Event puts ‘spots’ light on art gallery
FACADE FESTIVAL: Artist Eric Metcalfe using new technology to recreate his 1973 display
After a long absence, Eric Metcalfe’s black leopard spots are returning to the exterior of the Vancouver Art Gallery.
The first time leopard spots appeared on the VAG was 43 years ago. Back then, Metcalfe climbed a ladder every evening for five nights to outline the design freehand on the outside of the first VAG when it was located a few blocks west at 1145 Georgia.
“I would go in at six or seven o’clock with my crew and my wife Kate Craig,” he said. “I would draw and they would paint it in.”
In 1973, Metcalfe’s Leopard Realty was part of a big 39-day festival of art at the VAG called Pacific Vibration.
In 2016, Metcalfe’s leopard spots will launch the second annual Facade Festival. Four other artists’ work are part of the six-day festival, which ends on Labour Day.
Unlike a leopard, Metcalfe, 76, has changed his spots for the festival. Instead of being painted on like they were the first time, Metcalfe’s new spots will be projected on the outside of the neo-classical building. The new spots, like the old ones, are meant to represent the darker side of life.
In the late 1960s, Metcalfe was one of a group of artists who created an avant-garde art scene in Vancouver. He is a co-founder of the Western Front, one of the country’s most influential artist-run centres. In 2006, he was the recipient of the Audain Prize for Lifetime Achievement and two years later, the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Art.
Initially, Metcalfe wasn’t keen on reprising his leopard spots when he was approached by the Burrard Arts Foundation, the festival’s organizer.
“When they asked me, I said, ‘Not again,’ ” Metcalfe said. “Then I said, ‘Wait a minute. It’s a kind of interesting way to bookend what I did in 1973. This time, I’m using a very high-tech sophisticated system.’ ”
Metcalfe’s projections will include leopard spots and studies for Stellar, the abstract wall mural he created in the lobby of the Burrard Building at West Georgia and Burrard.
Throughout the festival, projections will start at 8 p.m. and continue until midnight.
Each work runs for a duration of about five minutes and repeats throughout the evening.
Metcalfe’s works start the festival on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the festival will feature Barry Doupe’s optical exploration of colour and surface/texture that complement the building’s architecture. On Thursday, Rebecca Chaperon will display animated projections of her paintings that depict landscapes of her internal psychic states. Friday has Renee Van Halm’s symmetrical butterfly compositions that are based on images of backgrounds, architectural elements and nature taken from magazines. On Saturday Chris Shier will show a two-part work that includes oozing cellular automata and a modified live digital video projection of people on Robson. Two encore performances taking place Sunday and Monday will show the work of all five artists.
The Sept. 5 finale includes projection-mapping by Go2 Productions of the nature-based work of Louie Schwartzberg. Instead of a traditional flat screen, projection mapping projects moving images onto irregularly shaped surfaces.
“It’s a kind of interesting way to bookend what I did in 1973.“— Eric Metcalfe