Google Street View

View Larger Map

Hey look everybody, it's Visual Arts Brampton Creative Art Studios, as photographed by Google Street View's car, which drived all over the GTA to take pictures.

We don't get much more visible from Bartley Bull, either. How about Google Parking Lot View next?

Glenn McFarlane wins Arts Person of the Year

Congratulations to Glenn McFarlane, president of the Brampton Folk Club, for winning the City of Brampton Arts Person of the Year Award. Nominated previously, Glenn is president and a founding member of the Brampton Folk Club. The Club regularly hold concerts; various times of the year, they perform weekly during the evening at a local church, and weekly at the Rose Theatre's outdoor stage.

The Folk Club is perhaps best known for its Brampton Folk Festival, which ran for many years at Gage Park. The festival attracted audiences from around the province, and top performers from across the country, like Murray McLaughlin, Tanglefoot, and General Store. Unlike many of its large cousins, the event was perpetually free, meaning people not normally exposed to folk music could have a chance to appreciate it.

Visual Arts Brampton president Keith Moreau attended the event, held at the Rose Theatre. Keith was Arts Person in 1992. The event, themed to "Singin' in the Rain", included entertainment, the Corporate Support of the Arts Awards, and Harry Dale Literary Grant for Aspiring Writers. Among the people at Keith's table was a representative of Colony Ford, sponsor of the Art Gallery of Peel.

Keith actually designed the logo of the Brampton Folk Festival, and his son Nick designed the programme multiple years. One group compilation album featured Keith's coloured pencil artwork on the cover, the winner of a group-wide competition. McFarlane posed for the portrait sessions, in relation to the CD and event.

The Brampton Guardian has an article on the win as well.

Art Gallery of Peel holds art bus tour

The Art Gallery of Peel is one of four stops an annual bus tour of area art galleries. The tour starts at the Art Gallery of Mississauga at 10 am, going to the Art Gallery of Peel, Gallery Streetsville, and the Blackwood Gallery. The bus returns to the Mississauga Civic Centre by 3:45 pm. Coffee and refreshments are provided in the morning, and time is scheduled in Streetsville, to allow you to go off and eat lunch and shop.

The “Regional Art Bus Tour” happens October 18, and costs $15 paid at the bus; pre-register by calling the Art Gallery of Mississauga at 905-896-5088, or email gail.farndon@mississauga.ca

VAB artists at Complex, October 3 and 4

Visual Arts Brampton artists will be demonstrating at the Peel Heritage Complex, on October 3 and 4, from 10 am to 5 pm. Throughout the day, artists including Debra Ali and Paul Highgate will be working on artwork, and available to talk to the public.

In the rest of the Complex, check out Susan Williamson's "wsh u wr hr" exhibit at the Whitney Gallery. Williamson organized our popular 1999 show Great Canadian Mail Art Show.

vablearn: Pete Emslie caricatures a teenage girl

Above is the test show for vablearn, Visual Arts Brampton's free instructional video project. Thanks to a 2008 grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation, VAB has purchased a digital video camera and is paying select artists to teach video workshops.

This test episode features Pete Emslie drawing a caricature of Emily Kowalik, co-instructor of VAB's 6-to-8-year-old youth classes. Outlining the steps he takes to draw a caricature, the image unfolds in this roughly 11 minute clip. Future episodes will be released in HD, with better sound; this first episode was an equipment test.

View the episodes as they're posted at visualartsbrampton.blip.tv, or subscribe for free, via iTunes.