1. Director's Meandering Preamble
2. Gallery Players | Saturday 16 January at NAC
3. Dennis Tourbin Members Gallery | Kathy McBride Threads
4. Best of CRAM | Friday 8 January
5. OAC Exhibition Assistance | Friday 29 January by 5pm
6. Call for Submissions | In the Soil: Niagara's Homegrown Arts Festival
7. Bookbinding Workshop | Sat 30 Jan & Sun 31 Jan, 9am - 3pm
8. Learn Photoshop in Six Classes

1. Director's Meandering Preamble

The fastest snowmobile on record reached a top speed of over 330kph on an airstrip in Val-d-Or a couple of years ago. From this fact I think we should all take heart, especially during these dark winter months when the bleak colourless world we inhabit begins to narrow our thinking and imply that the coefficient of life really is drag. When these slushy days that are metered to a rhythm kept by the alternating wetness and coldness of our feet begin to dim hope, a fast snowmobile might provide a flicker of light. I’m not suggesting that the only way this season nears being tolerated is the ancient and trusted ritual of slurping rum and flat coke out of a leaky wine skin in between bouts of riding a concoction of skis, track, and motor that lines your nostrils and coats your clothing with the redolent odour of oil and gasoline, but rather, in our search for life affirming meaning this winter—meaning beyond salting the walk or breaking a hip on an unsalted one—a Quebec-built snowmobile that travels at ludicrous speed may be considered a ratification of our collective belief that sharing ideas is a way to see us through even the darkest times. I mean, if a bunch of yahoos can get together and find meaning for their lives through the engineering of an alcohol-burning supercharged contraption that resembles a rocket with a pair of cross-country skis affixed to it, then whatever our prodding of the firmament, no matter how apart from the zeitgeist they might be, no matter what great or little effort we expend on them, must somehow measure favourably. There are some special events scheduled at NAC this month, we hope to see you out at them. You’re welcome to park your sled out back.

2. The Gallery Players Presents New Sounds Niagara & Sextets Redux!
Saturday 16 January 2010 at 8pm
Niagara Artists Centre - 354 St. Paul Street
$29 Adult, $26 Seniors, $11 Student/Child, $58 Family
Group rates available

The programme features Arnold Schönberg’s epic tone poem “Verklärte Nacht” op. 4 and a newly commissioned work by one of Canada’s best known composers, Michael Oesterle. Schönberg’s “Verklärte Nacht” or “Transfigured Night”, composed 110 years ago, is based upon a 36 line poem by the German poet Richard Dehmel first published in 1896 in a collection entitled Weib und Welt or Woman and world. The highly expressive music reflects the story of the poem in which a woman reveals to her lover on a moon-lit walk that she is carrying a child by another; in the course of the poem, the her lover concludes that their love can overcome the tragedy of their circumstances. Although it is an intensely chromatic work, it is distinctly in D Major.

Michael Oesterle’s new composition, Rudolphine Tables, composed in 2009, draws inspiration from two sources: a couplet from Dehmel’s poem:

“Look, how brightly the universe shines!
Splendour falls on everything around”

and the star catalogues and planetary tables published in 1627 by Johannes Kepler, and dedicated to the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II. Kepler worked with the observations of Tyco Brahe to produce this extremely accurate heliocentric set of tables that were used for decades to predict the location of the stars and the planets at any moment in the past or future; they were also the basis of much of the work of astronomers seeking more accurate star charts. Created in the midst of the Thirty Years War, the tables are also a tribute to Kepler’s monumental perseverance in his search for the mind of God.

Most of the performers for the evening will be familiar to Niagara audiences, as the members of the Eybler Quartet (Aisslinn Nosky, Julia Wedman, violins; Patrick Jordan, viola; and Margaret Gay, ‘cello) will be collaborating with two long-time colleagues, violist Max Mandel and ‘cellist Allen Whear, who will be joining the group for the first time.

Subscription Tickets still available: Save up to 30%. 
For more information, contact the Gallery Players of Niagara Box Office at (905) 468-1525 or visit www.galleryplayers.ca

3.Threads - How evocative clothing can be...
Recent works in mixed media by Kathy McBride
Dennis Tourbin Members Gallery
Saturday 23 January – Saturday 6 February 2010
Opening Reception Saturday 23 January 2010 7-9 pm

Threads tugs at our psyche ~ delicate, tenuous.

Memories held in the hem of a child’s sundress, caught in the folds of a father’s well-worn work gloves, laced into a favourite pair of rain boots, tucked away and forgotten in the pocket of a mother’s apron, or pinned like a corsage to the stiff bodice of a pink prom dress...

McBride’s mixed media images hold personal history.

Mixing paper with paint and potent recollections retrieved from a closet-full of garment-memories, Kathy has recreated a series of nostalgic garments, cut from the fabric of her own life-story ~ woven with textured twisted fibers and colourful threads of memories, whispered from the past.

Each piece of clothing tells a story, familiar as a friend’s face. Evocative as a childhood dream.

Privately hers ~ unique yet universal.

- from the artist’s statement

4. Best of CRAM
New & previously seen artwork by the best of CRAM artists
On display from 8 - 20 January 2010
Opening Reception:  Friday 8 January at 8pm

Celebrating 4 years of unbridled growth and prosperity in The Garden City...

CRAMplex
24 James Street - 2nd Floor
downtown St. Catharines - The Garden City of Niagara
between Christopher's Magazines & Smoke Shop and The Office Tap & Grill
Ontario, Canada
Gallery Hours: when the sandwich board is out and by appointment

Contact: Tobey C. Anderson
Mobile: 905.380.3910
info@cramart.ca

5. OAC Exhibition Assistance
Deadline: Friday 29 January by 5pm at NAC

The Exhibition Assistance program provides grants of $500 to $1,500 to assist individual artists with costs related to presenting their work in confirmed, upcoming exhibitions. Artists apply to third-party recommender organizations located throughout the province. The recommenders are public galleries, artist-run centres and other visual and media arts organizations that administer the Exhibition Assistance program and make grant recommendations to the Ontario Arts Council (OAC).

In the Soil: Niagara’s Homegrown Arts Festival is thrilled to announce the Great Lake Swimmers will headline the ‘Hot Ticket’ event at Centre for the Arts, Brock University on April 23, 2010.  Three of the jury’s top festival picks will have the opportunity to share the stage with Wainfleet native Tony Dekker and his acclaimed band. Their latest album Lost Channels (2009) was nominated for a prestigious Polaris Prize and has landed on countless Best of 2009 lists around the world.

Musicians, theatre and dance artists, poets, filmmakers and media artists of all levels of experience are invited to apply by January 29, 2010 for one of 60 showcasing opportunities in the festival set to take over downtown St. Catharines from April 15 – 24, 2010.

New additions to the 2010 festival include new and improved showcase opportunities for theatre and dance and a call for media artist proposals to be featured in street-level installations in downtown St. Catharines.

In its first year, 175 artists shared the fruits of their artistic offerings as part of a week of specially programmed events. This year, a jury composed of seasoned professionals will once again select artists to participate in the late spring harvest. Applications are available for download at www.inthesoil.on.ca/apply.html and will close on January 29, 2010.

Tickets for the Great Lake Swimmers HOT TICKET night at the Centre for the Arts on Friday, April 23 at 7:30 p.m. are available online at www.arts.brocku.ca, by phone through the Box Office at 905.688.5550 x3257 or toll free at 1-866-617-3257, Monday to Friday, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m. and Saturday 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. Tickets are only $20 and $5 for high school students through the eyeGO to the Arts program.

The seed for In the Soil was planted by a partnership that will bring Brock University and downtown St. Catharines together to grow a home for the arts in Niagara. Partners include: Centre for the Arts, Brock University, the St. Catharines & Area Arts Council, Suitcase in Point Theatre Company, Pulse Niagara, the Niagara Artists Centre and Yummy Recordings.

In the Soil gratefully acknowledges the support of The City of St. Catharines, The Ontario Trillium Foundation and the Arts Presentation Canada Development Support Program offered by the Department of Canadian Heritage.

Applications are available for download at www.inthesoil.on.ca/apply.html and will close on Friday 29 January 2010.

8. Learn Photoshop in Six Classes
Next class begins Wednesday 20 January 6-8pm

Classes are Wednesday evenings from 6-8pm

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