Why choose ‘Lineage’ as the theme of the McCleave Gallery’s first international tour?  You see, the gallery’s name was derived from the last name that labeled the suitcase when it was found and until recently, the identity of the original owner of the suitcase was a mystery.  As a result, some of the ideas behind the Lineage Tour were to discover the roots of the name McCleave and to host a traveling exhibition of artist books created with the theme of Lineage.

The following is the second half of an interview (done in March 2006) with Michael McCormack, McCleave Gallery founder/director/gallery attendant/custodian, focusing on the stories, artwork and concepts behind the Lineage Tour.  To find out a bit more about the general history of the McCleave Gallery of Fine Art, be sure to check out the first half of the interview featured in Volume 1, Issue 10 of silenttalkie.

How did the Lineage Tour 2006 come into being?

I was interested in continuing the McCleave Gallery as a touring nomadic exhibition venue.  Since the McCleave Gallery had begun, I noticed that the issues that I had originally been addressing had changed as the project and my own life had simultaneously developed.

By the time that Adair (the McCleave Gallery Assistant Director) and I had arrived in Dawson City from the 2005 tour, the locality, for one thing, was not particularly about Nova Scotia anymore, but more about tourism in general and the responsibilities and commitment to each community someone has as they enter and leave a place. During the tour across Canada, Adair and I soon became aware that although we were both in a position that we could enjoy each community and what it had to offer, we were not there long enough to commit to anything, and we always had the option to leave if we wanted. The McCleave gallery gave us the opportunity to connect with each place in a way that seemed more genuine. We were able to give back an experience to someone instead of monetary exchange being the primary focus.

The lineage tour was a way of re-visiting the roots of the project as well as the McCleave suitcase gallery. I am also interested in how our obsessions with lineage have affected how many of us approach tourism and how our culture today has learned from the past but in many cases has only adopted the more direct, efficient, or profitable principles and methods from it.

If you stop to think about it, the topic of Lineage is a broad one. Did the books in the Tour take on a few main thematic directions, or are they all over the map?

With the intentions of going overseas, I felt that it was vital to represent a diverse range of artists with multiple interpretations and responses to the subject of lineage. For me, one of the most accessible entry points to the entire exhibition is to be able to experience the range of different interpretations of the theme. There were a few books that naturally had an autobiographical or biographical theme to them (some fiction and some not), as well as many seemed to have a personal tone to them. There is a nice mix of playful and sculptural with some more serious and grounding themes as well. All in all though, ranging from Kelly Andres’ autobiographical fiction titled The wee Storybook Theatre about her long line of inventive ancestors to Julieta Maria and Lisa Ross-Rizikov’s Semites, an exploration of their collective Jewish and Palestinian identities through digital photo/montages, I’d say that the variety of approaches to the theme are apparent.

In the Lineage Tour Call for Submissions, artists were invited to submit proposals for ‘bookworks in any form’, stretching the traditional definition of a ‘book’. Could you elaborate on the experimental approaches taken by some of the artists?

Understanding that the format of a book itself is specifically tied to western methods of documenting (and in some cases manipulating) history, I was particularly reluctant to portray that this was the only way we could be connected to our ancestors. For many folks that were here before colonization, history was remembered through storytelling and aural traditions. Currently, through the use of television, visual culture, computers, and digital media, we are moving further away from our dependencies on books to define our history.
About half of the 17 books were done in a magazine or a book format. Otherwise, there is a silent video in DVD format, a couple of posters (one that is to be posted on telephone polls as I walk down the street), an audio-visual storybook theatre, and a sculptural cube-puzzle. I found it interesting how a few of the artists chose the accordian style of bookmaking.

How is the genealogical research into the last name McCleave coming along?

I had done a bit of research at the Nova Scotia Public Archives in Halifax when it basically fell into my lap in Halifax when I received an email from a Mr. Spense McCleave who happened to be browsing the web and stumbled across the McCleave Gallery Website. Spense said that he used to live in Halifax and got me in touch with his sister who thought that the suitcase might have one day belonged to her mother Blanche. So Janet and Blanche McCleave and myself scheduled a meeting and sure enough, Blanche remembered the suitcase as being the one that she threw out in a yard sale years ago. She still had the companion smaller version of it under her bed where she kept all of her favorite photographs and memories.

Blanche and I have kept in contact and I had tea with her a couple of times in Halifax to discuss the strange coincidences in life and exchange some family stories. I decided at this point not to go through with the video portion of the project and instead provide a travel journal about the tour. I have set up a meeting with Blanches niece who lives in Belfast where I will begin the tour in Ireland by visiting a place called Belfast Exposed which is basically a photography gallery with an archive of nearly half a million images of Irish art and Photography. It will be in Dublin as well where I will find a public archive and continue my research further.

The public has been able to view the books and projects in the Lineage Tour in Halifax since late February. How has the response been so far?

It was extremely rewarding to see both the replica suitcases next to the original one. I am going to try to get them all together for a family photo but they’re all over the place now you see, repro #1 is in Australia, repro #2 is in Halifax, and repro #3 has taken off to Bishop’s University in Lennoxville, Québec. Perhaps after the tour is over I can convince them all to sit still together for a photo session.

The response was pretty positive in Halifax, it’s easy there to organize an event because I know the city well and there are a lot of people there who are familiar with what I am doing. For the show at the eyelevelgallery, I launched a postcard series called Checkpoint to accompany the 2006 Lineage Tour. Sarah and Sonya at the Anchor Archives hosted a wonderful opening with a small slide show presentation followed by a walk that was led by a tape recording of bagpipe music, a sound often heard in the streets of Halifax but in a different context in the summertime during pub-crawl season.

The response to the books was great, it is great to have the reproduction models available in a more permanent setting so that viewers can spend a decent amount of time with the books. The day before leaving Halifax, I made a trip with the suitcase to the Veith Street Gallery, a gallery for people with disabilities in this amazing old building that used to be an orphanage for nearly one hundred years dating back to the 1860’s. The gallery director Michael Searey told me that it was one of the only buildings in the area that survived the Halifax explosion and many of the orphans were rescued by a nun who heard an explosion, and thinking it was an air invasion, hurried them into a shelter in the basement.

What parts of the Lineage Tour are you looking forward to the most?

I have basically just arrived in Europe safe and sound with the very heavy suitcase and a backpack full of booklets and postcards to be given out as part of the tour. I’m hoping that as the tour progresses, people will take some booklets off my hands to lighten the load a bit. Right now I am in Amsterdam staying with a friend and next week I will begin my residency at the This Neck of the Woods residency program. This I’ve been looking forward to for quite some time. The concept of TNOTW is similar to the McCleave concept, where the organizer, Yvette Poorter has transplanted some seedlings from the trees from her old backyard in Montréal to her new place in Rotterdam. Amongst these trees is a tree house on stilts that she has turned into a residency. It is extremely minimal and has just enough room for a fold out bed to sleep in at night, and a fold out table to use during the day.

I’m also excited about visiting Dublin where there are a few collectives and book stores that I’m interested in meeting. One being the red ink bookstore, a bookstore that specializes in zines and books about DIY culture. The unexpected can always be a bit of a rush as well, but I try no to anticipate that too much!

For fans of the McCleave Gallery, Michael created a blog documenting the Lineage Tour in Europe and Canada.  As well, the gallery is gearing up for its 2007 Space Mission exhibition and is accepting artist proposals until March 20, 2007 (Ed. sorry we’re a day late but you should contact them).   You’ll find the Lineage Tour blog, the Space Mission Call for Artists and a wealth of other information at the McCleave Gallery website: www.mccleavegallery.ca .

So what does it take to be a full time artist? I’ll skip past the obvious obstacles (money, talent, work) and the not so obvious (my fear of becoming so famous I can’t shave my head, attack a car with an umbrella and go drinking with Paris every night of the week, while my wife stays home with Karim Jr. and Rusty). The hurdle I’ll focus on here is becoming part of a “scene”.

Although it might be different where you are, here in Toronto the art scene is pretty diverse but split upon a couple lines.  There is the more bohemian type scene which is/was focused around Queen West and then the rich peoples scene which is focused around Yorkville.  There are other scenes in the middle, but again, they aren’t nearly as fun to focus on.

The bohemian “artsy” kids are really annoying to me.  See how crazy I’ve dressed? See how weird my hair is and how everything I do is “artsy” and cooler than you?  See how great I am and nonconformist?  No, you don’t? Well, screw you.  Who needs you.  Not me, I’m down with this alternative scene which isn’t so alternative anymore.

I met up with Karim Awad (an American artist living in Canada), in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, New York in the United States of America.

I’d heard of him from a few friends-of-friends and was a bit apprehensive to talk to him. The following took place from 10:36 AM to 11:15 AM and has been edited to remove adult language, racial slurs and short violent outburts.

Karim: So, how’s it going?

Karim:Why do people ask that? Do you really want to know? Should I REALLY tell you ‘How it’s going?’? …. It’s fine. I’m tired but I like New York. It’s really cold though. It’s going fine.

K: Right… As an artist, you must love all the museums and galleries. What have you seen this trip?

K: I went to the MoMA yesterday. They’ve finished the renovations. It costs $20 to get in and although they almost ruined it all with one sin, it’s a fantastic new space…

K: A sin?

K: Yeah. The Dance by Matisse is essentially hung in a stairwell. What’s up with that? The painting is a flowing mix of movement, colour and form and they throw it on a wall where you can really only see it from either the bottom of the stairway, or over the heads of people going up or down. Seriously. I thought about writing a letter but… well, you know.

K: Um, you got lazy?

K: No… i thought they might keep it on file and then I’d have no chance of getting any paintings in there.

K: Oh.. you think you have a shot at getting your work in the Museum of Modern Art?

K: I did before this interview. Fine… you’re right. I’ll write that letter tomorrow. Those bastards.

K: They have some pretty memorable pieces there. Anything catch your attention?

K: This trip through I came to a realization, an epiphany really…

…

K: Which was…

K: This is your first interview isn’t it… I was pausing for effect. Cripes. [loud 10 second sigh] So, before you jump in again, my realization was that a lot of the paintings which are considered “masterpieces” [note: even though masterpieces was said with a differing inflection, he actually did the finger quotes.. what a dork] really are masterpieces. I mean, Starry Night.. holy hot damn. That’s one fantastic picture. And Picasso’s Musicians are just brilliant. The Pollack room, the Rothkos, pick a De Kooning, Still, Newman, Kline, Warhol… the MoMA has them all.

If you’ve ever flipped through an art book, the MoMA has about 80% of the paintings in the damn thing. It’s really fantastic. And these paintings which are significant really do create what we see today. They are the history of art. Art freakin’ history.

But I guess I didn’t answer your question… no, nothing really jumped out at me.

K: So, what does jump out at you right now?

K: Phil (Delisle) and Ben (Van Dyk) are probably painting some awesome stuff… and any other friends of mine are probably being awesome too. I haven’t been around much recently or been to any openings. Most other stuff is really bad.. .or boring… or way better than mine, so I have to act like I “appreciate it” [agian with the quotes] but critique it harshly. Then I just act like I hate that stuff to be more “artsy” [this guy really has to stop that]

K: Let’s talk about your art. What are you working on these days.

K: I have a few stretchers that need canvas and I’ve been too busy with other stuff to really build up the energy to possibly, maybe, start to work on getting those ready. But the other stuff is going well… there’s this online ‘zine I’ve been working on. But visually, all i’ve done recently is this. [hands me a napkin]

K: Um, are these sketches for a new series?

K: Nope. That’s it. I figure the future of art is pen on napkin. It really is a classic, yet underappreciated medium, which makes it modern or post-modern, or post-post-modern.. I forget where we are these days.

K: This is quite a departure.

K: You sound like a dick. Isn’t departure from what I normally do good? I can’t win with you critics.

K: Hey… I’m not a critic. I just meant that your other paintings are all painted with quite a lot of paint, lots of layers and are um… more substantial.

K: More substantial? Dude… that’s retarded. This is substance. You are looking at gravity. Behold the face of God. This is the future of art. This is genius wrapped in awesomeness with a side of kick ass. Either get on board, write up an awesome interview expounding on the future of art or just give up. If you can’t reliaze what I’m doing, then you don’t even get to look at it [steals back the napkin and rips it in two pieces]

…

And now it’s done… Exactly as I had hoped.

K: Um, but I guess now it’s a collaboration… what’s my cut? [I start to laugh but Karim isn't amused]

K: Damn it. What?!… I’m not sharing any profits with you. This interview is over…

[gets up and leaves]

[comes back..]

Don’t make me look like a dick… ok?

K: I’ll, um, try.

Karim leaves.

K: sheesh… what a dick.

To view Karim’s paintings check out http://www.karimawad.com. His napkin series isn’t online yet.

It could take days for the photographer to see the final result of his hard work, and that didn’t leave much room for error, experimentation or impatience.  If the light was wrong, the subject moved or something went haywire with the camera, he was likely out quite a bit of money and would have to have re-shoot the pictures.

When George Eastman popularized chemical film cameras in the late 1800’s, the popularity of amateur and hobby photography was off the charts.  Anyone with some disposable income could now take photos themselves, and with 100 exposures to fool around with, you could take a chance on wasting a few exposures in the hopes of getting something truly beautiful.

Well, that attitude has followed us into the digital age.  Now anyone with a couple of hundred bucks can pick up a digital camera capable of taking hundreds of high-resolution images with any number of formerly ‘professional-only’ automatic settings.  They can shoot to their heart’s content until they stumble upon the perfect photo (sometimes by sheer dumb luck), and whatever can’t be perfected by the camera, can be retouched in PhotoShop for any desired effect.

So why exactly do we think this is a bad thing?  What about all of this causes an artist’s blood to start boiling?  Why are the REAL photographers out there rolling their eyes as they read this (assuming they haven’t given up already)?

I’ve been over all of this for myself, and here are some arguments/counterarguments I’ve come up with in the last few months:

Her medium is oil on wood panel, and her style is reminiscent of Peter Doig’s The collisions of the real and the surreal, the expressive and the absent., the strange and the lovely, really drew me in. I wanted to understand the empty spaces as well as the full ones. I wanted to know why, at first, I felt as though I misunderstood the figure’s expression, instead of accepting that she had a “House for a Head”(2005, oil on wood panel)* see image below.

I was delighted at every turn. Playful abstraction and sinister, undefined landscapes characterize most of the work exhibited. The rich, fulfilling surfaces are fulfilling because of what is happening below the surface: there is so much color and shape showing through from underneath. The unfinished quality to the work, both in technique and in narrative, left me fascinated: what are these worlds and why do the children seem to be existing in them with such a seeming complacency?

The gallery is: www.kmartprojects.com

And the painter’s site is: www.margauxwilliamson.com

Michael McCormack, McCleave Gallery founder/director/gallery attendant/custodian, took the time amongst the chaos of tour organization and travel preparations to answer a few questions about the McCleave Gallery and The Lineage Tour 2006:

Is there an interesting story of how the suitcase came into your life? What prompted you to turn it into a gallery?

The suitcase used to belong to a woman named Blanche McCleave, who lived on Vernon Street in Halifax, NS for many years. Well into her 80’s, Blanche eventually decided to move into an apartment building around the corner where she still lives today. Shortly before her move in the summer of 1998, Mrs. McCleave decided to have a giant yard sale to get rid of some old junk of hers. The suitcase was one of the few unfortunate items in the yard sale that didn’t find a home so it was discarded onto the side of the road for garbage pick-up.
Like many maritimers (or perhaps just a couple of young whipper-snappers looking for trouble), my older brother Scott and his friend Danni were very resourceful people who came across this suitcase and took it home to eventually find a use for it.

It was not until four years later, when I returned to Halifax from University in Guelph, Ontario to take a few summer courses at NSCAD, that I stumbled across Mrs. McCleave’s old suitcase in my parent’s attic. This was the summer of 2002, which was shortly after the Nova Scotia Arts Council collapsed due to a lack of funding support by the conservative government leaving Nova Scotia as the only province or territory without an arts council and the province with the least amount of funding per capita in Canada. The economy in Nova Scotia has also transformed after the decline of the mining and fishing industries and the recent rise of the tourism industry which has left us dependent on clinging onto our past in any way we can, ‘maintaining’ or stagnating our culture into a continuous loop leading us virtually nowhere in terms of artistic progression.

These factors, leaving myself as well as many others very concerned about the future of the arts in Nova Scotia, encouraged me to start an exhibition venue that could exist in my suitcase. The suitcase acting as both as a metaphor for travel and tourism, and well as the urgent situation that artists in Nova Scotia were in. The mandate was and still is to provide a venue primarily for emerging artists that was run on a ‘by chance or appointment’ basis in a manner that was personal, accessible, informal, and adjustable in atmosphere.

The McCleave Gallery of Fine Art has been in existence since 2002. How did its early days differ from today?

Because of its site specification to Halifax’s seasonal tourist based industry, the McCleave Gallery has almost always worked as seasonal exhibition space. Also, being an institution that is closely tied to my personal life, the nature of each exhibition season will adjust accordingly. When I was a student during the 2002 and 2003 exhibition seasons, the McCleave Gallery was run locally, on an extremely low budget.

Later on when I had time to work full time and wasn’t tied down to a particular location, I was able to conduct more elaborate exhibition seasons that could involve a more nomadic lifestyle. The 2005 season for example included a 4-month Cross-Canada tour including 16 suitcases by 14 artists or art groups from Halifax, NS to Dawson City, YT. This year’s exhibition season includes a tour in Halifax, Rotterdam, the UK and Ireland with a single suitcase filled with 17 artists books based on the theme of Lineage.

As opposed to the scheduled 2005 tour, this one takes place more spontaneously, as I will be researching the history of the McCleave family and the genealogy of the original McCleave suitcase. I have also constructed three ‘repro’ or spawn suitcases of the original, each containing one black and white photocopied version of each of the 17 original books. These repro-suitcases are made out of a cookie cutter style pattern made out of corrugated plastic that can be easily folded into a box. The repro-suitcase #1 of 3 is being shown in various venues in Australia, while repro-suitcas #2 and repro-suitcase #3 are both being shown in various small gallery spaces and group shows within Canada.

I’ve always been curious about the ‘by chance’ encounters with the McCleave Gallery: Do you solicit random people to have a look at the exhibitions or do you wait until you are approached? How do people usually respond to the exhibits? Does anyone ever think you’re trying to sell them something?

Mostly I wait until someone approaches me, I will often approach established spaces by surprise such as artist-run centers, festivals or public events with the suitcase. The sign on the outside of the suitcase that reads ‘The McCleave Gallery of Fine Art’ usually catches the attention of passer-bys successfully enough, and peaks their curiosity as to what is inside the suitcase. I find these situations the most rewarding as the elements of surprise and spontaneity are integral to the concept of the McCleave Gallery. It is these situations that exercise the venue’s truly public characteristics, when someone is interrupted from their daily routine to experience the work.

Most people respond quite well and are delighted to see the works, particularly in places where they are comfortable, such as a park bench or a café, which has already been established as a space that is commonly social. It is in places of intense transience that are the most challenging, where the McCleave Gallery may be seen as an obstacle or a nuisance. However, it is these spaces that I feel are the most interesting to occupy from time to time as the contrast is stronger in these spaces, emphasizing the space as something that we share and can enrich with culture if we make an effort to do so.

There have been a few occasions where I have been kicked out of places for soliciting, most of the time when I explain to them that nothing is for sale, they are okay with it though.

Be sure to tune in next issue to read Part Two of silenttalkie’s interview with Michael McCormack. Until then, you’ll more information about the McCleave Gallery of Fine Art, The McCleave Gallery 2005 Cross-Canada Tour & The McCleave Gallery Lineage Tour 2006 at: www.mccleavegallery.ca!