Prison photograph

Last Saturday was the opening of Leung Chi-Wo's "In the Name of Victoria". The Hong Kong based photo artist was in Toronto. Bonnie and Marcy came to the opening and met Leung. Bonnie, the Director of CONTACT Photo Festival, took a picture of Leung in front of the artis's photograph Victoria Prison III and we all laughed. It was like Leung was actually in the prison. Then Bonnie mentioned the exhibition she and David Liss curated for the Festival: Still Revolution: Suspended in Time which also featured the prison photograph Cell 508 by Mikhael Subotzky. Subotzky's photograph of South Africa’s notorious Pollsmoor Maximum Security Prison was taken in 2005 and Leung's Victoria Prison, which is now decommissioned, was taken in 2006.

Tomio Nitto's Camera Shop

What started as mere fun could have some serious consequence.

Tomio enjoys drawing cameras so much that he has decided to open his camera shop - drawing cameras on paper and make them into buttons. Already people are lining up to order a portrait of their favourite cameras. Pretty soon, Tomio, who has not used a camera for many years, will become a camera expert. Voigtlander, Hasselblad, Leica, Alpa, Holga, Holgaroid, SWC, M3, SX-70, Diana, Brownie, Minox. In the last SUNDAY BAZAAR, he even did a portrait of Bolex, a movie camera that Lee Ka-sing inherited from his father.

SUNDAY BAZAAR "The Action of Light"

Bill's Daguerreotypes collection

It was a sunny day when we had our first-ever SUNDAY BAZAAR! The whole month of May is the official photography month of Toronto, so naturally this SUNDAY BAZAAR is about photography. We have invited Bill Grigsby, the Director of Reactor Graphic Studio, to organize a two-table showcase of his Daguerreotypes and Ferrotypes collection. Bill was busy renovating his cottage up north so unable to attend the event. He left us two tables full of beautiful images of people, taken when photography was just invented.

Sally Ayre's Cyanotypes


On the other side was Sally Ayre's wonderful, delicate work of Cyanotypes and VanDykes printed on silk. Sally has been working with these alternative processes for years, gathering ocean memories from her childhood spent in Newfoundland. She has recently moved on to using the Japanese hand-made Hosokawa paper. Talking about Washi, here is Nancy chatting with Sally about the coming Washi Matsuri (Washi Festival) taking place from June 5th to 30th. Last year's big Washi Summit was a success and this year's will be of a smaller scale to keep the momentum going. There will be several exhibitions, workshops and special events. Check out more information from the website:
http://www.japanesepaperplace.com/goings-on/events.htm

A rich, diverse tapestry

Another highlight of the SUNDAY BAZAAR in May was unique buttons hand-drawn by Tomio Nitto. Here is the proud owner Alan Shapiro - he owns a portrait of his Leica M4 (as a button). He mentioned to me that he carried his Leica everywhere and seldom used his digital camera. In the midst of analog, digital, film, pixel, physical, virtual, tactile, intangible... artists seem more comfortable now mixing and matching whatever methods or mediums that suit them. Tomio uses a brush as a camera, Jacquelyn uses a camera as a pen, Cher uses a pin-hole and prints digitally, Sally scans her images and prints traditionally, JK combines images with graphic elements, Bruce puts his images in digital frame, Lulu and Patrick silk-screen their images on T-shirts... a world of confusing languages knitted into a rich, diverse tapestry.