An Artistic Dialogue on Inner Cultural Borders: Paintings by Erik Chong at Urban Gallery

by Brenda Clews
December 8, 2014

Erik Chong, in his show at Urban Gallery, 'Shifting Borders: Seen and Unseen,' uses Chinese calligraphy techniques on rice paper to create minimalist modern urban paintings. Many are imbued
with geometries of the city that remind one of rhythms of a Mondrian filtered through a colour field sensibility that has the presence of an Olitski. They also echo Chinese tradition in their colours and simplified geometric landscapes. ‘Sunset On The Roof (Cityscape Series)’ shows both of these elements along with Chong’s signature brushstroke, a grid painted painstakingly by hand with a bamboo brush and Sumi ink. While his paintings have a stark purity, the blacks and vermillions and golds are sumptuous and rich, and the grids that form many of the paintings are nuanced, like threads interweaving in a loose burlap material through which light shines and in which we find
various sheens of washes, greys, muted vermillion, faded yellows. These grids are organic, drawn by hand, and yet are set within rigid geometries and the stark square and rectangular borders of the frames. The sense of cloth, another echo of a strong Chinese tradition, is also found in paintings like, ‘Emperor’s Cloth,’ a large textured painting of gold gouache where Chong worked the paper with the wet brush until he achieved a type of repetition not unlike a grid in the way the paper shrank and expanded in puckers until it became a chromatic field of texture. Many of the paintings remind me of the city at night and in fact one carries that title, ‘City at Night,’ and it was interesting to overhear that the rhythms of the city in Chong’s paintings are drawn in part from his experience as a driving instructor. Buildings and their
lights subtlety imbue the room of Sumi blacks and bright Chinese reds, of sunsets and dreamscapes, of a natural landscape of light and dark, of the sun and skies of lucid darkness amid cityscapes alive with their own grid patterns of electrical inner light.
‘Shifting Borders: Seen and Unseen,' paintings by Toronto artist, Erik Chong, runs from December 4, 2014 to January 10, 2015 at Urban Gallery, 400 Queen St East, Monday-Saturday 11AM - 5PM, Thursdays 11AM - 8PM. Do phone as the doors are sometimes not open during Gallery hours: 647-460-1278. urbangallery.ca

From Urban Gallery’s website:

SHIFTING BORDERS: SEEN AND UNSEEN: Abstract paintings with hidden images somewhat resembling architectural blueprints, which experiment with geometric and chromatic patterns. The artist’s intention is to force the viewers to question perspective as well as the creative process itself.

ARTIST STATEMENT: The ancient practice of Chinese calligraphy continues to inspire me to push the boundaries into new forms. I use a repetitive brushstroke technique that sometimes carries my paintings to the verge of
abstraction. Unlike many of my contemporaries, my appropriation of calligraphy does not simply romanticize the past – rather my creative process explores past, present and future by addressing subject matter both old and new. The purpose of my work is to offer a unique take on the evolution of cultural histories, narratives and identities -and to question these ideas both in a private, personal way and on a public scale.

-Erik Chong, November 2014
erikchongfineart.com

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Brenda Clews is a Toronto poet and artist and may be contacted through her website, brendaclews.com. Photo of Erik taken by Brenda.

The photographs of the paintings were taken by Kaspara Albertson, a Toronto photographer and special events and wedding consultant at Urban Source Creative Catering.

Adam Abbas hosted my final Poetry Salon at Urban Gallery this year on Saturday Nov. 29th from 3-5 PM EST. Talented, charming and ever-generous, thank you Adam for all the hard work you put into this Salon! Featured were Anna Veprinska, Dave Hurlow, Rasiqra Revulva, Neal Alexander Shroobacca Armstrong and Nyla Matuk. Thank you for such fine poetry and readings! Norman Bethune Allan, John Oughton, Areta M., and I also read on open mic. Adam arranged for the licenses and brought beer and wine. It was truly a wonderful afternoon! Many thanks to all who came out!!! xoxoxoxo

Anna Veprinska's new poetry collection Sew with Butterflies was released by Steel Bananas in 2014. She is a poet who is currently pursuing her PhD in English at York University, researching empathy in poetry. Her writing and photography can be found in various Canadian and British publications. She also plays the mandolin in the Toronto Mandolin Orchestra.

Dave Hurlow's first collection of short fiction Hate Letters from Buddhists was released by Steel Bananas in 2014. He is a Toronto-based writer and musician. He studied literature at King’s College in Halifax, and plays bass in the Toronto band The Darcys. Their second album Warring was released by Arts and Crafts in 2013.

Neal Armstrong is an artist and performer who splits his time between Toronto and the dream world.

Rasiqra Revulva is a Toronto-based writer, multi-media artist, editor, musician, and performer. She is a founding member of the synth-punk/electro/glitch/industrial music and visual art collective The Databats. Her writing has been published by The Incongruous Quarterly, Cordite Poetry Review, ditch,, The Feminist Wire, and The Quilliad; and exhibited at the 2014 PULP: paper art party, the 2014 BIG on Bloor Festival, and IMG Forums at Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts.

Nyla Matuk’s first full-length collection is Sumptuary Laws, published in 2012. A chapbook, Oneiric, appeared with Frog Hollow Press in 2009. Her poems have appeared in, or are forthcoming in, The Fiddlehead, The Walrus, Hazlitt, Canadian Notes and Queries, The Best Canadian Poetry in English 2012 and PN Review, among others. She was a finalist for the Walrus Poetry Prize and the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award.

Please go to my Poetry Salons at Urban Gallery album at Picasa to see who's who - the album starts at the first salon and goes to the latest.

                                                                                           

The photography on the walls is by KAREN SILVER, whose show, Otherworld, was up at Urban Gallery when we had our Poetry Salon there.
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Finally got around to photographing, cropping and whatnot the life-drawing session at Bampot Bohemian Teahouse on Oct 19th. Not terribly.... not. But, ok, let's post. The final drawing, which is the first here as they are in backwards order, was what keyed me into thinking, Why don't I take a little canvas for that last pose... (which is supposed to be 40min, though it's often a lot less than that because the break is a lot longer than the time allotted but I can insist that the model do the long pose right after break and then whatever short one might fill in to 5:30pm, yes I can).

You'll see my little canvas, which will be in a Group Show at Yellow House Gallery, in my next post, whenever that is.

Hope you're all well!



                           
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I've been absent for a bit ...not off having fun, but working on a videopoem that I had on my list for 6 or 7 months and which I finally finished because I wanted to submit it somewhere and had a dead-line. I pushed myself through a gruelling week and a half of 18hr a days and towards the end found myself out every single night at different poetry, dance and drawing events. Sleep was less than minimum (2-3 hrs a night, I was approaching break down). However, I got a complex poem written and edited, edited the video footage, did about 6 readings of the poem before getting one I could live with, and created the soundtrack for the background with a small cheap keyboard and GarageBand - and also I did subtitles. The videopoem is about 7.5min, and was a feat. I am happy with the result, though I don't hold out too much hope for its finding acceptance where I sent it (this is the norm for me - my first choice never says yes, but if I keep submitting, where it is accepted is always better for my work and me).  So I will be sending it elsewhere, whenever it comes back. Due to the requirements of previously unpublished works, I can't publish it or share it with you now.

I have been drawing, though. And today finally had some sun and time to do the arduous task of photographing. One set is ready....

Life-drawing at Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School Reloaded in Toronto, Nov 7, 2014. Model: Obskyura; theme: 'Over the top, pop star decadence. Excessive glamour. Sex, drugs, and rock and roll.' ©Brenda Clews, 18" x 24", graphite, Inktense black (and sometimes red or pink) blocks with a water brush pen on Strathmore 70lb archival drawing paper.













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And a completely silly video that I threw together on a whim last night in an attempt to deal with my talking head syndrome...

direct link: On the talking head syndrome...

Testing some umbrella lights and neat video effects, I thought I'd take on my difficulty with doing the 'talking head' thing when I do video reviews of poets who have featured at my Poetry Salons at Urban Gallery in Toronto.

Ok I got a bit carried away....

The titles in FCP X that looked best did not give me room to add the music credit: Collegium Musicum De Minas - Regina Caeli, Chiquitos (Anônimo jesuítico, séc. XVIII) found in free downloads on Last FM.
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Gettin' ready for Halloween! And I did get a small black mask for the eyes. Oh hoho... way too much light in the iPhone photo and it washed away the years. Lol!

She wistfully remembers her vamp days.... (ok they were very short and a very long time ago. but.)

(got ma first corsets this year, or, properly, bustiers, which have resin or plastic stays and are very comfortable, unlike corsets proppa, which have bone or steel stays)

Leather lady!

direct link: Deep in the Cyanean Surf

...cast myself in shadow in this video... for Nik Beat/aka Michael Barry... written within days of his death, in remembrance and love. Miss you!

There are subtitles that can be translated into many languages... just click on the CC.

Because the raw clip was not in focus, I cast myself in shadows in two different 'copies' or 'projects' with different approaches to the textures and focus of the poem. I kept trying this and that on each project to see what resonances with the poem might work - one, for instance, had a film noir effect; in the other I used a background generator. The editing took me to many mysterious places until one of the clips, the latter one, emerged more fully as a 'videopoem' and became what you see here. This is when video editing is like writing a visual poem or painting with the possibilities offered by multiple video effects. The background sounds, which are quite dimmed, are of waves lapping.

I rarely get into cutting of scenes and images, preferring the integrity of a single clip, the cleanness of it, and allow it to build like a painting around the poem.




 

As I begin working on the video from my Poetry Salon at Urban Gallery last Saturday, I thought, waiting for responses from some of the readers who were sent raw video clips for approval (even simple editing takes quite a bit of time, and I don't want to do it if that person will nix the final edited video as others occasionally have done), that I would work on the poem I did (the one I wrote for Nik Beat). Well, my. Many hours later I think it'll work. I blotted myself out altogether -



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Can't believe that I forgot to upload and post the photos and videos from last month's Poetry Salon at Urban Gallery! I did the Facebook album, and somehow did not get around to updating the Picasa album. My bad!

Many thanks to our lovely and talented features Oct 25th at the Poetry Salon at Urban Gallery, Niki Koulouris, Ellen S. Jaffe and Pat Connors, as well as those on open mic, Norman Allan, Catherine Raine, Heather Roberts Cadsby, Trixie Gleason (Margaret), Albert Shepherds (taken from video, his name a bit unclear) and Adam Abbas! Here are a few photos. It was a wonderful afternoon of poetry, hot apple cider and Girl Guide Cookies! - thank you Pat!! And thank you Urban Gallery for nurturing, promoting and supporting this event!


















Heather Cadsby was born in Belleville, Ontario and moved to Toronto at a young age. She obtained a BA degree from McMaster University and taught elementary school for a number of years. In the 1980s she helped organize poetry readings at the Axle-Tree Coffee House in Toronto. A co-founder of the poetry press Wolsak and Wynn, for several years she served as a director of the Art Bar Poetry Series. Her fourth book Could be was published by Brick Books in 2010.

The poems Heather read:
0.35 "life drawing"
1.38 "drawing the face"
3.14 "what does she think about when she's up there sitting still for so long?"


Pat Connors' chapbook, 'Scarborough Songs,' was released by Lyricalmyrical Press last year. He was also recently published in Belgium, India, and Timmins. He was literary juror of Big Art Book 2013, a digital project of Scarborough Arts. He recently performed at the Austin International Poetry Festival, Stellar Literary Festival, Blue Coffee Reading Series, and, for the third time, at The Art Bar Poetry Series. He is a manager for the Toronto chapter of 100,000 Poets for Change.

Pat says, “I am a People's Poet, in the tradition of Milton Acorn and Raymond Souster. I want my work to be read, listened to, and have relevance for everyday people and everyday life. Mick Burrs, who is editing my first full manuscript, likens my reading style to giving my audience a hug.

However, it shouldn't be so good that it reaches only a few people.”

The poems Pat read:

0:00 The Beginning of Forever
1:41 To the Point
3:04 When My Worlds Collide
4:24 Me With You
5:58 Teenager
7:07 Bleeding Blue and White
7:35 Buds
9:41 Order
11:26 Epic


There is more video from this Salon, but the poets probably don't like their videos because there are almost no viewcounts at all. Go here to see what's available.

I took lots of video and spent 3 days and nights editing and applying noise reduction (which renders so very slowly - a 20min video took nearly 7 hours, frame by frame I guess) and uploading - it was exhausting - and then two of the women wouldn't allow me to post their videos. Because of the amount of work these (I guess) fairly boring videos are (no-one really likes the way they look in video and so most of the poets don't promote the Poetry Salon videos), I've decided to stop doing it whole-hog. I've been trying to figure out livestreaming from my iPhone, but so far haven't managed it. I, myself, would like a record in case I ever decide to review any of the poets' readings and so I have to figure something out that works for me without having to go through the all-too-often thankless and arduous task of editing and uploading and all that entails when, hey, we don't look like Beyonce, nor do we have her budget or production team, we're actually pretty ordinary. That's kind of beautiful it itself, I feel.

It was a truly wonderful Salon! Don't get me wrong. My gripe over the video and how much work it is is in no way a reflection of the readings, the poets or the lovely warmth of the Salon.
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