Decorative Arts in | Les arts décoratifs au Canada SPRING | SUMMER 2014

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BOTANICAL ART Dye Plants and Emerald Ash Borer | Flowering Passion | Diaphanous Folds A Victorian Brooch Deconstructed Ornamentum Spring | Summer 2014 Volume 31 Number 1-2 Contents ornamentum Decorative Arts in Canada / Les arts décoratifs au Canada © copyright, the contributors Cover image: watercolour of cyclamen, by Jean Johnson. See page 6. Ornamentum defines decorative arts as creative work, frequently of a practical or useful nature, produced by an artist, craftsperson, or amateur, which has intrinsic aesthetic and/or historical value. These arts include , furniture and furnishings, ceramics, glass, metalwork, graphics, textiles, theatre arts, aspects of , industrial and . 14 Financial support for Ornamentum has been provided by the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $20.1 million in writing and publishing throughout Canada; the Ontario Arts Council; the Macdonald Stewart Foundation. 28 Cette publication a été réalisée grâce à l’appui du Conseil des Arts du Canada, qui a investi 20,1 millions de dollars l’an dernier dans les lettres et l’édition à travers le Canada; Le Conseil des arts de l’Ontario; la Fondation Macdonald Stewart. Subscription information Email [email protected], see www.ornamentum.ca or write to Box 235, Station Q, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4T 2M1. Annual subscription $20.00 (2 issues). 6

Publisher Harriet Bunting-Weld Editor John Fleming Managing and Associate Editor Lorraine Johnson 5 editorial Botanical Art John Fleming Editorial Assistant Lindsay Rose-McLean 6 the Diaphanous Folds of Botanical Art: The Work of Jean Johnson Circulation Martha Wilder Art direction and design Adams + Associates John Fleming Design Consultants Inc. Pre-press and printing 10 the Colours of Nature: Dye Plants and Design The Lowe-Martin Group Thea Haines and Rachel MacHenry

EDITORIAL ENQUIRY & ADVERTISING CORRESPONDENCE 14 mining Material: The Emerald Ash Borer Noa Bronstein Please send advertising inquiries to [email protected]. 18 the Crying of Lot 222: A Victorian Brooch Deconstructed Unsolicited manuscripts will be considered for Donna Bilak publication. We publish in French and English. Articles accepted will be published in the language in which they are written. For submission guidelines 22 Linking Human to Nature and Hand to Machine: please contact Lorraine Johnson (416) 536-2325 or Marian Bantjes’s Brian Donnelly download them from www.ornamentum.ca. Please send manuscripts, discs, photos and other editorial and advertising matter to: Ornamentum, 26 SPOTLIGHT ON THE COLLECTION: A Flowering Passion for Porcelain: Box 235, Station Q, Toronto, Ontario M4T 2M1. George and Helen Gardiner Rachel Gotlieb Deadline for next issue: 31 July 2014 Printed in Canada ISSN 1718-5211 28 eye, Mind, and Hand in Evolution Sam Carter

34 WHAT TO SEE Decorative Arts Exhibitions across Canada Editorial

Botanical Art

John Fleming

ALTHOUGH THE DECORATIVE IMPULSE in its earliest historic manifestations may be ascribed to human understanding of natural forms and forces as signs with mythic, religious, and spiritual meanings— sun discs, phases of the moon, wave-like repetitions, and the like— it seems generally accepted that the origins of botanical arose as a technique of discovery and classification in the search for plants and flowers with medicinal properties. This practice of discovery and application through visual representations of the material world conveyed both a functional scientific content and a system of aesthetic markers necessary to the identification of that meaning: thus colours to attract certain insects, whether bees to pollinate flowers or other species to feed the insectivorous pitcher-plant. So too can images of a botanical nature be found in a multiplicity of other material produc- tions, in Aboriginal uses of plant materials for dyes, on pottery and ceramics that match contents with container, in still-life paintings and floral watercolours, on sculpted furniture, jewellery, graphics, and in language, as a complex lexicon of floral imagery constructed to express human emotions and rituals, traditionally described as “the language of flowers.”

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 5 THE DIAPHANOUS FOLDS of BOTANICAL ART

The Work of Jean Johnson

John Fleming

BOTANICAL ART HAS BEEN a life-long presence in Jean Johnson’s imagination. She recalls Left from early days recurring walks through fields and woods with her father, an avid gardener and Watercolour of orchid, by Jean Johnson amateur naturalist, who named as they went, in the well-established binomial system of Linnaeus, wildflowers, plants, and shrubs in both common and scientific terms. Thus the bloodroot plant Above Watercolour of bloodroot, (Sanguinaria canadensis), described in Champlain’s Voyages et Explorations (1604) and also in by Jean Johnson Elizabeth Simcoe’s Diary (1792), took root in, and still frames, her botanical vision, through images that now express in her drawings and watercolours the diaphanous effects of the medium: “In the afternoon we entered a lake (Lac des Chênes) five leagues long and two wide, where there are very beautiful islands filled with vines, walnuts and other fine trees...The soil is sandy, and a root is found there which makes a crimson dye, with which the savages paint their faces... ; “…the leaf springs singly from a thick juicy fibrous root, which, on being broken, emits a quantity of liquor from its pores of a bright orange colour: this juice is used by the Indians as a dye, and also in the cure of rheumatic and cutaneous complaints.”1

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 7 It was at Northern Secondary School that the games, through many stages in the business Iris watercolour, Orchid watercolour, single visual look to take in the object and then from the 17th century on. As a member of the by Jean Johnson instinct and directions of a professional career and cultural worlds over the years, Jean by Jean Johnson allowing this first perception to develop freely Botanical Artists of Canada, Jean continues as a visual artist began to take shape during the Johnson’s enthusiasm for watercolours through unmediated imaginative impulses. to practise and promote the unique qualities four-year program in commercial art offered by persists. I asked her “why watercolours?” rather These are the thoughts of an artist whose of watercolour as a kind of antidote to the the school. The Group of Seven was in the air, than any of the other materials and techniques understanding of the medium is deeply felt and shrinking presence and fewer contacts we may and Canadian landscapes were on the walls of that had formed her background at Northern practised in a spirit of collaboration with paper, have with flowers and plants in a postmodern many Canadian homes. In tune with the times, Secondary in fonts, illustration, life drawing, pen or brush, and pigments. age of electronic distractions. market conditions, and personal inclination, painting, sculpture, etc. The answer was In addition to her activity as a watercolourist, Jean’s first chance of a job after graduation immediate and direct: watercolour supplies Jean Johnson is a lecturer and amateur John Fleming is Editor of Ornamentum. presented itself as a choice between dull lightness and delicacy of touch; it is luminous historian of botanical art in its scientific commercialism and working for Art and Design and colourful in effect; its innate fragility and beginnings, its medical, topographical, and Notes Studios, a company producing Captain Marvel apparent transience convey the essence of an aesthetic uses, and a proponent of the many 1 Mary Alice Downey and Mary Hamilton, ‘and some comics, owing to an embargo related to paper object such as botanicals; and it leaves an ways in which watercolour representations of brought flowers’ Plants in a New World (Toronto Buffalo shortages on U.S. comics entering Canada. impression with the viewer altogether more the natural world have left a compelling visual London: University of Toronto Press, 1980), 20. Drawing skills were the basic ingredient for this life-like and truthful than an image in oils. and encyclopaedic representation of early travel newcomer to the art scene, attaching character And, of course, there are the “lines,” that is, and contemporaneous scientific discoveries. heads provided by the company to bodies and the basic component of drawing—outlines, Of particular interest to her in recent years are action backgrounds to be created and called parts, profiles, composition, structure. Jean native plants, bulbs and perennials, inspired by to life by the talismanic “Shazam!” also spoke about “contact drawing,” a technique those childhood memories of botanizing with From these heroic beginnings in the age sometimes used to discover an aptitude for her father, and discovery of the many texts of of action comics, now revisited in our own drawing in a beginner, or by professionals, to early explorers and colonists who have left a electronic times in movies and computer create a more spontaneous image by using a record in words and often images, of local flora

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 9 The COLOURS of NATURE

Dye Plants and Design

Thea Haines and Rachel MacHenry

Photographs by APPLYING DECORATIVE COLOUR undertaken by colourists in these print houses, Thea Haines obtained from natural sources—plants, which resulted in natural dyes being used on insects and minerals—is an ancient practice, an industrial scale. Dye-house colourists were with evidence of natural colourants being highly valued and respected scientists, and their found in textile fragments from as early as research can be linked to much of the under- 2500 BC. The practice of dyeing and mordanting standing we have of colour theory today. cloth was recorded by Pliny and Herodotus. Scientific advancements that facilitated the Textile trade was vital to Europe’s economy large-scale use of natural dyes made way for the during the Renaissance and Enlightenment development of synthesized colour and had a periods, and the cultivation, processing and broad impact on the textile industry in the form manufacturing of fibres and dyestuffs played of mechanization and innovations in chemistry a crucial role. Exploration and colonization led and pharmacy. to new sources of colour with the discovery of Interest in natural dyes and dyeing is exotic products such as cochineal, indigo and currently undergoing a global revival. Fuelling logwood. Natural dyes were hot commodities, this resurgence is a growing awareness of the some so prized that they were more expensive potential for harm from by-products of the than gold. There was heavy trade in printed industrial dye process and greater understand- textiles from India, where skilled dyeing and ing of the environmental issues related to printing techniques produced colourful cloth textile production. that was sophisticated and complex, far beyond Interest in local colour is evident in the anything produced in Europe’s printworks. spread of community-based dye gardens that European reconnaissance into Indian textile seek to provide accessible natural dye informa- dyeing and printing techniques amounted to tion, such as the Textile Arts Center’s Sewing Left industrial espionage; scouts were sent to India Seeds garden project in . In this Naturally dyed yarns to research techniques that could be replicated garden, dye plants are raised in an abandoned by European print houses. Above left city lot, creating a community green and Onion skins In Europe during the mid-18th to mid-19th providing dye material for project participants. centuries, intense scientific and empirical As well, free workshops and tours offer local Above right research into the complex chemical and residents the opportunity to learn about plants, Chamomile, Chelsea Physic Garden physical properties of natural colour was harvesting and extraction processes, and dye

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 11 THE PROCESS OF NATURAL DYEING to create more somber tones. Once fabric purples, violets, browns and blacks, begins with mordanting, which facilitates is mordanted, dyes can be applied either depending on processing conditions. the chemical bond of dye to cloth, by direct applications such as hand- Other dyes are highly sensitive to changes increases colour permanency and painting, stenciling or printing, or in pH; cochineal can produce as many as enhances or alters the resulting hue. through immersion methods. 60 different shades of red with differing pH Alum, or potassium aluminum sulfate, The richness of tone and harmonious levels. Natural dyes are not limited to use a naturally occurring mineral salt, colour palette produced by natural on textiles, but may be applied to any is the most commonly used mordant. dyes can be credited to their molecular natural substance—leather, fur, bone, It brightens plant dyes on all fibres and structure. Typically, synthetic dyes consist grasses and any protein or cellulose fibre. has been used in dye houses for millennia. of a single colouring molecule, whereas Diverse materials can be dyed together Tannins, especially useful as a mordant most natural dyes contain several different in one dyebath, resulting in an array for plant fibres, are found in many nut- colours belonging to different chemical of shades, as each fibre accepts the bearing trees; those derived from the bark, groups. Madder contains as many as 18 colour differently. acorns and galls of oaks have long been chemically different pigments, and can used in the tanning of leather. Oak-gall produce a vast range of shades, ranging tannin combines especially well with iron from pinks to corals, oranges, reds,

Left techniques. The educational mandate of such wonderful Chelsea Physic Garden in London, Osage orange dye swatches projects focuses on teaching the next generation UK (established in 1673), where dye plants

Top left about the many uses of plants not only as from around the world are grown, or the Goldenrod, Horniman Museum sources of food, but as sources of medicine, recreated dyer’s garden at Black Creek Pioneer Dye Garden fibre and colour. At Sasha Duerr’s Edible Village in Toronto, Ontario, which preserves

Top right Schoolyard in California, schoolchildren learn the plants used by early European settlers Golden marguerite–dyer’s about raising fibre and dye plants; Duerr to dye their home-grown clothing. chamomile, Chelsea Physic Garden outlines a process she calls “garden to garment” A number of North American to help children connect the plants they see and artists are becoming known for their growing with the clothing they are wearing. use of natural colorants. Canadian Jolanta A number of art and design institutions Prochnowski’s simple clothing collections for have recently established dye gardens, includ- women are based on muted and sophisticated ing the London College of in the UK naturally dyed surface treatments, while and Sheridan College’s Craft and Design Homefrocks, a New Mexico-based label, program in Oakville, Ontario, where a garden is offers richly coloured garments with historic currently under development. Campus gardens references. Mackenzie Frere, based in Alberta, allow the entire process of growing, harvesting, focuses his art practice on a refined use of processing and dyeing to be integrated into natural dyes in his hand-woven installation the curriculum, and give students maximum pieces while Brian Vu of Toronto creates access to design and research opportunities. interiors collections by over-dyeing military Classical dye plant names evoke the global surplus with natural indigo. history of textiles: woad, madder, lady’s The distinct qualities of natural dyes are bedstraw and dyer’s broom. Unassuming part of their appeal. The associated historical common plants from our region yield surpris- narrative, the connection to raw materials, the ing colour. Roadside goldenrod gives a range capricious nature of each colour, and even the of greens and golds; black walnut hulls, elaborate process of working them, all lend to considered so troublesome to the urban the cachet and appeal of natural dyes. gardener, give rich deep browns, while sumac berries and oak galls both provide tannins Thea Haines is a natural dye researcher and teaches used in the mordant process. The richness of at Sheridan College in Oakville. this global plant record can be traced through Rachel MacHenry is a textile whose work a number of historical gardens, such as the focuses on sustainable artisan production.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 13 Mining MATERIAL

The Emerald Ash Borer

Noa Bronstein

IN RECENT YEARS, concepts of greening, repurposing and using salvaged microscopic structure of ash wood. In a What often makes Eunson’s works so materials have not only guided the design of spaces and objects, but have rigorously detailed process, the physical seductive is the realization of a kind of illusion- entered the public vernacular in unprecedented ways. Our collective interest properties of ash wood’s molecular structure ary landscape. The ash wall panelling is a prime in responsible methods of production, fabrication and distribution has led are magnified, abstracted in low relief, modelled example of this kind of approach, as the pattern to greater focus on the relationship between consumers, makers and with 3-D software, and then cut into the wood takes on a kind of lunar landscape. It is both socio-environmental accountability. itself using a Computer Numerical Control familiar and foreign. This topographical One recent example of new challenges sparking new solutions can (CNC) machine. The resulting wall panel takes rendering is partially accomplished via the be found in the work of several designers who have created functional on the formal qualities of a photograph recast blackened surface, which is in fact a burnt pieces using wood from trees destroyed by the emerald ash borer. Since as sculptural object (see page 17), a leveraging finish. While seemingly at odds with the more this non-native, invasive pest was discovered in Detroit in 2002, it has been of the documentary impulse to capture the archetypical, unfinished appearance of salvaged attacking and killing ash trees in Ontario and parts of the United States. inherent qualities of material and the com- wood projects, the finish is completely natural It is estimated that the cost of removing and disposing of dead ash trees plexities of this particular species of wood. and unsealed. According to Eunson, this makes will cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. In an effort to promote Pattern and form are leitmotifs that inform the carbon essence of the material more the productive use of this wood, IIDEX Canada partnered with Ideacious. much of Eunson’s practice. Interested in the accessible. The burnt surface exposes the com to develop IIDEX Woodshop, an exhibition of prototypes and market- universality of pattern, whether related to wood’s continuities and invites a light refrac- ready projects by 15 Toronto-based makers. According to Jeremy mathematic, geological, molecular or celestial tion only afforded by the unique attributes of Vandermeij, Director of Marketing and Sponsorship at IIDEX Canada, geometries, Eunson derives patterns from the fired ash. Engaging a myriad of senses and the project was launched in September 2013 as a way to increase awareness pre-existing systems and applies these towards further contributing to the otherworldly quality, of resource instability, to reduce the number of ash trees headed for the production of what he calls an “organic the wall panelling also has an acoustic compo- landfill and to promote innovative material re-use. minimalism.” While he says that these reductive nent, as the grooves absorb sound. One of the more successful projects featured in IIDEX Woodshop is by forms fail at fully exposing macro complexities, Taking a narrative turn, Rob Southcott Scott Eunson, whose practice operates at the intersection of art and design. Kona Recliner, Miles Keller it is the exploration itself that becomes the and Miles Keller’s projects for IIDEX Woodshop Eunson’s Burned End-grain Ash Wall Panelling offers an investigation into the Felix Wedgwood Photography productive venture. pay homage to Canadiana. Southcott was

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 15 interested in exploring the wood’s region of Left Fort York origin, which in this particular instance was Rob Southcott Fort York in Toronto. As Southcott says, “Fort York started as a concept that referenced Right Burned End-grain the area from which the material was harvested, Ash Wall Panelling but also referenced the battle which Toronto’s Scott Eunson ash population was confronted with.” The maquette-like fort recasts familiar iconography through the lens of a spatial reframing. This project seems a natural extension of Southcott’s orotund practice. Collapsing art and design, Southcott’s works are assemblages of formal representations that are at once pared-back and un-ornamented while imbued with humour, memory and nostalgia. Miles Keller also takes this approach by marrying two enduring design typologies—the snowshoe and the chaise longue. Shrinking down (the fort) and magnifying (the snowshoe) familiar structural typologies teases out a new dimen- sion to these immediately recognizable forms, and in both instances the maker is able to exploit scale to expose nuances in the scaffold. As with several other projects at IIDEX Woodshop, the design for Miles Keller’s Kona Recliner is derived from the properties of the wood. Through an intensive research process, Keller’s team learned that white ash is a particularly tough native wood with high shock Immediately recognizable in these projects absorbency, which makes it an ideal material is that the design, materiality and ideation for tools, baseball bats and hockey sticks. The operate in tangent. Perhaps this is the appeal cell structure of ash allows the wood to be bent of using repurposed resources, apart from the easily by steam, a process that has yielded many obvious “do good” value. Rather than taking familiar objects, including snowshoes. Wanting concept from that which is exterior, the nucleus a challenge, the team decided to design a of the design is derived from the matter, as the sizable object and the chaise provided an material itself is didactic. A veteran of using additional opportunity to consider ergonomics. reclaimed materials, Lars Dressler, one-half Experimenting with the mesh seating resulted of the design duo behind the Brothers Dressler, in a CNC-cut leather pattern that is akin to the explains that using repurposed resources snowshoe yet circumvents the derivative. provides the opportunity to consider layered Further exploring the historic trajectory of provenances. Sharing this perspective, Scott traditional ash wood products, Keller used Eunson notes that the act of reclaiming is about traditional steam-bending techniques to acknowledging a deep history, and that materi- produce the frame of the recliner; instead of als are often permeated by a social patina. It is using nails and screws, he designed a system of through this patina that the material is permit- discrete wooden wedges and ramped slots that ted a kind of agency beyond “tree-ness.” holds the leather in place. Keller recounts that one of the most interesting experiences during the design process was being able to hand- Noa Bronstein is a curator and researcher based select the wood from the urban woodlot where in Toronto. She has held positions at the Design the tree grew and then died, explaining that Exchange and the Gladstone Hotel and is currently urban wood draws elements from the soil, such the Head of Exhibitions and Publications at Gallery as iron, which translate to unique patterns and 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography. colours that might not appear in rural areas.

16 | Spring Summer 2014 | ornamentum Donna Bilak A SNAPSHOT IN TIME. It was early in the afternoon on September 9th, 2013, when Lot 222 came up on the block at Waddington’s Jewellery and Watch Auction in Toronto. Described in the catalogue as a 19th-century 18kt yellow gold brooch weighing 16 grams, its oval body was decorated with a simple filigree pattern embellished with gold granules, its centre set with faceted purple-toned garnets arranged to form a six-petalled flower. From its place in the auction house showroom, this piece of jewellery evinced silent testimony to a bygone era by virtue of its design and materials. If this brooch could talk, what stories would it have to tell about the society in which it was the past, on the other, was fuelled by an worn? Who was its first owner, and how did it ongoing series of important archaeological end up for sale in an auction room in southern digs. Notable excavations included the 1859 Ontario? While we may never know its full discovery of the royal tomb of the Egyptian story, the brooch itself constitutes a fascinating queen Ahhotep (circa 1560-1530 BC), made at a material embodiment of certain 19th-century time when construction of the Suez Canal cultural trends. Indeed, it was created during from 1859 to 1869 drew attention to Egypt’s a period of British North American history ancient past. In Italy, significant caches of distinguished by the Industrial Revolution, Etruscan jewellery were excavated from three World Fairs, and Grand Tours to Continental different tomb sites dating from the 7th century Europe—the technological and cultural BC: the Regolini-Galassi tomb at Cerveteri hallmarks of 19th-century society. What makes (1836), as well as the Barberini tomb (1855) and this brooch so interesting is that, in fact, it is an the Bernardini tomb (1876) at Palestrina. In 1873, amalgamation of two distinct jewellery genres Mycenaean gold treasures were discovered in popular in Victorian England. Its body reflects Asia Minor by Heinrich Schliemann, a wealthy the style known as “archaeological revival,” and self-educated merchant-turned-archaeolo- which emerged from popular interest in gist who believed he had found the fabled contemporary archaeological excavations. ancient city of Troy. Yet the garnet floret embodies what is referred The Victorians also experienced classical to as “the language of flowers,” the term used antiquity through the Grand Tour, a fashionable for the 19th-century social convention of educational experience embraced in particular expressing sentiment by using flowers whose by affluent British classes in the 18th century. meanings were codified in floral lexicons. Indeed, British Grand Tourists collected The use of gold and filigree decoration in voraciously on their trips, and while Napoleonic Lot 222 is characteristic of the 19th-century wars interrupted such excursions, recreational vogue for souvenir jewellery rendered in the travel around the Continent resumed after 1814. archaeological revival style, often acquired on For Victorian tourists, the Castellani atelier in visits to Italy as part of a continental Grand Rome was an obligatory stop on the Grand Tour, Tour. Archaeological revival-style jewellery where ancient jewellery was on display and The CRYING of LOT 222 characteristically featured yellow gold surfaces exquisite reproductions made by the firm could embellished with geometric patterns comprised be purchased by visitors as a memento of their of gold granules, suggestive of the Etruscan trip. Founded by Fortunato Pio Castellani A Victorian Brooch goldsmithing technique of granulation, as well (1794-1865), the firm was managed by his two Opposite page as filigree wire twisted into such classic designs sons, Alessandro (1823-1883) and Augusto Deconstructed Floral dictionary, 1842 Image courtesy Thomas Fisher as the egg-and-dart motif, palmettes, and (1829-1914), after he retired in 1852. Castellani Rare Book Library, University of scrolling or fret-work lines. This genre of became the most influential firm working in Toronto jewellery and the culture of the Grand Tour what became known as the archaeological Top right intersect in interesting ways. In a period defined revival style, which generally fell into two 19th-century 18kt yellow gold on the one hand by industrial and scientific stylistic categories: close copies of the ancient brooch with garnets Image courtesy Waddington’s achievements, the Victorian fascination with original or fanciful interpretations. The

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 19 jewellery creations by Castellani essentially set small, pocket-sized books, were collected and 19th-century brooch ribbon-like gold border. Here, the flower is Image courtesy Waddington’s the standard for this genre, and the firm’s rise to admired in England and North America, and immediately recognizable as the forget-me-not international fame was rooted in their participa- were frequently given as gifts between women. by virtue of its faithful depiction of form, yet tion in the excavation of Etruscan tombs during The morphology of the pansy flower is based its characteristic blue colour is absent. As a the 1830s, which yielded exquisitely wrought upon six heart-shaped petals: two large and piece of jewellery created to commemorate gold jewellery among other ancient artifacts. overlapping petals comprise its top; two side a deceased loved one, the replacement of the Because the Castellani kept abreast of archaeo- petals fill out the left and right side of the forget-me-not blue with white, the colour of logical discoveries, they were able to amass an flower’s face; and the lowermost petal is innocence and purity, assumes heightened extensive collection of Etruscan, Greek and positioned front and centre. The arrangement significance against the black onyx background, Roman pieces, which they studied and copied, of the six gemstones in Lot 222’s floret presents the traditional colour of mourning. and the firm caused a sensation with their a symmetrical interpretation of the pansy; The garnet floret in Lot 222 participates in display of Etruscan-style jewellery at the the triangular shape of the garnets evokes the this Victorian culture of floral signification, London World Exhibition of 1862. heart-shape of the flower’s petals. A verse from and the brooch itself serves as a physical From a material standpoint, Lot 222 reflects the 1840 edition of the floral dictionary The embodiment of sentiment and memory. It may the (then) newfound availability of gold in Sentiment of Flowers, or, Language of Flora thusly meanings and nuances of meanings, and the indeed have been a piece of souvenir jewellery 19th-century Europe in the smooth expanse of summarizes its praise, “...the garden’s gem: | recipient of a floral message would have had acquired during travel, or perhaps purchased at its surface use, while its gold embellishments Heart’s-ease, like a gallant bold, | In his cloth to be certain of the floral dictionary used in a boutique in England. Moreover, 19th-century (the granule beads and twisted wire filigree) of purple and gold…” and also comments on the its composition. However, certain flowers did jewellery catalogues included an array of 1 articulated classical motifs from the decorative pansy’s many variations in colour. Flower have fixed meaning, such as rosemary for archaeological revival-style pieces as part of repertoire of antiquity. During the period in dictionaries also instructed the reader in ways remembrance, ivy for friendship, pansy for the stock in trade. Evocative of the Victorian which Lot 222 was created, jewellery rendered to create flower arrangements to express thoughts, and the eponymous forget-me-not. interest in the classical past, and an eloquent entirely in gold constituted a novelty, at a time specific messages between sender and recipi- The forget-me-not provides a useful case expression of the popular sentiment “think of when earlier 19th-century wars and campaigns ent. On this point, the 1878 floral dictionary study about the flexibility of the Victorian me” conveyed by the pansy floret, Lot 222 had depleted European reserves. This situation The Language of Flowers and Floral Conversation language of flowers as transposed in jewellery. presents us with a fusion of genres as well as a changed with Californian and Australian gold A small, five-petalled bright blue flower, the customized statement of emotion. That said, it discoveries in 1849 and 1851 respectively, so forget-me-not was a popular motif in 19th- is difficult to ascertain when this marriage of that by the 1860s, a significant increase in the century pins, rings, bracelets, lockets, and styles was made, though it likely occurred availability of gold marked the production earrings. The bright blue colour of this flower during the late 19th or early 20th century. But of revival-style jewellery. was rendered either in cabochon-cut turquoise this much is certain: at some point, some owner With regard to the gold work in Lot 222, its stone or turquoise-coloured enamel. Jewelled wished to personalize this piece, possibly central garnet floret appears incongruous with forget-me-not pieces were often given as tokens taking the garnet floret from a ring or pin and the archaeological revival idiom in which the of love and/or friendship. Notably, the “forget- having a jeweller join it to the brooch. As an body of the brooch is rendered. This is because me-not” sentiment could be conveyed not object lesson, this is what a reading of the the central floret is, without doubt, from an only by the flower but also by its distinctive design and the materials of Lot 222 tells us. entirely different piece of jewellery. Even though turquoise blue colour. The human element (the interwoven acts of the scale of the garnet floret is well matched to The following two examples of 19th-century acquiring-giving-receiving-wearing) is more fit the concave centre of the brooch in terms of brooches aptly illustrate how forget-me-not difficult to recreate, yet this is what imparts width and height, it looks to have been either The Language of Flowers flower jewellery played with form and colour meaning to the object. While much of the and Floral Conversation personal story of Lot 222 has been lost in the superimposed upon, or have replaced, a by Charles W. Seelye, 1878 to express meaning. On the one hand, we see a pre-existing central element whose edge can Image courtesy Thomas Fisher brooch designed as an oval-shaped floral frame transit of time, this brooch is like a jewelled Rare Book Library, University of time capsule of events and ideas of a still be seen in the photograph as a repeating Toronto comprised of generic white and yellow gold pattern of gold granule beads set between flowers interspersed with crescent shapes, past world. scallop shapes. This purple-toned garnet floret provides diverse examples. For example, which forms the setting for a piece of polished Donna Bilak holds a PhD from the Bard Graduate also has a particular story to tell about 19th- to say “Your modesty and moral and intellectual pearly-white agate that has a decorative flower Center: Decorative Arts, , Material century society, for it is designed as a pansy, worth inspire my love and devotion” you would design riveted to it made from gold and set with Culture (NYC). also known as “heart’s ease.” According to the assemble a posy containing sweet violet turquoise stones. Interestingly, this particular Victorian language of flowers—the sophisticated, (for “Modesty”), mignonette (“Moral and brooch evokes the idea of the forget-me-not Notes encoded floral vocabulary that governed flower Intellectual Worth”), lavender, or red rosebud flower through colour, conveyed by the 1 Anonymous, The Sentiment of Flowers, or, Language of arrangements used by Victorians to articulate (“Confession of Love”), and heliotrope turquoise cabochons, as the itself Flora. Embracing an Account of Nearly Three-Hundred 2 Different Flowers, with their Powers in Language feelings and emotions—the pansy signaled (“Devotion”). Conversely, “I disdain a fop” is not botanically accurate. On the other hand, (Philadelphia:Lea & Blanchard, 1840), 234-5. “think of me,” derived from the French verb required a yellow carnation to articulate and in contrast, the example of the rectangular- penser, “to think.” Floral dictionaries were “Disdain,” in combination with the cockscomb, shaped mourning brooch features a forget-me- 2 Charles W. Seelye, The Language of Flowers and Floral 3 popular publications throughout the 19th signifying “A fop.” While hugely popular, floral not spray rendered in seed pearls set into a Conversation (Rochester, 1878), 60. century on both sides of the Atlantic. These dictionaries were not standardized in all black onyx background framed by a scrolling, 3 Ibid.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 21 LINKING HUMAN to NATURE and HAND to MACHINE Marian Bantjes’s Designs

Brian Donnelly HISTORY SUGGESTS THAT even the this was, she notes, “in no way a creative most unexpected twists and turns never come process.” Ten years there led to another completely from nowhere. Narratives of the professional challenge as a founding partner career of designer and artist Marian Bantjes in a rapidly growing and busy design firm, always note her sudden rise, “bursting” onto Digitopolis. After a decade, she took a buyout the scene in 2003, an overnight sensation at age to afford herself a sabbatical, and immediately Images by 40. Her commitment to pattern and ornament began to work in the curvaceous and florid Marian Bantjes combines in a fresh style that places her both style that catapulted her to success, rendered alongside the stars of the design world and in her own hand and on her own terms. somehow a little to one side, on the outside, Despite the fame and acclaim she has earned, or even heading in the opposite direction. it can be hard to easily reconcile her work with Bantjes has been called a “designer’s the logic, rigour and geometry we most often designer,” but she also refers to herself as associate with and professional outside of the mainstream in design, as though visual communication. The elements of the her independence and insistence on personal page—the use of colour, the rhythm and flow expression place her in another category of the layout and the cropped shapes of the entirely—not strictly a communication or photographs, even the shapes of the letterforms graphic designer, but not quite an illustrator themselves—are all abstract elements, some- either. She prefers the term “graphic artist,” thing we may overlook in our rush to under- in recognition of her ongoing attempt to do stand the message and get the “meaning.” the impossible: “make a living doing something The open-ended nature of non-representational that I loved.” Meanwhile, critical response from or evocative form would seem to make the one of the leading lights in the design field, central visual concern of design a matter of Rick Valicenti, sums her up as, “Perhaps the purely aesthetic distinction and a careful and most important, conceptually complete pleasing sense of order. But you won’t get far designer of our time.” telling senior art directors or large corporate Her background incorporates abrupt shifts. clients to buy your idea because you think it Opposite page How Are You After a year at Emily Carr University of Art just looks really good. Ballpoint pen/digital and Design in , she stumbled into More likely, the struggle to control and March 2006 a job with book publisher Hartley and Marks, discipline the essentially abstract nature of Top right working as a typesetter. She was taught to design explains why professionals are at such I Want It All follow instructions “to the letter,” correcting pains to assert that research, logic and a clear Peony petals June 2006 technical details the designer overlooked; rationale are the true principles of good work.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 23 Michael Bantjes Identity and call for entries Vector, pencil and photograph for Graphex Awards 2006 2008 September 2005

Beauty and pleasure were rendered anathema and Gothic blackletter, Aesthetic Movement by machines and the modern sometime in the interiors, and even the geometry of art deco 1960s (much earlier in Europe); the postmodern and the Dutch modernist avant-garde. served up a riot of shape and historical pastiche, Clients include magazines and book but all in the name of an anti-aesthetic. No one publishers (she designed her own artist’s book, has yet made the design world truly safe for I Wonder, published in 2010); paper company playful curves, vegetative ornament, and promotions and wrapping papers; clothing beautifully obsessive detail. Bantjes has designs and retailers from Saks Fifth Avenue certainly challenged the confidence of design’s to snowboarding companies; art galleries, small paradigms, even if it’s hard to argue they have companies and individuals, not for profit events yet been supplanted. and enterprises, and commissioned work from Her work broke out quickly and forcefully other well-established and well-known in the mid-2000s because it was both visually designers, many in the United States. pleasing and structurally coherent and She works on the digital screen, largely forefront. Bantjes’s work suggests it has always seemingly anti-modern attitudes as curiosity, convincing. It uses references to history and in vector-based software that unleashes her been easier and perhaps more convincing wonder, joy, surprise, and humour. the decorative canon in such an overwhelming uncanny knack for curves; but also by hand, to celebrate the sheer visual pleasure of the Her originality and independence, in other and confident way that you can’t help but get in ink, pencil and ballpoint pen; sometimes natural world in expressive design than in the words, are not purely in the name of style or it. The familiar gets reworked so thoroughly in oil paint; or with letterforms from leaves self-critical and anti-aesthetic precincts of simple visual pleasure. She has commented it bypasses your critical filters to work directly nibbled and shaped by her fingernails. Grains contemporary art. She also demonstrates how on her appreciation for the social and political on the visual pleasure centres, like a flood of sugar swirl about, blurring the boundary the sheer visual variety of botany is easier to ideals that underlay the machines and mass of dopamine. between word and pattern; even nail polish integrate across the spectrum of challenges production of modernism. She looks to the Bantjes is aware of the potential side effects and laser burning in wood have been incorpo- and assignments in the typical design practice. past, and natural inspiration, to dig deep into of playing with feel-good visual drugs. She told rated. Bantjes famously “typeset” the phrase Like most designers, Bantjes shows she is designers’ motives, not just as a source of an interviewer that, “I’m terrified of the hordes “I want it all” using fallen peony leaves. free to adopt and adapt ornamental, natural forms to copy. Perhaps through her sheer (of mostly young women) who love [her work, (This last work, she notes, “smelled fantastic.”) inspiration in a wide variety of ways. Floral and invention, Marian Bantjes can teach us to leap but also] unicorns and fairies and hearts.” Indeed, the direct use of natural materials, vegetative patterns arise more naturally, as it over the functionalist rejection of ornament But Bantjes very rarely falls properly into the shapes and motifs is perhaps what places her were, in solving communication problems than and find something approaching a “utopian… categories of kitsch or Disney; there is usually farthest outside the current mainstream, as in forging the often restricted signature styles earnestly hopeful outlook,” linking hand to more than enough visual thinking and edgy pixels and algorithms have propelled design of individual artists. machine, and human to nature. complexity to reward, even compel, close far from the “natural” (now necessarily For all her natural sources, however, looking and careful appreciation. rendered in quotes) into the virtual and Bantjes is disinclined to accept commissions Her radical calligraphy (normally a manmade. Her intention is not to regress, from those who see her work as merely “type Bantjes has written and published a monograph and conservative and minor genre within design) however, or devolve back to nature (although with a bunch of bullshit curlicues coming off it.” catalogue résumé of her work. See Marian Bantjes, variously evokes plant tendrils, heart and skulls, she does now live on bucolic Bowen Island). (She liberally uses earthy language as well.) Pretty Pictures (New York: Metropolis Books, 2013). arabesques, Arabic calligraphy and tiling, She has stated that she wants to “resurrect She notes that early on, her work backed away medical , symbolist art, First motifs that had been abandoned by modern- from arabesques, allowing her to work through Brian Donnelly is Professor in the Faculty of Nations graphic patterns, tattoos and needle- ism…without being nostalgic.” ornament while resisting “pretty things for Animation, Arts and Design at Sheridan College in point, hot rods and eyelet lace, octopus And always, in the motifs she reclaims, pretty subjects.” Always, there is a structure Oakville, Ontario. He holds a BFA in fine art, a PhD tentacles, Nintendo, Murakami, baroque one finds vegetative imagery, and sometimes underneath her pieces, and her goals are to in art history, and was a practising designer in a architectural details, medieval manuscripts actual flora arranged into letter forms, at the showcase visual invention and invoke such variety of roles for fifteen years.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 25 Spotlight on the Collection

Opposite page concentrated on specific forms, amassing and pears. The fresh fruit often came from Pair of plates from a named botanical dessert service one of the world’s largest and finest public the owner’s hot houses, and represented yet A FLOWERING PASSION New China Derby Works collections of eighteenth-century rococo another symbol of status and wealth. English, circa 1796-1805 Attributed to porcelain perfume bottles and commedia dell’arte These two plates reproduced here come for PORCELAIN William “Quaker” Pegg figures. George Gardiner served on the board from “Pattern 216,” which was in production Soft-paste porcelain, enamel, and gold: 3.2 x 23.2 cm of the Harlequin publishing house, hence his for approximately ten years, and are attributed Origin: Derby, attraction to the dramatic form and the to a leading flower painter, William “Quaker” George and Helen Gardiner Derbyshire, England Gardiner Museum mischievous Harlequin character who played Pegg (1775-1851). Pegg was active between 1796 Gift of George and Helen Gardiner, a starring role in the Commedia series. and 1801, and he most likely drew upon contem- G83.1.1126.1-2 Remarkably, the Gardiners made the porary botanical illustrations from William decision to gift the collection to the nation Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, which Duesberry and build a museum. When a collection is purchased in 1787 to serve as sources for transformed from a private collection to a Derby’s china painters.2 Interestingly, Pegg’s public institution, new meanings unfold.1 father was a gardener who worked at Etwall Hall For example, the Gardiners had a penchant near Derby.3 The younger Pegg apprenticed at for the colour yellow, and their personal taste the Potteries in Staffordshire as a china painter. influenced their decision-making so much that, When he heard John Wesley preach at Hanley to this day, many Gardiner Museum visitors in Staffordshire, he left the Baptist Church and Rachel Gotlieb ask if yellow was a popular colour amongst joined the Society of Friends. Because of his eighteenth-century porcelain manufacturers religious beliefs, which discouraged ornamenta- and consumers. The answer is no, just one tion as it was perceived as a form of vanity, preferred by the original collectors and he stopped decorating and worked instead at founders of the museum. a stocking manufacturer. Fortunately, however, A pair of delightful botanical plates made he returned to china painting in 1813. by New China Derby Works between circa In all, the Gardiners bought 16 yellow-ground 1796-1805, a manufacturer operated by botanical pieces of dessert tableware by New William Duesberry II, evidences the Gardiners’ China Derby Works to create a small service. privileging of the colour yellow. The Gardiners The pieces are currently on display at the purchased the plates from a London antique Gardiner Museum for all to enjoy. store in 1979. One plate is filled with lush renderings of rose buds, and the other with Rachel Gotlieb is Chief Curator at the Gardiner tulips, and both are encircled by brilliant yellow Museum of in Toronto. ground rims with plain and foliate wreaths in gilt. They are signed in blue on the back with Notes the names of the flowers, “Moss Rose Buds” 1 Ruth Formanek,“Why they Collect; collectors reveal and “Tulips,” respectively. their motivations,” in Susan M. Pearce, Museums, New China Derby Works specialized in large Objects and Collections (Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 334-5. dinner and dessert services featuring named, hand-painted topographical views of Derby or 2 Patricia Ferguson, “The Nature of Dessert,” Rachel Gotlieb COLLECTORS ARE MOTIVATED to collect build an encyclopedic collection illustrating botanical images. The dessert course was a Potpourri (Fall 1999), 7. for myriad reasons that often overlap: for the history of world ceramics. This manner of potent sign of elite status in the eighteenth 3 John Murdoch, John Twitchett, Painters and the personal pleasure, scholarship and edification, collecting has been in favour since the nine- century because it was a luxury affordable to Derby China Works (Trefoil: London, 1987), 62. preservation and prosperity, and for financial teenth century. However, what is remarkable few, as was the medium of porcelain since the investment. George and Helen Gardiner, the about the Gardiners is that their collecting material was extremely difficult and expensive founders of the Gardiner Museum of Ceramic taste covered a wide temporal, material and to make. A dessert service in the late eighteenth Art in Toronto, which opened thirty years ago geographic range: pottery from Ancient century typically comprised 24 plates, two on March 6, 1984, collected for all these reasons America, sixteenth-century Italian Maiolica, covered tureens for sugar and cream with and more. Most importantly, and typical of most seventeenth-century tin-glaze English stands and ladles, 13 compotiers or serving collectors, they had a passion for a particular Deftware, eighteenth-century German Meissen, dishes, footed centre dishes, ice pails and ice medium, in their case ceramics. They deliber- Austrian Du Paquier, French Sèvres and English cups. Desserts included ice creams, nuts such ately chose to specialize, allowing them to Chelsea, Bow, Worcester and Derby porcelain as pistachios, walnuts and chestnuts, and fruit collect with focus and in depth, rather than comprised their collecting purview. They also including apricots, pineapples, plums, grapes

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 27 Opposite page top Opposite page left Below Emily Carr University of Art First issue of Woo Magazine Emily Carr University and Design coat of arms 2010 of Art and Design Image courtesy Woo Magazine

Emily Carr College of Art (1978) When the Vanc.ouver School of Art was EYE, MIND, renamed the Emily Carr College of Art in 1978, faculty and students of the time protested the and HAND new name. It was felt that Carr’s name did not represent the contemporary nature of the school as it moved into new premises on in EVOLUTION Granville Island. By the late 1980s, the Granville Island premises were too small to accommodate Sam Carter the burgeoning number of students. The south building was added in 1994, providing for a “EYE, MIND, AND HAND” is the motto of the Emily Carr University of Art and Design coat of arms. larger library to acknowledge the new degree- “The crow is the smaller cousin of the raven, but unlike the raven, is at home in urban areas...As well, granting status (Bachelor of Fine Arts and they [crows] are noted for their intelligence, and thus symbolize the intellectual quotient in all Bachelor of Design), which brought about aesthetic endeavours.”1 another change of name from College to Emily Carr is widely regarded as the dominant figure in art in the first half of the Institute (now University) during this period 20th century. Perhaps this is why BC politicians championed the idea of the Vancouver School of Arts’ of growth and much greater visibility. If the new name honouring Carr as the province’s most significant artist of the day. Although she was 1980s had focused on issues of gender, the associated with the Group of Seven artists, and close to Frederick Varley and Lawren Harris, both 1990s emphasized cultural diversity and sexual early modernists, she was never a member of this now classic group. orientation. A student exchange program It would be interesting to know what Carr would have thought about the Emily Carr University of Vancouver School of Art (1933) began; technology became the primary toolbox Art and Design today. In 1898 Carr made the first of many now legendary sketching and painting trips The Depression, World War II, and limited for design and media practices as the commit- to Aboriginal villages on the west coast of Vancouver Island. I think she would have been pleased with resources all had a profound effect upon ment to the digital world began to redefine the recognition and inclusion of First Nations’ art and , current emphasis on “green” talented students and teachers through the the university’s place in culture, art, and practice and application, not to mention the significant number of women instructors on staff. There 1930s and into the immediate post-war period, commerce, with innovative and experimental is no doubt also that she would be amazed by the modern use of digital tools and their ubiquitous when painting flourished as abstraction became courses and approaches as suggested by the influence on local and global art and culture. known to the students through instructors such student profiles included here. Although Emily Carr never taught at the Vancouver School of Decorative and , her as Gordon Smith and Jack Shadbolt. Sam Carter is professor emeritus at Emily Carr spirit, art, intellect, and popular lore played an important role in the development of culture in BC Perspectives changed again when Fred University of Art and Design, Vancouver, British and Canada during the 1920s. Her presence continues even now, made obvious in material form by Amess became principal upon the retirement Columbia. Woo, the student publication, playfully named after her pet monkey. of Charles Scott. He believed in the importance of crafts and hired ceramists such as Reg Dixon Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (1925) and David Lambert who took promising Notes 1 Concept and design, Susan Point, 2007; In 1926, Charles Hepburn Scott, a graduate of the Glasgow School of Art (1909), was appointed first students to St. Ives in England to study with from www.gg.ca. director of the Vancouver School. Jock Macdonald, graduate of the Edinburgh College of Art, Italian their mentor Bernard Leach. Soon, a new sculptor Charles Marega, painter Kate Hoole, and Scott’s sister-in-law Grace Melvin, also from the building in the sixties brought modernism and 2 75 Years of Collecting; from http://projects. vanartgallery.bc.ca./publications/75years/pdf/ Glasgow School, and Frederick Varley, a founding member of the Group of Seven, were all hired by large open studios, skylights, high ceilings, and Macdonald_Jock_39.pdf. Scott. As might be expected, Scott and Melvin brought with them from Glasgow the aesthetics and well-equipped workshops, along with hard-edge interests of Charles Rennie Mackintosh in the Arts and Crafts movement, Japonism, and Art Nouveau. abstraction, while pop and op art soon found a Writer Louise Aird in her blog (louiseaird.com) noted that, “Varley and Macdonald indignantly resigned place in the studios. At the same time, practices from the Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts and opened the BC College of Arts, taking were becoming increasingly multidisciplinary half the student body with them.” Historian Joyce Zemans described the curriculum in these words: with photography and film animation, perfor- “The school [BC College of Arts] was dedicated to an interdisciplinary approach to the arts and to the mance, and installation art. Grading was largely integration of eastern and western philosophy. Music flowed through the studios and metaphysics eliminated; formal drawing classes and art dominated the discussions.”2 history were optional.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 29 STUDENT PROFILES

Left to right Katherine Soucie Charlotte Kennedy Katherine So Nouveau Collection, 2012 ECUAD graduate, Master of Applied Arts and Romney Shipway Photograph by Shimon Karmel Fourth-year students, As a professional trained in Ian Nakamoto and textiles prior to my studies at ECUAD, “The Three Stool” was a third-year collaborative Charlotte Kennedy I had completed my BFA in printmaking and industrial design project with the goal of using and Romney Shipway sculpture in 2009. It was during this time that the least amount of material (western maple) Xwalacktun (Rick) Harry, an the Intersections Digital Media Studios to create maximum strength. In our practice, ECUAD graduate, gives a carving demonstration at the Aboriginal acquired an industrial embroidery machine. we consider the environmental impacts Gathering Place at the Granville From here, I found myself enrolled in the MAA, holistically in evaluating not only the quantity Island campus. Photograph courtesy Aboriginal Master of Applied Arts program, 2010-2013. of material consumption but also the material Gathering Place, ECUAD This decision encouraged an ability to combine itself and the processes used to create it. my professional studio practice with research We feel that the experience at the Great meant to explore concepts and applications Northern Way campus will build upon the for waste materials through acts of mending. creative workspace that is present at Emily Carr, The next generation at ECUAD can look but on a larger scale. It will offer a platform and forward to being in an environment in which comfortable space for people to work together creative thinking will lead down pathways that in defining their art and design practices and offer up opportunities never imagined. creating a community around them.

Ian Nakamoto Lee-ann Neel Fourth-year student, Animation Third-year student, Visual Arts

I’ve always been fascinated by the Soviet school Over the past three years at ECUAD, of sculpting, particularly the work coming out I have had an opportunity to strengthen my of the Stroganov school in the 1970s, which was traditional arts while learning from new built around the idea of sculpture being a kind materials, techniques, and cultural theory of stylized, almost architectural interpretation courses. My artistic practice includes traditional of the human body. Kwakwaka’wakw-style button blankets, My practice has become evenly split between woodcarving, jewellery, and painting, and two disciplines: traditional sculpting and 3-D I am currently apprenticing in both wool modelling for computer animation. I want to and cedar bark weaving. merge the two in my work. I hope that in the My hopes for the future are continued design of the new Great Northern Way campus growth of the Aboriginal student population, now under development (2014-2017), an even and curriculum that reflects their diverse stronger dialogue with students and industry artistic practices. professionals may be encouraged.

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 31 2-5 OCTOBER 2014

32nd Annual Canadian Society of Decorative Arts Symposium

Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario Visit www.csda-ccad.org for details

ornamentum | Spring Summer 2014 | 33 What to See Decorative Arts Exhibitions across Canada

VICTORIA MONTREAL upholstery cloth featuring Art Gallery of AROUND 1914: DESIGN Montreal Museum hand-drawn, curvilinear Greater Victoria IN A NEW AGE of Fine Arts imagery designed for aggv.ca Claret jug mbam.qc.ca individual pieces of Tel: (250) 384-4171 Designed under the Tel: (514) 285-2000 antique furniture. ALTERNATIVE VISIONS: supervision of Albert Mayer FABERGÉ: JEWELLER To June 14, 2014 RENDITIONS OF (German, 1867-1944) TO THE CZARS MYTH, LEGEND AND Silver-plate, green glass, This exhibition features ANNUAL MEMBERS FOLK TALES FROM circa 1900-1905 approximately 240 EXHIBIT CHINA AND JAPAN Ht: 36.3 W: 20.6 D: 15.9 cm objects, including four of An exhibition of This exhibition explores Gift of Mrs. Harry Davidson the most famous Easter contemporary craft the portrayal of Image courtesy ROM eggs commissioned from across the myths and legends in by the Romanovs and province, with awards to Japanese and Chinese enamelled picture celebrate excellence in arts and crafts, in outstanding sculptures silks from highland frames, clocks, gold innovation and design. various media, from by Inuit artists in the Madagascar. This exhibit cigarette cases and June 28, 2014 to paintings, prints and permanent collection takes advantage of this knobs for walking canes, August 23, 2014 textiles to sculptures. of the WAG. Most of unparalleled collection rock-crystal flowers, To June 15, 2014 the sculptures have to explore wildly coloured caskets and brooches. COLLECT subject matter relating and patterned 19th- June 14 to October 5, A group show featuring SASKATOON to traditional shamanic century wraps known 2014 vessels, sculpture Ukranian Museum legends and beliefs. as akotifahana. Great and imagery reflecting of Canada To December 31, 2015 works of art, these FREDERICTON Newfoundland and umc.sk.ca cloths also had great Beaverbrook Art Gallery Labrador in a variety Tel: (306) 244-3800 TORONTO ceremonial value. beaverbrookartgallery.org of media to inspire MOVED BY THE SPIRIT Royal Ontario Museum To August 4, 2014 Tel: (506) 458-2028 any collector. This exhibition includes rom.on.ca NEW BRUNSWICK June 28, 2014 to works by twelve artists Tel: (416) 586-8000 100 YEARS OF COLLEGE OF CRAFT August 23, 2014 interpreting the life AROUND 1914: COLLECTING AND DESIGN of Jesus through DESIGN IN A NEW AGE On March 19, 1914, GRADUATION textiles, glass, book This exhibition the Duke of Connaught EXHIBITION 2014 arts, ceramics, explores a pivotal officially opened the This exhibition jewellery, wood, stained period of innovation doors of the Royal celebrates the creativity glass, painting and and experimentation Ontario Museum for the of graduates from the religious icons. as artists struggled to first time. This exhibition New Brunswick College To June 21, 2014 reconcile quality design celebrates 100 years of of Craft and Design with the emergence collecting by the ROM, and features work WINNIPEG of mass production, through unique and from various diploma Manitoba Craft Council and the new materials interesting objects. programs: Ceramics, manitobacraft.ca made available with To March 29, 2015 Jewellery and Metal Arts, Tel: (204) 946-0803 technology. Works Fashion Design, Textile SHARON LOEPPKY on display include Gardiner Museum Design, Photography, Sharon Loeppky’s key designers of this gardinermuseum.on.ca Graphic Design, current ceramic mosaic era, such as Charles Tel: (416) 586-8080 Integrated Media, and work documents the Rennie Mackintosh, A TRIBUTE TO Aboriginal Visual Arts. landscape around her Louis Comfort Tiffany, GEORGE AND HELEN June 1-15, 2014 Manitoba home and Frank Lloyd Wright, GARDINER & THE JOY workshop, on the bank Georg Jensen, and OF COLLECTING ST. JOHN’S FABERGÉ: JEWELLER of a small creek. Walter Gropius. These two 30th- Craft Council of TO THE CZARS To June 27, 2014 To March 21, 2015 anniversary exhibitions Newfoundland Imperial Tsesarevich pay homage to museum and Labrador Easter Egg Winnipeg Art Gallery BORN OF THE INDIAN founders George and craftcouncil.nl/ca Peter Carl Fabergé, Canadian magazines are u niqu e. wag.ca OCEAN: THE SILKS Helen Gardiner, as well Tel: (709) 753-2749 1912 Virginia Museum And so are you. That’s why we publish hundreds of titles, so you know there’s one just for you. All Tel: (204) 786-6641 OF MADAGASCAR as to the significant CROQUIS: FULLY of Fine Arts, Bequest of you have to do is head to the newsstands, look for the Genuine Canadian Magazine icon marking HIGHLIGHTS OF The Royal Ontario collectors who have RENDERED DESIGN Lillian Thomas Pratt. truly Canadian publications and start reading. It’s that easy. INUIT SCULPTURE Museum is home to donated their collections WITHOUT REPEATS Photograph: Katherine Wetzel This exhibition one of the world's or exceptional pieces A solo exhibition of Visit magazinescanada.ca/ns and newsstands to fi nd your new favourite magazine. features some of the best collections of to the museum. Jacquard-woven To January 11, 2015

Advertise in Ornamentum’s gallery is a valuable marketplace for collectors and dealers to showcase antiques, decorative arts, and professional services. Be seen and connect with others who the Gallery appreciate the decorative arts. Contact John Fleming at (416) 324-8347. Peter E. Baker Antiquaire depuis/since 1976

1119 2nd Concession, Elgin, Québec J0S 2E0 www.peterbakerantiques.com (450) 264-6794

Decorate with Distinction Several examples of our current inventory of 19th-century sponge decorated earthenware made for the Quebec market, circa 1875: Maple Leaf, Rosette, Peony, and Maple Leaf with flower. Other examples (including a Peony cup and saucer) also in stock.