Stephen Weir articles, editorials and popular social media weir postings

Denyse is coming home to the AGO this fall   By Stephen Weir Early in October the Art Gallery of Ontario is presenting the first major retrospective exhibition of the late Trinidadian-Canadian artist  Denyse Thomasos.  She is considered one the finest painters to emerge in the 1990s. The exhibition is entitled  Denyse Thomasos: just beyond  and is co-organized by the AGO and the Remai Modern art gallery in Saskatoon.  “Thomasos had a singular style that employed abstraction as a means to explore contemporary issues of race, the architecture of confinement and our complex relationships to space and place, and the environment” said the AGO in a recent release about the coming show.   Denyse Thomasos: just beyond  is co-organized by the AGO and Saskatoon’s Remai Modern contemporary art gallery. Born in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, Thomasos was raised in Toronto and spent most of her professional career in Philadelphia and New York City. Thomasos ear...

Breakthrough Exhibition Opening At Toronto's AGO By Stephen Weir as published in the Caribbean Camera A first for a noted American artist is about to be made at Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO).  Opening next Thursday is a solo exhibition by African-American artist Mickalene Thomas – this is the first Canadian solo show for the famed painter / photographer. Recognize the name? She is best known as being the first artist to create a portrait of the First Lady Michelle Obama.  Thomas's silk-screen portrait, "Michelle O," was a riff on Andy Warhol's famous portrait of former First Lady Jackie O and captured the attention of all Americans. Thomas has made a career out of creating powerful portraits of Black women.  The Brooklyn-based 47-year old artist comes to the  AGO  November 29th with a remarkable exhibition that sparks urgent questions about race and sexuality and how society sees the Black female body.  ...

Carnival Themed Fete At the Art Gallery Of Ontario Attracts Hundreds and Hundreds Rhoma in costume at the AGO - photo by Craigg Slowly By Stephen Weir for Caribbean Camera Rhoma Spencer, Macomere Fifi, traditional costumed carnival performers and dancer Jasmyn Fyffe took the AGO by storm last Thursday night as part of the art gallery's First Thursday fete. The theme last night was Carnival, and thousands crammed into the Toronto public gallery to jump up. Rhoma Spencer, a well-known Trinidadian Canadian actor and producer, recreated the custom of Viey la Cou (The Old Yard), where traditional Mas was performed over two centuries ago. The characters that she brought to the Dundas St W building were larger than life. There was Dame Lorraine, a Trinidadian mas character of the 18th century, was known for love of dance and shakes it up in a big way with huge padded breasts and an equally large padded butt. Pictured with the Dame is Rhoma Spencer dressed as the Midnigh...

Feature story by Stephen Weir in today's Caribbean Camera Shake it? Rhoma Spencer is going to Rock, Dazzle And Amaze downtown millennials at the Art Gallery of Ontario The Art Gallery of Ontario bills its February evening millennial bash as Shake It. But, actress playwright Rhoma Spencer plans to take it up a notch, dazzling, rocking and ‘Carnivalizing” hundreds of downtown hipsters who will be taking in the First Thursday party this February 1st, from 7-11:30pm. Shake It is a unique programme meant to attract new (and younger) audiences to the downtown Toronto art institution. Shake It looks at traditional in a contemporary way, and as always through the eyes of the artist,” reports the art gallery about next month’s event. “ We will be honouring the season, history of Carnival.”  Rhoma Spencer Headlining the event will be Rhoma Spencer, Macomere Fifi, traditional costumed carnival performers, dancer Jasmyn Fyffe and New York artist and DJ Juliana Huxtable. She is ...

CNW photograph -  Josh Basseches Trending At Toronto's Cultural Attractions: Hire Out Of Canada . Just got a CNW release about the new head of the Royal Ontario Museum here in Toronto. In the press release ROM welcomes its new Director & CEO, Josh Basseches . He was previously the Deputy Director of the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts. Basseches is well qualified to take-over a museum the stature and budget of the ROM. However, by passing over, once again, worthy Canadian candidates for the job (last CEO, an Australian, lef t her post early), ROM has continued a disturbing trend here in Toronto -- most of the high profile roles at this city's key cultural institutions have been handed over, at a huge expense, to foreign nationals. Earlier this year the Art Gallery of Ontario announced that after a 7-month worldwide search it had hired Stephan Jost as CEO of the Gallery. A Michigan born art expert, Jost does not appear to have a background in ...

.   . AS MAY FADES, SO DOES THE CONTACT FESTIVAL. STILL TIME TO SEE MAGGS, MACLEANS AND SCHOOL EYED KENYA! (Draft article for Huffington Post Blog) Somewhere in the great city of Toronto, there is an art lover who has seen every single Contact Festival picture hung by over 1,500 Canadian and international photographers in 175 venues throughout the city.  But for the rest of us,  it is a challenge to  see at best a few of the exhibitions that make up the  world's largest month long photography festival.  With only a few days left in the At the Design Exchange Big Show, what will you see? May I suggest three -  the late Arnaud Maggs (AGO/Ryerson), Maclean's Face to Face (Gladstone Hotel)  and the intriguing group show - I Am Standing In The Place Where I Live - by four students from Emori Joi High School in Kenya (Design Exchange)! I Am Standing In The Place Where I Live : Christopher Nokes is a well-known figure in Toronto's art...

Top: Eran Penny and Old Self, Variation #, 1960 Left: young Penny . "HOPE I DIE BEFORE GET OLD" (Oops too late)   Maybe, says Canadian artist but that was a long time AGO From the Huffington Post by Stephen Weir   http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/../../stephen-weir/evan-penny-ago_b_1964942.html It was the sixties. Vietnam.  Nuclear testing in the Pacific.  Sgt Pepper. And, t he Who singing they hoped th eir generation would die before it got old. What could be worse than aging?  Cutting your hair? Buying a suit?  Cubicles? Getting a mortgage? The song didn't work.  Most of us lived. We all grew old.  Overnight. No one thought about what was going to happen as the aging process took hold ... except maybe Canadian sculptor, Evan Penny. When Peter Townsend wrote My Generation (with that famous dying line) it was 1965 and the Who w ere pointing out that older people just "don't get it".  Evan Penny w...

Stephen Weir HUFFINGTON POST RAN THIS EDITED VERSION OF A BLOG POSTING ON JANUARY 14th . How Steve Jobs Transformed PR    Huffington Post 1.14.2012      See the full length blog at: http://20minutesoffame.blogspot.com/2011/09/was-it-only-year-ago-that-you-never-saw.html Last month when the Ontario Science Centre (OSC) held a media launch for an exhibition of miniature working models of some of Leonardo da Vinci's greatest inventions, Massimiliano Lisa, curator of the traveling show, dedicated the day to the memory of Steven Job. Lisa (no relation to Mona) compared the game changing genius of Da Vinci to the intellect of the recently deceased head of Apple. The room full of science geeks agreed with the visiting curator. Little did they know how much Jobs has changed how PR people like me stage media events -- including the event they were at. In the old days -- a year ago -- there was a certain never-stray-from blue print for the physical...