the Gardiner Museum

Just a couple of pictures from the Gardiner Museum of Ceramics in Toronto.  The museum shop carries my work and I had been wanting to pop in there to actually meet the manager and staff who I've been emailing back and forth with over the last couple of years.  It was super helpful to hear what was working, and also, what I need to change on my end to make orders process more smoothly.  Nothing like a good face-to-face!

We had the chance to check out the Betty Woodman Exhibit happening right now at the Gardiner, and both my friend Disa and I thought her work reminded us of the Vancouver artist Gathie Falk (here for some of her paintings). They are both of the same generation so it kind of makes sense even though one is is from Vancouver and Betty Woodman is from New York.  There were some lovely pairings of her small teacups on porcelain with historical ceramics that I liked- perhaps I'll show them here on the blog.  It's not easy to capture images of anything with glass in front of it, but you would get the idea. 

The Porcelain collection at the Gardiner is truly amazing.  Going back to the 1700's and perhaps even earlier, it was hard to come away without seeing every idea I've ever had having been executed already 300 years ago.  Even the glaze colours and combinations looked so contemporary compared to their age.  I'd like to work on a little pairing of the historical ceramics with contemporary look-a-likes.  It would be interesting, indeed!

I'm still sorting through some of my photos from the trip- I'll be back with those next week.  In the meantime, I'm signing off for Easter weekend.  We are hunkering down at home together this weekend- we've either been on holidays or had company or I've been away or Dean's been away for the past month.  So a little family togetherness at home is certainly in order!
Happy Easter!