My “Featured Member” exhibit at ViewPoint Gallery is a selection of photos covering my photographic journey from the late 1970s to the present day. The exhibit runs from Feb.1 – March 3, 2024.
I do social landscape photography and am interested in New Topographics—the human-altered landscape–recording how human behavior and activity has affected the world. I also look for whimsical scenes, as well as elements of surrealism found in everyday life. My work is firmly planted in the documentary tradition, getting photos through observation rather than through set-up and image manipulation. Photography keeps me in touch with the changing seasons and the passage of time. My images are intertwined with childhood memories, music, and locations around Hants County, Nova Scotia.
I got my start I photography in the late 70s at the Acadia University camera club, and I took photos for the school paper, The Athenaeum. After that, I studied photography at TMU (formerly Ryerson) in Toronto and worked for a time doing freelance jobs, as well as street photography.
Over the years I’ve learned always to carry a camera, and, even more important, to take time to study details of the world around me. In refining my vision and technique, I also strive for images that, I hope, carry some deeper meaning.
My work has been exhibited in Canada and, internationally, in France and China. It’s also featured online and in print: in blogTO, iNPUBLIC, the Toronto Star, the Japan Times, Eyeshot Magazine, Camera Canada, and Photo Life.
I have eight self-published photo books that are available online (through Blurb Books) and at the gallery.
In October 2023, I became a member of ViewPoint Gallery–a vibrant photo co-op with a group of talented photographers. It has been a pleasure connecting with like-minded people who are passionate about photography.
I had a summer job on a railway gang in Alberta while studying at Acadia University. I started to explore the potential of street photography and using juxtaposition in my compositions.
This collage is all about the transition from Wolfville, Nova Scotia, to a new life in Toronto. When we move to a new place, some things are kept while others are left behind.
Mountain worshippers of the Shugendou religion watch the sunrise over Mt. Fuji. I’d climbed the mountain two years earlier, but seeing the sunrise from this location was a more powerful experience.
I found this birch bark in Algonquin Park on a canoeing trip, and used it as a mat. I always welcomed opportunities to get out of the city and into nature.
I was still doing some of the adjacent frame diptych work that I started in 1982. I received two 12-exposure rolls of Kodak “Cosmos” 400 in a promotion, and this was shot on that rare and mysterious film.
In 2010, I discovered Flickr and started posting photos online. It started a renaissance in my photography that has continued for the past 14 years. I look for hooks to make my photos more interesting, like juxtaposition, scale, reflections, and unusual subject matter. My daughter Jane took some painting classes at NSCAD in 2022, and did a nice representation.
Beauty and chaos in the modern world. Interesting photos can be found anywhere–even in a McDonalds.
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Viewpoint Gallery in Halifax, NS., Canada exhibits fine art photography. Viewpoint offers monthly exhibitions and a variety of photography focused events.
1475 Bedford Highway Unit 109, Bedford, NS B4A 3Z5
In November 2023, I traveled to Toronto for the opening of “Hickox, Pahwa, Woolaver – Scenes from Toronto,” an exhibit at the City of Toronto Archives. The showfeatures photos from the 1980s to the late 2000s, and explores how contemporary artists capture the ever-changing city. The reception was well attended and I had a chance to meet some interesting people, including Patrick Cummins–a former City of Toronto archivist.
My portion of the exhibit is a digital slide show with 250 images on 90 slides. The slides are shown at 7 second intervals. They are drawn from my collection of 700 digital images contained in the archives–primarily street photographs taken in the 1980s. There are also two vinyl enlargements of a street scene, and a phone booth on the wall beside the monitor. The curator of the exhibit, Naoise Dunne, did a wonderful job sequencing the images and identifying themes in my work. It an honour to have my photos in the City of Toronto Archives and I’ll mark this as a highlight in my photographic journey.
April Hickox’s photography documents the unique landscape of Toronto Island and seasonal changes.Vik Pahwa captures the city’s built environment, focusing on forms and shapes, creating abstract images. The three digital slide shows encourage viewers to explore the city through the photographers’ perspective and picture-making methods.
A second exhibit, “If These Walls Could Talk – Researching the history of where you live,” focuses on the unique stories of 11 homes. The exhibit opened on October 19, 2023 and runs until August 2024.
Monday to Friday, 9 a.m – 4 p.m. Free entry
City of Toronto Archives
255 Spadina Rd.
Toronto, ON M5R 2V3
Promo poster for “Hickox, Pahwa, Woolaver – Scenes from Toronto”
I was fortunate to have a portfolio of my 1980s Toronto photos in the 2023 Pingyao International Photography Festival. The festival ran from September 19th to 25th in Pingyao, North China’s Shanxi province. Themed “New Light, New Orientation,” the six-day festival attracted 13,961 works by over 2,000 photographers from 28 countries.
Photo courtesy of China Daily
Curator Don Snyder invited eight photographers to be part of “Image, Document, Memory: Photographs from Canada.” Here is his introduction to the exhibit:
Image, Document, Memory: Photographs from Canada
While thinking about images for the 2023 Pingyao Festival, my first goal was to select work that would be new to the audience in Pingyao. I also wanted to represent approaches to image-making that would range from traditional to highly experimental, and to exhibit photographs from many different parts of Canada.
I considered nearly 50 portfolios and selected eight photographers to invite. While their photographic styles are very different, common themes can be found that link the various portfolios together. Every photographer I spoke with told me they had been deeply affected by the pandemic, and that they had often turned to more personal image-making during this time. This is where the theme of “The Poetic Image” originated, exemplified by the photographs included here from Kendall Townend, Pierre Tremblay and Alexander Alter. These images deal with landscape, time and memory, and the inner workings of the imagination, utilizing methods and processes that blend the uniquely photographic with the composite, layered, and digital imagery.
Many photographers talked about developing a new appreciation for the workers in manufacturing and transportation–workers who kept people everywhere supplied and fed during times of lockdown. This is where the idea to include the portfolios about “Labor and Commerce” originated. Images from Workspace Canada, by Martin Weinhold, and 23 Days at Sea, by Christopher Boyne were chosen for this component of the exhibition.
For the portfolios in Part III, “Place and Culture”, several photographers I spoke with had found themselves reviewing personal archives and images from past years during the pandemic, drawn to explore photography’s unique ability to juxtapose past and present time. The sequences in this group were selected from Toronto Days and Toronto Flashback by Avard Woolaver, and from Kensington Market: Meditations on Home by Wayne Salmon. These portfolios examine the relationships between memory and present time, and between place and a sense of belonging.
Lastly, as an educator I was keenly aware of the changes the pandemic brought to the world of art education. “Making and Thinking: The Idea of a Photographic Workshop” is a group project produced by my colleague Rob Davidson and his students in a situation where they were unable to meet for in-person classes. The images made during this online workshop, available in either book or exhibition form, point to new possibilities for photographic education in an environment of networked communication, and make a strong case for this mode of teaching in the future.
Don Snyder
Here are the photos as they appeared in the exhibition:
I’m excited about the exhibition in March. I hope those of you in the Toronto area can come out!
Toronto Days: photographs by Avard Woolaver
Gallery 310, Ryerson School of Image Arts
122 Bond Street, Toronto, ON
March 5 – 16, 2018
Opening Reception: Saturday March 10, 2pm – 5pm
Artist talk, 3pm
Avard Woolaver graduated from the Ryerson School of Image Arts in 1984 and has photographed, worked, and lived in Ontario and Nova Scotia. In addition to personal projects including “Wish You Were Here – Surrealism in Everyday Life” and “Scattershot: A Journey Through Place and Time (1976-present),” he has produced three books: Toronto Flashback (2016), No Money Down (2017), and Toronto Days (2018). This exhibition includes selections from each book that document the city of Toronto from 1980 to 1995 and show Woolaver’s interest observing and capturing ordinary scenes.
