberta Ballet's Dangerous Liaisons. I was pleasantly surprised. Take everything you thought you knew about the ballet and throw it out the window. Dangerous Liaisons pushes the boundaries by having a play and a ballet going on simultaneously. The choreography was visually stunning as dancers held poses that at times were painfully beautiful to watch. This truly is a must see, even if you don't think you like the ballet. Go. I promise you won't be disappointed.  read more »