Originally built as a courthouse, the gallery is due to be moved in the next decade, moved to a new site in a yet-to-be-constructed building that looks to be woodier and blockier than its current grey concrete humourless home. A similar thing happened in Halifax with their library, formerly housed in a cramped, concrete bunker, they’ve recently moved into a blocky, glassy building not far from the original site.
Halifax happens to be where I’m heading today. I’m in Vancouver on a long layover and, after meeting a friend for lunch and sitting in a Starbucks long enough to witness a complete changeover in patrons, I decide to visit the VAG.
Inside the gallery it’s busy. There’s a mock up of the new VAG on a table near the ticket counter, where I queue up to pay the $18 student admission fee. (Embarrassing to be 30 with a student card but not so embarrassing I won’t use it to take $6 off the WTF adult admission of $24.) This would be my third visit to the gallery and, like my two previous visits, I came away disappointed.
The big feature at the gallery is a Picasso exhibit called the Artist And His Muses. It is how it sounds — Picasso stuff coupled with details of the people, places and events that inspired him. I’m wary of such exhibitions — showing somebody’s work and incorporating things outside of the finished product. I don’t covet the bonus tracks on album reissues and I would never intentionally watch the director’s cut of a movie. The Picasso was no different. Every limby, bug-eyed piece was accompanied with more explanation than needed. I’m not a big Picasso fan to begin with. My grade six teacher had a print of that tragic Spanish Civil War thing he did, you know the one, I believe it’s called, “limbs in distress.” That’s a powerful picture. Other than that, Picasso isn’t exactly my guy.
There is also an exhibit by American photographer Henry Callahan, some of which is good. He captured street life in a variety of locations, most notably Rust Belt cities. This exhibit too, was damaged by a “reaction” exhibit featuring a variety of artists, many of them local, all of them with impressive school resumes.
Most of the reaction stuff isn’t great, particularly the floor exhibits, which always make me feel as though I’m avoiding stepping in dog shit. Despite that feeling, I looked down a couple times. What I saw appeared to be a pile of small hooks painted white and piled high like the mashed potatoes in Close Encounters. The other was a few rocks and some dirt … a few rocks and some dirt … a few rocks and … what the hell was that all about? Reminded me of a useful equation from artist Craig Damrauer:
“I could do that + yeah but you didn’t = modern art.”
The only reason for going to the VAG, I’m discovering, is for the Emily Carr work that (I believe) is on permanent display. Carr’s paintings get better each time I go. Maybe this is the gallery’s strategy, have a steady rotation of bleh exhibits so that Carr’s work seems that much more awesome.
My bias is obvious but my favourite Carr stuff is from Haida Gwaii, the raven at Cumshewa head, the village at Skedans. Holy crow. (BTW, we should put Carr on one of our bills. How about the twenty?)
HOWEVER, even the Carr stuff was spoiled by some strange add-ons. Carr had a French friend, Wolfgang Paalen, who came over to B.C. The two of them conversed and spent time together. The idea behind the exhibit, I think, is to show how Carr’s work influenced Paalen or vice versa. Either way, it was terrible. A weird mash up, an unsuccessful duet. I would take in the glory of Carr, then avert my eyes from Paalen's work.
After an hour I was back outside the gallery. Besides the movie production, there are vendors selling food, tourists taking pictures on a Vancouver Police Dept. motorbike, a couple practicing ballroom dancing on the slick de-iced novelty skating rink that sits nearby. There are skateboarders along the gallery steps and buskers with guitars. Life was happening.
As an aside, here’s an article I would read: How good is the entertainment outside an art gallery vs. how good/accessible is the work inside an art gallery? Because even though my friend and I scoffed at the movie scene when meeting for lunch, I quietly went back and gawked at the spectacle of it all after I was done in the gallery. It was more interesting than most of what was inside the gallery.
And what will this move to a new building do to the scene outside the current VAG? Will it dry up? Is art necessary to support the life that happens outside the VAG, or is the VAG popular in part because there happens to be a lot going on outside the building at all times.
Let me try and draw blood from a worn out phrase: art imitates life, no? If that's the case, it appears to be doing a poor job of it at the VAG. Skip the gallery and take in the real art outside the VAG, the hours are better and so is the price.