Dear Editor
A visit to an art gallery can be inspiring, surprising, educational, sometimes puzzling or infuriating, seldom boring.
You may say there are lots of art shows on TV, or the internet, where you can see major art works and their galleries, right from your own home.
But there’s nothing that substitutes for seeing the real thing
Somehow there’s a connect between the skill and vision of the artist and the viewer.
That’s why visits to art galleries are so valuable. Artists can emphasize for us the beauty of nature, of people, of colour and form, or just different ways of seeing things.
We have our own gallery here in Burnaby that was the initiative of local citizens who felt this experience was so valuable that it should be available for their own city (then municipality).
It was their idea and a lot of their own hard physical work that made the current building, Ceperley Manor, a gallery that was a centre of excitement and innovation during the 1970s. Why, even people from Vancouver came to see what we were doing.
Then it became institutionalized, brought into line with the current thinking on what constitutes a recognized official art gallery in terms of who and what you should show. These guidelines also decide what travelling art exhibitions a gallery qualifies for.
The current building can’t meet most of these criteria. It was built originally to be a family residence, not a public building.
It’s still amazing how the staff managed to modify it so it’s attractive and acceptable for certain shows.
For over a decade in the ’80s and ’90s I had the pleasure and privilege of reviewing the shows at our own Burnaby Art Gallery for the Burnaby NOW. Many were memorable, some astonishing, all professionally presented.
The only things lacking were enough space, and not enough Burnaby content, that would bring more of our own citizens to the gallery. The exception always was the annual show for work from our own schools.
The work of Burnaby’s own artists are regularly exhibited in galleries in neighbouring cities and municipalities, hardly ever in our own.
In any projected new gallery, while there should be proper space for travelling fine works, there should be even more dedicated to proudly displaying the work of our own local artists – and maybe bring back some of that ’70s excitement.
Annie Boulanger, Burnaby
