Skip to content

A chance to see the artistic side of RDC Creative Arts faculty and staff

A cyclone, cattle and cubic designs are all part of a Red Deer College art show being held in downtown Red Deer.
rdc-faculty
Red Deer College visual art technician Dan Anhorn holds his piece titled “Feast” which will be on display during the Red Deer College School of Creative Arts

A cyclone, cattle and cubic designs are all part of a Red Deer College art show being held in downtown Red Deer.

RDC School of Creative Arts art exhibit at the Welikoklad Event Centre gives the public a chance to see some paintings, prints, sculptures, installation works and ceramics pieces created by faculty and staff at the college.

“Even some of the students don’t know what their instructors do. This gives us a chance to put our money where our mouth is, and let the community see what we do,” said Robin Lambert, a visual arts instructor at the college.

Visual arts staff aren’t the only ones with works in the exhibit — creativity spills over to several departments.

Carrie Hamilton, a designer for RDC Theatre Studies productions, shows three of her costume sketches for The Country Wife restoration comedy.

Larry Reese, an acting instructor for Motion Picture Arts, shows three of his paintings of cattle, a landscape, and a nude couple.

And School of Creative Arts dean Jason Frizzell displays a couple of his sculptural works, including a tiny cyclops in business attire and a larger piece depicting a vessel about to topple into an abyss called Ship of Fools.

Most of the artworks are contributed by visual arts instructors and technicians, however. They include an abstract painting by James Trevelyan, a tornado-like bronze sculpture by Ian Cook, ceramic vessels by Trudy Golley and Matthew Boyd, an art book by Megan Bylsma, and a superhero or villain figure created with a 3-D copier by Avery Andrykew.

Marnie Blair, who teaches printmaking, is showing two of her untitled aqua-tint etchings. The sparse cubic designs, created with charcoal and light peach colours, appear translucent when portions overlap.

The printing process used is the same as was employed by Rembrandt and Goya, said Blair, but her modernist works are more inspired by architectural elements.

“Is it something that’s being built or taken apart?” questions Blair, who leaves it up to viewers to decide.

Dan Anhorn, a technician in the Visual Arts Department, has created two smallish picnic tables —a bronze sculpture and a slightly larger one made of painted foam core and covered with a forest of trees he created from pipe cleaners.

The more sizable model, called Feast, might be seen as a picnic table that encapsulates the outdoor experience, or the table could be in the process of being reclaimed by nature.

Anhorn sees picnic tables as iconic shapes everyone can relate to from personal experience. He envisioned the forest-covered piece as a maquette for a potentially larger-scale version.

Lambert’s installation, I Shall Like to Give You a Kiss, was recently shown at the Garner Museum in Toronto, where it won Lambert a $10,000 Emerging Artist Award from a people’s choice contest sponsored by the RBC and the ceramics museum.

This is the first time Red Deer viewers can see the 1,000 white porcelain thimbles lined up across 10 shelves.

The work is named for a quotation from J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan story. When Peter tells Wendy that he doesn’t know what a kiss is, the flustered girl places a thimble in his hand and calls it a kiss.

Lambert, who ordered the thimbles from England and signed the inside of each one, invites viewers to take a thimble home with them. In that way, the random spaces created by missing thimbles eventually become part of the design.

“Once they start being taken it’s like missing teeth,” said Lambert, who heard from the Gardiner Museum staffers that viewers liked the interactive part of his installation.

“(Local) people have been asking me, ‘How do I get a thimble?’ and I’ve been saying, ‘You have to wait ’til February.’ ” Now’s the chance.

The show is on until Feb. 27, and can be seen whenever the Welikoklad Centre is open. Some firm opening hours are from 5 to 7 p.m. from Feb. 17 to 20. An opening reception will also be held from 5 to 7 p.m. on Feb. 24. This will be followed by local artist Dawn Candy speaking about her ceramic works at 7 p.m.

lmichelin@www.reddeeradvocate.com