Oxygen Art Centre is excited to launch their education program for the whole of 2023.
The program features 36 different courses in a myriad of disciplines including writing, film, singing, acting, printmaking, painting, and drawing. Oxygen’s unique programming and incredible local artist instructors provide a rich experience to learn creatively together.
The spring semester is broken into two four-week sessions that span spring break, and the fall semester runs for 8 weeks straight starting mid-September. There are a variety of different course formats from one-day intensives to multi-week with both online and in-person options.
“There is so much to look forward to at Oxygen in 2023! Come to Oxygen to be inspired and creative all year long” says Education Coordinator, Natasha Smith. She hopes the year-long format and extra classes will help people plan for all their arts education explorations through the year.
Oxygen is also adding some affordable community-based programming to their semesters.
Starting in February, Oxygen will be partnering with the Polka Dot Dragon Arts Society to offer lantern-making workshops prior to their festival in February. Following this is a new opportunity: Art Speak – Peer to Peer Work Sharingthat invites artists of all disciplines (professional or not) to share their work in a safe space and engage in contemporary art dialogue with other open-minded art loving individuals.
Learn the fundamentals of drawing, build your painting skills, try out lino, silkscreen, and low-tech printmaking, bind some books, learn 16mm low-tech film processing, develop your solo performance, be an actor, recall memories, start dreaming, and write what you love!
To register and learn more about the semesters, classes, and instructors, click here. Registration takes place through Google Forms on a first-come first-serve basis. Class sizes are small, ranging from seven to twelve students in each.
Join the magic that is learning a new skill and exploring creative processes this year at Oxygen Art Centre. Learn more about the Spring semester on our website.
Oxygen is thrilled to announce our call for submissions for our exhibition and residency programs. We are excited to welcome proposals from artists of any discipline that engage our mandate in experimental and challenging ways.
As of 2022, we no longer seek submissions for specific projects or exhibitions. Instead, we are interested in receiving applications that present your practice, interests, and research questions. This could include a summary of current concerns, methodologies, mediums, and research interests that you are working with or are interested in exploring further. While we do not expect that you apply with a resolved project in mind, you are welcome to propose solo, group, curated, or major exhibition projects and screenings, workshops, performances, and collaborations.
The shift in our submission model seeks to build some flexibility in how artists and Oxygen may approach programming together, and allow for more reflexive engagements with the space. This work is inspired by the curatorial and programming approach that Oxygen is already cultivating as well as models from different ARCs around the country.
HOW TO APPLY
Applicants are encouraged to submit proposals expressing interest in an exhibition, a residency, or both. Oxygen’s Submission Guidelines are structured to offer an introduction to you and your practice; you are not expected to have a resolved project at the time of application. We are interested in hearing about your approaches, ideas, and methodologies with which you might approach collaboration with us.
We encourage you to take a moment to consider Oxygen’s history, our past exhibitions and our current accessibility initiatives as you prepare your submission. Click here to visit our website.
Click here for full submission guidelines including what to send us, a floor plan of the gallery and a breakdown of the compensation that OAC provides professional (CARFAC) exhibition and artist presentation fees are paid for all programming.
We are now accepting applications via Google Form. We suggest familiarizing yourself with the form in advance of submitting your application. Deadline: December 3, 2022 Questions? Please contact the gallery with any questions about the exhibitions and residency program, the application process, or preparing your submission.
We look forward to hearing from you!Images (top to bottom): (1) OAC Call for Submissions promotional image by Megan Quigley, 2022; (2) “Become a Member” text overlaid on an image documenting an installation in progress at Oxygen Art Centre, 2015;
Oxygen Art Centre info@oxygenartcentre.org #3- 320 Vernon St. (alley entrance) Nelson, B.C. V1L 4E4 Canada 250-352-6322
Hours of Operation: Wednesdays – Saturdays, 1:00 – 5:00pm (during exhibition run) Admission by donation
Oxygen Art Centre acknowledges with gratitude that we are located on the tum xula7xw/ traditional territory of the sn̓ʕay̓ckstx/the Sinixt People. As uninvited guests we honour their ongoing presence on this land. We recognize that the Sinixt Arrow Lakes, Sylix, Ktuxana, and Yaqan Nukij Lower Kootenay Band peoples are also connected with this land, as are Métis and many diverse Indigenous persons.
We are grateful for the financial support we receive from Canada Council for the Arts, BC Arts Council, BC Gaming, Province of BC, Government of Canada, Vancouver Foundation, Columbia Kootenay Cultural Alliance, Columbia Basin Trust, United Way, Osprey Community Foundation, Nelson Lions Club, and Nelson and District Credit Union.
We offer thanks to Elephant Mountain Literary Festival and other key partners including Hall Printing, Speedpro Signs, and Selkirk College for their support.
We especially thank all of our volunteers, donors, and members.
Oxygen Art Centre is committed to ensuring all exhibitions, programs, and events are accessible to visitors. Our facilities are wheelchair accessible and equipped with an all-genders washroom. Please contact Oxygen if you have any questions or concerns about your visit.
OXYGEN TO HOST ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING ON NOVEMBER 21, 2022
Oxygen Art Centre invites the public to attend their Annual General Meeting on Monday, November 21, 2022, at 7:00 PM PST (Zoom).
Oxygen Art Centre was founded as the Nelson Fine Art Centre Society in 2002 by former writing and visual art faculty at the Kootenay School of the Arts. Oxygen spent its first two years establishing its educational focus and in January 2005, the Society opened the Oxygen Art Centre in downtown Nelson, BC.
The Annual General Meeting will provide an overview of the artist-run centre’s 2021-2022 year, including reports from staff and board, as well as artistic “palette cleaners” contributed by the directors.
Please ensure your membership is up to date before the meeting to vote. Renew or become a member by visiting Oxygen’s website.
ONLINE WORKSHOP ON DEEP MAPPING CONNECTS NELSON, YMIR, AND MONTREAL
Oxygen Art Centre is delighted to announce an online workshop series entitled BODIES OF WATER: SK/ETCHING DESIRE LINESfeaturing artists Eija Loponen-Stephenson and Kevin Pinvidic. The workshop explores deep mapping connecting artists in Nelson and Ymir, BC and Montréal, QC.
The series aims to create meaningful connections between creative practitioners and scholars in three urban, semi-urban, and rural communities. Over three (3) weeks, nine (9) participants–three from each community–will explore collaborative map-making methodologies which critically and creatively interrogate embodied experiences of living in settlements along unfixed bodies of water.
These sibling settlements are scaffolded by colonial legacies and the tactics of extractive capitalism; their gridded cartography etched into the fecund earth. As these settlements are developed, dilated, and diverted the meandering paths of least resistance support capital accumulation from their potential energies. Consider the relationship between the functions of dammed rivers, canal locks, traffic lights, and metro gates in the manipulation of water bodies (a term here which refers to human and animal bodies that are mostly made of water and bodies of water).
Western cartography (digital and analog) offers panoramic and homogenic representations of space in which the earth is an impenetrable and unchangeable surface, traversable only along pre-cut lines and crossable borders. We often forget that just because paths exist, it doesn’t mean that they should or always have.
Where bodies pool, overflow and leakage is inevitable. Desire lines, cracks or trails cut through city grids or inscribed in walls of reinforced concrete, are signs of water bodies resisting containment. These deviant lines, which can emerge at any scale, are often erased from maps of the global north as they challenge the perceived opacity of man-made barriers. The removal of desire lines from archival documents is one of many ways that colonial grand narratives have become naturalized in western historical canons.
Deep Mapping is an emergent practice and speculative archival strategy that can hold these ephemeral datasets and affective experiences of place and atmosphere. Tracing the defiant paths of desire lines, participants in this workshop series will attempt to document and creatively respond to behavior of water bodies when their flow is disrupted. Collectively we will imagine a new form of cartography which is just as permeable and sensuous as the earth itself.
Loponen-Stephenson developed this program with Pinvidic as part of her tenure as Research Assistant during the Summer of 2022 with Oxygen Art Centre. Following the workshop series, a zine will be published and available for free at the Centre in January 2023.
This workshop is generously supported by the Canada Summer Jobs program and the renascence arts and sustainability society.
Image Credit: Eija Loponen-Stephenson (L); Kevin Pinvidic (R), Courtesy the artists
Saturday, October 15, 2022, from 1:00 – 4:00 PM Oxygen Art Centre celebrates their 20th anniversary on Saturday, October 15, 2022, from 1:00 to 4:00 PM. The artist-run centre invites the public to join the celebration! The event will take place along the alleyway behind Baker Street between Stanley Street and Kootenay Street at the 300 block. Everyone welcome to attend! Admission is free. Oxygen Art Centre was founded as the Nelson Fine Arts Centre Society in 2002 by former writing and visual arts faculty at the Kootenay School of the Arts. The centre spent its first two years establishing its educational focus and in January 2005, the society opened the Oxygen Art Centre in downtown Nelson. After twenty years of arts education and contemporary art programming we want to celebrate our rich past and welcome new community members to contribute to Oxygen’s future. Oxygen’s volunteer Fundraising Committee coordinated this family-friendly, fun afternoon event featuring local artists and performances, art-making stations, music, and refreshments. Committee Chair, Carol Wallace, says of the event, “It will be a great opportunity to celebrate twenty years of arts programming and all the wonderful artists in our community that support our organization!” To commemorate the 20th anniversary, specially designed tote bags by Jonathan Ramos will be available for purchase at the event while supplies last. The event is generously supported by Nelson Home Hardware Building Centre, Kootenay Co-op Grocery, Nelson and District Credit Union, and Oso Negro Coffee, as well as individual community donations. Please contact the gallery with any questions about the event or your visit. Oxygen’s 20th anniversary party takes place on Saturday, October 15, 2022, from 1:00 to 4:00 PM along the alleyway outside of Oxygen’s facility, #3-320 Vernon Street, Nelson, BC, Canada.
Lucie Chan’s exhibition opens at Oxygen Art Centre on Saturday, September 3
Schedule of Events:
Exhibition: 3 September – 1 October 2022
Artist talk: 8 September 2022 at 12:00 PM (Zoom) To attend, register via EventBrite here or join us directly through the Zoom link via Oxygen’s website.
Oxygen Art Centre is pleased to offer a new exhibition, How to be 57 by visual artist Lucie Chan. Lucie Chan was born in Guyana, and currently resides on the unceded and ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and səlilwətaɬ/selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations otherwise known as Vancouver, BC where she maintains a multi-disciplinary visual art practice and teaches at Emily Carr University of Art and Design.
Chan just completed a three-week residency at Oxygen Art Centre. During the residency she was immersed in installing her large body of work, How to be 57. The work was created over a six-year period, and first shown in 2018. The installation includes watercolour and ink drawings, handwritten text, and textural and found materials.
During her residency she also conducted interviews with community members investigating experiences of racialized violence, and in particular, the varying experience of people of colour and immigrants today. These intimate conversations inspire and fuel her work.
Critical to the development of How to be 57 was the artist’s conversation with two women, one a Dutch immigrant in France who finds herself interrogated in her home despite her innocence, and the other, an unarmed civil servant who suffers from racialized violence when her apartment is mistakenly raided. The work departs from the stories and emotions of these important conversations.
How to be 57 is situated in the historic and contemporary struggle of the diasporic peoples, of women and of people of colour to find justice in a world ripe with systemic violence and injustices. A powerful body of work that both confronts and subdues the viewer. For Chan this work is a way of honouring the individual who is often forgotten in the collective experience of being human, and of conjoining individuals through sharing stories around culture and identity.
Much of the installation is paper-based, which the artist has used to create scrolls of rich colour and texture, cloud-like forms, passages of handwritten text and figurative watercolour and ink drawings. Immersed in her residency, Chan has thoughtfully unpacked and installed the hundreds of individual pieces of worked paper that form this body of work.
The exhibition is an immersive experience. A banner-like installation of text hangs diagonally across the gallery space from which the artist has attached layers of handwritten text. The tactile nature of the papers with their yellowing tones and the use of the ink is reminiscent of the delicate papyrus sheets of ancient texts such as, the Dead Sea scrolls. Words and quotes from a variety of sources are written across the sheets of paper, for example, I really think the range of emotions and perceptions I have had access to as a Black person and a female person are greater than those of people that are neither by Toni Morrison remind us that these issues are not new to society.
During her residency, the artist gathered clothing from the community in shades of beige. She hung these articles of clothing on the gallery walls in clusters around her paperwork. These Chan says, serve to remind us that prejudices and stigmas are placed on people of non-white skin tones. Interesting to note that beige an unpopular colour and is often used for uniforms and work-related clothing and perhaps in this way holds a class-like demarcation.
To attempt to grasp the multilayered emotions and messages of this exhibit is a daunting task; however, like wandering in dream imagery we find amongst the many elements that which speaks and resonates with us. Several figurative drawings hold the abstract and textural pieces. They are scattered throughout the installation almost as if they are hiding waiting to be discovered, for the smallness of scale does not contain the loudness of their voice, and the pathos that is at the heart of this work.
How to Be 57 will be on view at Oxygen Art Centre from 3 September to 1 October 2022 on Wednesdays to Saturdays from 1:00 – 5:00 PM.
Admission is free. Everyone welcome to attend.
The artist will give an artist talk about the exhibition and her research on September 8th from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. The event will be held on Zoom. Register to attend via EventBrite or access the Zoom link via Oxygen’s website. Closed captioning will be available for the event.
Due to rising COVID cases in the province, we ask that all visitors to the space wear a mask. Maximum capacity is limited to ten persons at a time. Please contact the gallery with any questions about your visit.
Image credit: Lucie Chan installing How to Be 57 at Oxygen Art Centre by Deborah Thompson 2022
Artist Biography:
Lucie Chan (b. Guyana) teaches at Emily Carr University of Art and Design. She holds a BFA with distinction from the Alberta College of Art and Design and a MFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University with a specialization in drawing. She has shown nationally in various group and solo exhibitions and has undertaken artist residencies at ARTerra in Lobão da Beira, Portugal; the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts in Canning, Nova Scotia; Banff Centre for the Arts in Banff, Alberta; Museum London in London, Ontario; the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery in Halifax, Nova Scotia; and the Foreman Art Gallery in Sherbrooke, Quebec. In addition to receiving numerous provincial and national grants, including the Canada Council for the Arts, she has been long-listed twice for the Sobey Art Award (2005, 2010) and was a recipient of the VIVA Award from the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation (2020).
