It's Better With Bees

If you missed the It's Better With Bees exhibit (March 30 to July 1, at the Ball's Falls Conservation Centre in Jordan, Ontario), here are a few photos. The exhibit was about bee biodiversity. Along with my prints - which were apparently a useful teaching tool for schoolkids - there was a bee audio box and bee trading cards by Sarah Peebles (check out Reasonating Bodies for more of Sarah's work, lots of resources and a wealth of information on bees), various beekeeping artifacts and a large collection of specimens of different species. I really enjoyed getting so see the exotic bees up close.






You can find all of my available bee prints here, or at the gift shop at the Ball's Fall's Conservation Centre. It's a lovely spot, not too far from Hamilton, and only an hour from Toronto or Buffalo - a great place for a picnic. The large print showing all six bees around a hexagon (with lovely Japanese washi tissue paper with a honeycomb pattern) has sold, but I have more multi-bee works in mind! I wanted to comment on the fact that we always think about the honeybee, which is actually a bit atypical and a European import. Our native pollinators are often solitary bees, who live in the ground or simple nests (rather than hives), do not make honey, and can be very unexpected irridescent colours.

Happy Canada Day!

for the bees

If you're in the Toronto-Hamilton-Buffalo area this spring, I'd like to suggest making a day trip to the lovely Ball's Falls Conservation Area. Until Canada Day (July 1), along with the beautiful scenery and heritage areas, they will be hosting an exhibit about the biodiversity of bees, including artwork and 7 of my prints. The exhibit also has the wonderful multimedia sound and visual art of installation artist and composer Sarah Pebbles. Her "Audio Bee Booth for Ball's Falls" allows you to not only see, and learn about our beautiful pollinators (and their alarming decline), but to hear them too. There are many artifacts, and scientific photos curtesy of York University, also included. I set up my art early, so I myself have yet to see it all. Check out Resonating Bodies for more of Sarah's work on bees, and my set of images of bees here.

Blue Orchard Mason Bee

I made my sixth bee of the region. This is an important local bee, Osmia Lignaria, known as the orchard mason bee, or blue orchard bee, in a lino block print on Japanese kozo (mulberry) paper with gorgeous, irridecent, translucent non-woven blue and gossamer-like white silk tissue washi chine collé (collaged fine Japanese paper). Each print is 15.2 cm (6 inches) square. The print is one of only 7.

Working with these papers was challenging. They are remarkably strong for their nature... but they are almost more like barely-there fabric, than paper. The white tissue really is like spider silk; strong, yet breakable and very very fine.

We think of bees as living in hives, but these bees live in reeds or natural holes which they divide into chambers with mud walls. We also tend to picture yellow and black stripes, but this small bee is blue to blue-green. Osmia Lignaria is a common species used for early spring fruit bloom in Canada and the United States, though a number of species of other Osmia are cultured for use in pollination. Bee keepers often make collections of paper tubes of wooden 'bee condos' in which these useful bees can make their nests. You can build your own bee condo, if you are interested.

Ontario

I've always been a big fan of map art - art made from maps, with maps, inspired by maps - and have recently seen several handmade items based on the shape of US states, and the Great Lakes. I noted both that Canada and its provinces are un- or underrepresented and that while the geometrical shape of a state can be interesting and graphic (and I can appreciate elegance in simplicity) it isn't really me. So the idea of making prints of Canadian provinces and territories, starting with my own, has been at the back of my mind for some time. To me, it always seemed that where I grew up was defined by the Great Lakes - perhaps because I've spent so much of my childhood driving from the shores of Lake Ontario to the mouth of Lake Superior and back. Both finding triliums in the woods and the haunting call of the loon have something of the mysterious to them, despite their familiarity and association with home for me. So covering my map of Ontario and the Great Lakes with our provincial symbols is obviously the way for me to go.

The block was inked 'à la poupée' (with different colours, black, green and yellow, in different areas) and printed by hand on lovely Japanese kozo (or mulberry) paper. Each print is 23.5 cm by 31.8 cm (9.25" by 12.5"). The print is one of an edition of eight.

Trip photos: Québec and Ontario

We got as far as Québec and spent the night in Ste Foy. I was reminded, driving through Gaspé, how most places seem to be named after really specific saints. In California, for instance, you can guess what day a place was 'discovered' by Spanish explorers. It is always the saint's day (San Francisco, San Jose, San this-and-that). In Québec, most places are Saint somebody of the something something. My favorite, of course, is Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! How can you resist a name with such punctuation? Can you name another place name with not one, but two exclamation points? Plus, he sounds like a hoot (though, apparently the sense of the word Ha! Ha! (yes, word singular) is an "unexpected obstacle or abruptly ending path", and francophones I know never seem to find it the least bit funny). Maybe I just have a silly sense of humour.




The next morning we drove through Montréal to Ottawa and them up to Barry's Bay.
RJH joked that more fire departments should embrace this simple solution to their workloads: ban all fires in town.

We spent a few days with my father and brothers and sister-in-law at the cottage. RJH took Marley out in the kayak. I don't know if you've met any Labs, but that dog is like an extra furry seal with legs. He's happier in, or on the water.

We went for a short drive, to check out an archery supply store in the woods, and happened by these ... I want to call them shoe trees. I don't know why there are dozens of shoes nailed to these trees, but we stopped and took photos. One stray shoe was several metres (dozens of feet) up. It wasn't obvious how it got there.




The cottage, designed by my step-mother's father the architect, is like some sort of wooden space-ship, with moose antlers and plates on the ceiling.

Ottawa

We drove to Ottawa Friday morning, and back last night.



This photo isn't about Parliament, or the stance of the photographer up front... it's about the sartorial choices of the man in the turquoise hoodie, wearing plaid shorts *over* his pants.



I really don't know what to think about the unicorn at Parliament, but I like it.

I hadn't been inside Parliament since I was 12, and we decided to do the touristy thing and poke around. An enthusiastic guide (who, in a very Canadian fashion, had a distinct Mexican accent) invited us to take the 45 minutes tour. We declined, but he came back and said that actually, people didn't general know this, but it was possible to avoid the tour but simply go up the Peace Tower and see the Memorial Chamber. So, we decided to do this. Despite, some hassle with security (who were fascinated with my travel chop sticks), we got in and up the Tower after only a short wait. It was really worth it. The view is wonderful and the Memorial Chamber was actually quite moving.





The downtown core really does seem to empty out by 6 pm. We headed toward Byward Market to try and find dinner. We chose a place because I was amused that it was in the building which originally housed the Geological Survey of Canada.

Saturday, RJH played several hockey games (for the Heart & Stroke foundation) and I went to the Museum of Civilization, since I had yet to do so. It's across the river in Gatineau, with a great view of Parliament. Though this child appears to be fleeing, the museum is great. I enjoyed their Japanese exhibit, which rooted contemporary Japanese design in its traditions - for instance tracing robots to eighteenth century automatons, or manga to ukiyo-e woodblock prints. Since I've spent time in Japan, and visited the Tokyo Edo Museum and the National Museum, I wasn't sure I would be impressed, but it was really well curated. Also, I got to pet Paro the Japanese robot baby seal. It was creepy. I also enjoyed the amazing array of masks in their permanent collection, and even the straightforward Canadian history.