Here at the AGH we focus on historical Canadian art, 19th-century International art, and contemporary art. Many people are unclear about the definition of contemporary art, so we thought we would clarify. Contemporary art is art made in the present day, including painting, sculpture, photography, printmaking, performance art, mixed media, sound art, digital art and more.
The nice thing about working with living contemporary artists is that we can ask them about their work and process. We can get behind the scenes to get a sense of what makes them tick. In this Quest10ns series we asked contemporary artists on display at the AGH ten questions on topics ranging from people, places, time periods and techniques.
Currently on view at the AGH is Dianne Bos’s exhibition The Sleeping Green. no man’s land 100 years later. Travelling through France and Belgium from 2014 to 2016, Bos used a variety of vintage and pinhole cameras to photograph the land a century after the Great War. Bos then incorporated objects from the battle sites – such as rocks, leaves, and a bullet – in the darkroom printing process. By scattering these over the paper during printing, as well as dodging, burning, and overlaying maps of stars, she produces layers of imagery that convey the emotional depth of these extraordinary landscapes. As Bos says, these works “make the invisible visible” and explore how a terrible historical event has become part of the fabric of our collective imagination.
Below is Dianne’s Quest10ns interview:
- First camera you owned…
Kodak brownie
- Agree or disagree…”your first 10,000 photographs are your worst.” – Henri Cartier-Bresson
Disagree. I don’t take many photos so not up to 10,000 yet. I’d say I only take one good photo a year if I’m lucky.
- Three things that are must-haves while on a shoot (apart from the camera)…
Sketchbook, water, good knapsack.
- A photograph is…
No substitute for really looking and experiencing a place.
- To photograph is…
Currently a disease. Too many people taking photographs they never look at.
- Agree or disagree…”today everything exists to end in a photograph.” – Susan Sontag
That might now be true. Not a good thing.
- Last exhibition you saw…
Mac art student graduate show at McMaster Museum of Art.
- Person/s (dead or alive) you’d like to grab coffee with…
My friends.
- If you could live in any historical era, what would it be and where…
There are no historical periods that are great for women to live in.
- An artist you’ve recently (re)discovered…
Christian Boltanski
Dianne Bos: The Sleeping Green. no man’s land 100 years later.
Gallery Level 2
April 7, 2018 to September 23, 2018
