Archive for July, 2010

Sarah is the most creative person I know and a relentless and restless one at that. And I’m not saying this just because I’m her husband! Her creativity drives everything she does, especially her art. When paper stock colours available to her were too limited, no probs, she mixed and made her own colours and then started combining them with non-traditional materials such as vellum and mylar. I can see always see her personality in her work, like a quick wit and improvisational skills. If you were lost in the woods, she’d be the one making a flare from a flashlight battery and a pinecone. It’s sort of like living with McGyver.
– Tim Chan

The Proof

1. My latest piece is always my favourite. I just completed this one yesterday. When I make another piece that one will be my favourite.

2. My studio, which I’m lucky enough to have in the house.  I’m a bit of a recluse and this suits me perfectly. This August I’m going to get it together and build actual proper paper storage so it doesn’t look so bad.

3. My desk. Much of what I do is precise and fiddly, which is funny because I tend to be a spontaneous and messy. I wash my hands so often when I’m working on a piece sometimes it feels more like surgery than art.

4. On the deck after a hard day’s work. Because I’m in the studio for 6-8 hours a day, I take my leisure very seriously. I’m in love with this book on my art hero Miguel Angel Vidal. I ordered it from France and stinks so badly of mildew it has to live in a freezer bag.

5. My collection of first editions. The number one rule is they can only cost $5. I find them in thrift stores and library sales. I particularly love detective fiction, which I think says a lot about my artwork, which is all about finding balance and resolution.

6. Our outdoor cat cage we had built. Our carpenter thought we were crazy but he really got into the project. They go down a covered walkway you can just make out on the far right, which the raccoons keep crumpling on their nightly jaunts. Inside among the catmint you can see one of our five cats, Angel, lounging in the sun. As they say, dogs have owners, cats have staff. Sadly, this is true.

7. The alley at the back of the house. Strathcona is a great neighbourhood and we’re on the less leafy border of it, just next to Hastings. We have light industry and a bit of post-midnight alley screaming, and little old Chinese ladies going through our recycling, but that’s what I love about it.

8. The secret of a happy twenty-three year relationship.

The Questions

What neighbourhood do you live in?
Strathcona, just east of Chinatown and bordering the Downtown East Side. It’s a great place to be. It’s eccentric and surprising, everywhere you look something odd or beautiful is happening.

What do you do and where?
I make abstract compositions using paper. I guess you’d call it collage, but it’s really more like constructivism. It’s hard-edged abstraction with a nod to psychedelia. From my studio I can see the Port of Vancouver, with those beautiful orange cranes against the blue mountains.

What are you working on?
I’m currently getting ready for my first solo show. I’m mounting the show myself, and it’s a lot of work! But I love the autonomy.

Where can we find your work?
You can find my work online at my site.  Email me at sgee.collage@gmail.com if you want to know more!

As of last week Vancouver Is Awesome is now an official member of the BC Association of Magazine Publishers as an e-magazine! Check out our profile page HERE and be sure to click through all of the other magazines in the Members section to learn more about our province’s best periodicals. We’re thrilled and honoured to be amongst such great company and look forward to the benefits of being a member.

A reminder….Rule number one in blackberry picking….if it ain’t fallin’ off…don’t pick it.

But once they’re ripe….get out of my way….

According to my post last year, we’re right on schedule.

Despite a busy weekend full of summertime events in Vancouver, a few dozen people headed down to Trout Lake to participate in the “Little Drifters” picnic on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. Brought to you by Booooooom.com and the Vancouver Sun, the “Little Drifters” project encouraged people from around the world to design & build watercraft using all-natural materials, launch them into a body of water and then submit photos of their creations.

As you can see from the photos below, the folks who came out to represent Vancouver did a wonderful job with their boats! Lots more can be seen in the Booooooom.com and Vancouver Sun photo galleries.

…READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

Woah. The band, YUCA, one of the Peak Performance Project‘s top 20 for 2010, is not messing around. Click HERE if you missed the first video introducing the project and watch below to see just how committed YUCA is…

Every day we share a single photo from our Flickr Pool shot by one of our faithful and talented readers (that’s you!). Today’s photo was taken by Clayton Perry of a baker taking a break outside of the Romania Country Bread Store in Steveston Village.

Clayton is one of the most active photographers in our Flickr and I must nod my hat to him for all of the amazing shots he has added practically since we launched our group a couple years back.

SCENE AND HEARD showcases the independent music scene here in Vancouver. With 22,376 artists, boasting 99,212 tracks, the CBC Radio 3 web site is the absolute ultimate authority, and the home, of independent music in Canada. With that massive library along with tools for members (free to join!), we’re taking advantage of what they’ve set up by bringing you a fresh batch of music every week featuring local groups who have tracks (entire albums, even!) on the R3 site.

Jasper Sloan Yip is a singer/songwriter from Vancouver BC with two independent releases under his belt. His first studio album Every Day and All at Once was recorded at Vertical Studios in Vancouver in September of 2009. Soon after the album was released in March 2010, Jasper and the band had a string of performances for the CBC, including two live performances on CBC Radio One, as well as a seven song session recorded for a CBC Radio 3 podcast. Most recently, Slowly, the second single off of Every Day and All at Once spent ten weeks on the CBC Radio 3 top thirty, making it as far as number four. Jasper and the band’s next plan is to tour Canada from coast to coast in March of 2011….

Vancouver shows coming up include:
Aug 13th – Kits Showboat
Sept 14th – Vancouver international Fringe Festival – the Agro Cafe, Granville Island

Check out Jasper’s VIA playlist of Vancouver Artists by clicking below!

Sign up to become a member yourself and you can put together your own playlists, get notifications about what your favourite artists are up to and more.

SKIP TO THE NEW EPISODE (#25), HERE! [EDITOR'S NOTE: IF YOU ARE OFFENDED BY THE F WORD, YOU WILL DEFINITELY BE OFFENDED BY THIS PODCAST]

Hi Vancouver is Awesome Readers! Elianna Lev here with another episode of my podcast, the People’s Program Project. It’s episode 25, which is a quarter way to 100. At this rate, it will probably take about five years to hit that mark. Don’t lose the faith though. On this episode we have two stories. The first is probably one of the funniest stories I’ve ever been told. It involves loud, horny neighbours who just don’t give a f**k and a parrot. Seriously, what’s the etiquette on talking to your neighbours about their lovemaking noise levels? I had a terrible neighbour once who had little disregard of her, er, habits particularly during obscene hours of the night. I eventually just moved out after a year of sleepless nights since I’m terrible with confrontation. Our second story is a chat I had with Devitt Brown aka The Dark. You are probably familiar with his work – dark, moody, intriguing stencils and posters around town. He’s considered a legend in Vancouver’s street art scene so if you’re not familiar, get on it. Anyhow, he told me the story about the time he got arrested for putting up his art at Pacific Centre.

Do you have a story about loud, horny neighbours or a time you got arrested for street art? I wanna hear your stories real bad so get in touch: write@eliannalev.com, okay?

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