February 1, 2020

A Celebration of Life was held on Saturday, February 1, 2020 for Algoma Art Society member Nancy Caldwell at the Art Gallery of Algoma.

Nancy passed away in December 2019. Those attending were honored with the opportunity to view many of Nancy's artistic accomplishments in various media, especially watercolour.  Nancy was always open to experimenting with multiple methods and medias and loved to share her knowledge with others.  Nancy contributed much to the Algoma Art Society and will be greatly missed. Her husband, who has shared over 60 years with her, gave a moving speech of their life together.  One of the highlights was when they biked across Canada to celebrate their 40th Wedding Anniversary.  Her son, who recently celebrated his 50th birthday, which Nancy attended, also spoke very highly of his mother.  Her son in law talked about when he first met Nancy and her husband and how they introduced him to waterskiing with their daughter and his then future wife on his shoulders. After the speeches family and friends attending were treated to a delicious lunch and were welcomed to take home one or more unframed paintings of Nancy's as a keepsake. It was a wonderful evening and tribute to Nancy who will never be forgotten by Art Society members.

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February 7, 2020

The Winter Festival of Art officially opened at the Art Gallery of Algoma at 7:00 p.m. on Friday, February 7, 2020.

Dignitaries opening the exhibition were Mark A. Lepore, President of the AGA Board, Jasmina Jovanovic, Executive Director, the Honorable Ross Romano, Sault Ste. Marie MPP and Minister of Colleges and Universities, and the Honorable Lisa MacLeod, Minister of Heritage, Sport, Tourism, and Culture.  All spoke and distributed awards.  Jasmina and Ross Romano thanked Society member Nora Ann Harrison for being the initiator of the Winter Festival of Art and providing the awards for the previous six years. Prizes this year are sponsored by David Ellis, Member of the AGA Board.

Also speaking and presenting an award was Algoma Art Society president Rutger Becker, who talked about the Art Society's connection to the NOAA, benefits of being a member and the Society's proud past connection to the Group of Seven.  Rutger then presented an Algoma Art Society Award, in honour of recently deceased member Nancy Caldwell, to the artist chosen for having the Most Innovative Piece of art work at the exhibition.  Winner Penny Gabor was presented with a cheque for $50.00 along with a free membership to the Algoma Art Society until September 2020. Members of the Algoma Art Society can be very proud of the number of awards they received.  Member Zoey Wood-Salomon received second prize and top prize at the exhibition went to member Theresa Baic.  Members Pat Caldwell, Cheryl Thomas and Darlene Robb all received Honorable Mentions.  Ken Hagerman's young granddaughter also very proudly received a Participation Award.

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February 12, 2020

Sophie Nash was the featured artist at the February 12, 2020 Algoma Art Society meeting. Sophie displayed several of her art pieces and passed around a portfolio of her work which members enjoyed viewing. Sophie said that she does a lot of drawing and has been working with watercolour and watercolour with ink lately but that her favourite medium is acrylics.  She likes to listen to music while painting.  She is currently experimenting with painting landscapes.

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March 11, 2020

Karin Doleske (Court) was the featured artist at the Algoma Art Society's meeting held on Wednesday, March 11, 2020 in the Thompson Room at the Civic Centre. Karin was born in a refugee camp in Germany. She is well travelled. She has toured many galleries and loves history museums and has an interest in the psychological and in economics.  She is now 70 years old and has many years of art shows and achievements. Says "Art is her Lover".  She doesn't work big anymore and prefers to put together collages of clippings in scrap books which she shared with members at the meeting.

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September 13, 2020 (Plein Air Painting and Meeting)

On Sunday, September 13th, 2020 Algoma Art Society members got together at the Gazebo in Bellevue Park where we proudly displayed our new Algoma Art Society Banner. From 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Rudy, Sharon, Ken and Valerie worked on Plein Air Paintings exploring various interesting park subjects such as florals and landscapes.

The Algoma Art Society meeting followed.  It was the first meeting held in six months due to Covic-19 restrictions. Fourteen members attended and a number of Agenda items were discussed.  As a feature Rudy discussed and displayed several good quality pieces of framed art that he found and saved from local dump site Share Sheds.

 

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October 14, 2020 (Meeting at Art Gallery of Algoma)

On Wednesday, October 14, 2020 Algoma Art Society members met in Gallery I of the Art Gallery of Algoma between 3:00 and 5:00 p.m. The meeting opened with 15 minutes of  figure sketching led by Kathy Godfrey as several members posed. Cherie Ahvenniemi chaired the meeting and then shared several of her paintings that she was currently working on, welcoming feedback. Throughout the meeting members wore masks and self distanced. Algoma Art Society members appreciate the Art Gallery of Algoma providing us this with this artistically inspiring space to meet.

Gallery I featured a display entitled "Wrapped in Culture", a travelling exhibition from the Ottawa Art Gallery. This was a collaborative project that brought together ten Indigenous artists from Australia and Canada. Working over the course of three weeks in November 2017, the artists created contemporary versions of an Australian Aboriginal possum skin cloak and a Blackfoot buffalo robe: two culturally distinct, yet similar, artistic traditions that historically held both sacred and practical purposes. The goal of this project was to encourage an inter-cultural sharing of material history to produce a work reflective of Indigenous traditions, cultures, and communities both past and present. This project was made possible through the Canada Council for the Arts New Chapter and partnerships with the City of Ottawa and Carleton University Art Gallery.

 

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November 24, 2020 (Opening of Christmas Collection Art Exhibition and Sale)

24 Algoma Art Society Artists at L&D's Art Gallery and Framing, 348 Bruce Street, Sault Ste. Marie, ON

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December 09, 2020 (Meeting at Art Gallery of Algoma)

A number of members attending the December meeting displayed and talked about their favorite painting.  It was an opportunity for members to get to know each other better.

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Pat Caldwell spoke about the display case his is creating to display the Algoma Art Society's City Cultural Award received in November 2020.  When completed the case will be on display at the Art Gallery of Algoma.

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