These are dry times. Summer slips away faster than you can catch it – a dime down the drain. The sky hangs damp and icy today. Across the globe, powerful little men toy with the world’s future like it’s a game of chicken. Hurricanes have ravaged large parts of our earth. Families will suffer the effects for years to come. Terrorists won’t let London sleep.
This planet can get so ugly. So broken. So disordered. So many of our mirrors are shattered.
There is order in beauty. A divine order, I believe, but whatever your theology you can feel it. The affirmation of disparate parts falling into place.
Jennifer Berkenbosch’s Cultivar matters because the world needs beauty today. We need to be reminded that there is goodness. There is a solid bed beneath this wild river.
Is it a good idea to let people colour all over the walls?
I trust it will be worth it–something in my gut tells me that–but is it wise?
I'm wrestling with this Saturday morning, just before we open Borys Tarasenko's Sweet Jesus at the Bleeding Heart Art Space.
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What is the best thing you’ve ever made?
I put this question, or some version of it, to friends sitting in my cold basement. We are sipping wine and turning philosophical.
Our answers turn us backward, pulling out relics for show and tell. We are older now. I wonder if we’ll always see our best moments in the rear view mirror, glazed over with the false fondness of memory?
Are your greatest achievements in the past or in the future?
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I've never altered a book before.
Sure, I've highlighted and underlined and jammed a thousand sticky notes into the pages to mine the goodness from a book for posterity. But I have never transformed a book into a work of art.
Tonight, Penny Torres is going to teach me how to alter a book.
You have something to say–why not say it here? Email your blog post idea to dave@bleedingheartart.space and let's chat.
Thursday evening, February 18, I'm preparing for guests. I've just returned from the Latin market next door with a bag of spicy tortilla chips and refreshing salsa verde. Now I'm looking for bowls and plates and the teapot in the backroom of Bleeding Heart Art Space.
The early arrivals are helping. We set out chairs and plug in the kettle. We place tea and sugar next to insulated cups. Penny arrives and plugs in a crock pot full of Mexican deliciousness.
It's time for another ArtLuck.
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Saturday afternoon I am listening to Lana Whiskeyjack's artist talk.
Her show, the name of which I cannot pronounce, has just opened at the Bleeding Heart Art Space. She is telling us about these beautiful women she has painted and photographed. She is telling us stories of strength and resilience; power and grace. Then she speaks of language.
In residential schools, her ancestors were told not to speak their mother tongue. They were punished if they spoke it. I've heard of this particular indignity many times lately. How children had their language stolen from them. How children would return to their parents unable to communicate.
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In a couple of weeks, Bleeding Heart Art Space, the little gallery I lead, will open a show that is more ambitious than anything we’ve tried before.
A double-show, really. A gallery exhibit involving physical paintings and projected photographs. A massive outdoor installation involving 50 some trees arranged into a circular ‘forest’ pathway. So much is involved here. Connecting with artists and hashing out ideas. Permits and logistics. The physical labour of pruning 50 trees of their branches and building stands for every tree. There are costs attached to all of this.
None of those things scare me much. In those tasks, at least, I have some idea what I’m doing. Reconciliation scares me. Opening the doorway to a conversation about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in this country scares me. Because what do I know?
What does a white male possibly know about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women?
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A busy day is waiting for me. There is not much time to write this morning before I head to an all day field trip with my daughter. In about eight minutes, things start rolling and they won’t stop all day. First, I want to pause and thank you.
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I want to empower you to achieve what you hope for this year. I want to empower myself to reach some lofty goals. I think I have just the trick up my sleeve we require. We'll make our resolutions in reverse.
But first, a confession. I broke some major resolutions in 2015. Some of those failures were very public. I’m embarrassed by them.
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Based on Google Analytics’ Unique Page Views (meaning actual different people who looked at the content), here are the ten most popular Bleeding Heart Blog posts of 2015.
Opening these numbers up is a little humbling for me. Many of these posts hover around 100 readers, which I realize is not a massive number. But it’s a number that has grown and will continue to grow. Especially when I watch our social media communities continue to grow. And it’s a real number, and I hope when you look at your own real numbers, these give you some perspective.
Numbers are only valuable, of course, for what they mean. What they teach us.
You have something to say–why not say it here? Email your blog post idea to dave@bleedingheartart.space and let's chat.
We’ve covered a lot of ground in our first year in Alberta Avenue home. Opening late November 2014, we set out to create an art space, sacred space and community space in the heart of the revitalization of our neighbourhood. We’ve done that in so many ways this past year, and I’ve learned a lot on the journey.
In a year that included the shutdown of our founding church family and nearly five hundred visitors in one weekend, how could we not learn some lessons?
Here are some highlights from 2015, month by month. Not everything is covered, but like me, you'll find plenty to celebrate on this list. With each month, I’ll share one of many lessons learned, too.
You have something to say–why not say it here? Email your blog post idea to dave@bleedingheartart.space and let's chat.
