Print auction mines silver and gold
Those wagering their fortunes on precious metals have lately been a wary lot. But SNAP Gallery’s Silver & Gold fundraiser is as safe as bets go — not just on local visual culture, but also in terms of having a killer night while easing the murderous burdens of holiday shopping. Think Royal Bison with a dance party and industrial tour attached.
It’s a bash, a store, a gallery, a lottery and an auction, with each of these components supporting Edmonton’s international printmaking reputation at Saturday’s hands-on party, thrown in the dual spaces of the Society of Northern Alberta Print-Artists. Part of the $20 ticket is a chance to tour the facilities and built-in studios, where DJs Prairie Dawn and electro-spider Ghibli (replacing Mitchmatic) will be spinning.
The annual Print Affair fundraiser’s theme of silver and gold is to suggest clothes and accessories, but it deservedly nods to our city’s almost secret reputation, rooted in the University of Alberta’s fine arts department, for creating and intertwining with printmakers who go on to show at all levels, on every continent. As an example, ManWoman. Knowing he would transcend past the Earth soon, the swastika-reclaiming artist donated five prints to the gallery this summer. During a visit to SNAP, I saw the last one going for a substantial amount of money, which nonetheless seemed like a crazy deal.
“What isn’t printmaking?” jokes April Dean, SNAP’s charming and articulate executive director, asked to define. “Printmaking is essentially a fine art that has always fed off of industry. As soon as something in industry dies, we build it into our lexicon of artmaking to preserve it. Look at traditional stone lithography. There’s beautiful stones out in the world that used to be used by banks to print banknotes and beer labels and war posters, so that was commercial printing. And now the only people using them are diehard, fine-art lithographers.
“All of our artists are tech-savvy. Most of them are combining some form of digital media, like photography or text or something they’re generating through a computer into their work. But they’re constantly having to go elsewhere for digital printing, so that’s definitely on the horizon.”
Also amid its plans for 2013 is a broadening of its quarterly SNAP-line — traditionally including commissioned prints made by members — to evolve into more critical and creative content. Having just gone through its 30th year, visioning sessions are planned, Dean joking that this parallels a 30-year-old’s identity crisis at the cusp of true adulthood: married in the suburbs, divorced with kids or a freewheeling entity driven only by dreams and urges? She notes a proper sign and a curated window gallery are easing closer. “We need to and do have a broader reach in Edmonton now, and some of our programming needs to reflect that, too.”
Dean brings it back to Saturday night, an auction item collaboration between Josh Holinaty and Aaron Pedersen, his photos of a gorgeous model melded with Holinaty’s cartoons, printed and framed. “We’re really excited about that work, specifically because of the way it intersects all the facets of printmaking and print media. It’s mashing all these things up and making a kind of hilarious and savvy social statement, and connects to printmaking’s roots of advertising and commercial uses, as well as its history of propaganda and social commentary.”
One of many affordable items on sale in the gallery space is by the clever Blair Brennan, a small icon of Christ with an Eat-More-looking candy bar wrapper on its back stating “Eat-Me,” laminated together into an ID-sized package. It serves both as reminder of eucharist and a wink about capitalism, depending on your bias. Another piece is by Mark Clintberg, whose colossal “Behind this lies my true desire for you” is currently up in the atrium of the Art Gallery of Alberta. For SNAP’s auction, the Montreal thinker printed a gorgeous portrait on newsprint, specifically because of its tendency to deteriorate. “Whoever buys it,” Dean notes, “gets to decide, do they do what the artist intended and let the art fade and disintegrate? If it’s out in the light it’ll be a very different-looking piece of art in two years.”
The coveted raffle item is a story on its own. Created for the 30th anniversary as a boxed portfolio, a fullsized print set by 30 SNAP-affiliated artists (including Anna Szul, Liz Ingram, Sean Caulfield, Michiko Suzuki, Nancy Fox) is a staggering historical document — a treasure really, worth $6,000, tickets $25 apiece. But no pressure.
“Anyone who wants to come and spend $20 on a ticket and $5 on a beer and just hang out with artists and the art community in a print shop is welcome to do so. Then they start to come back. They get engaged with our programming, with the making that happens in our facility and it’s ultimately what makes us really unique in our city, having a print shop, being able to rent affordable space to artists and teach them new skills.”