A&E Seeing from two perspectives Amelia Douglas Gallery opens new show October 17 by J. Robinson here is a really wonderful pencil sketch of a chicken. In the background is a light yellow wash. It is so very atypical, content-wise from the rest of the acrylic paintings on the wall, that I’m left wondering if it’s a work from the other artist represented in the latest showing in the Amelia Douglas Gallery. But she, Lil Chrzan, has used this chicken another place. And [’m not too sure what the chicken is doing there. If the pencil drawing is ‘This is not about a chicken,’ then is the acrylic about a chicken? I would like to say that the chicken was a fertility symbol — especially since each chicken is paired with an egg — but something is stopping me. I’m not sure if the hesitation is there because I saw or heard/was told or assumed that the chickens weren’t fertility symbols. Maybe I should take notes at the next opening, but I find people get a little nervous when you start writing down their words. Perhaps it’s something about being published, for all poster- ity, that makes people think about what they’re saying, and then they start wondering if they sound stupid, and what other people think of what they’re saying, and now this is making me a little nervous. The same thing happens to artists. Suddenly what you were feeling, what you were seeing is put down, and maybe you can change it, but then you’re changing what you're saying. It takes a lot of courage to leave what you’re saying and move on to the next work. present 2 one act plays A Murderous Comedy by Tom Stoppard Sr Student $ call: 527-5488 Theatre & Stagecraft . The Real Inspector Hound opa&e@siwash.be.ca And then there’s always the chance that you didn’t really say what you meant. At least you can revise an essay, or a letter before you send it off. How do you choose what painting really says what you meant it to say? We’ll you let your friends see it, and your family, if you’re in art school your teachers will be able to comment. That’s the safe route. And it’s where most artists begin to look at their work critically. Then you get to move on to juried art shows, gallery showings, or a graphic design job. Whether your vision comes with you is totally up to you. And therein is the difference between form and content. Now, was that putting the cart before the chicken? Loretta Walz is in the Theatre Foyer, her art holding the wall up. Stepping back the rounded wall looks unified with her vision. But the little framed pieces — tributes to the departed — draw the eye more than the large impressionist paintings. Stand close to the butterflies and flags. That is where the message is. Then there are the boat — I had to know what the abstract shapes were, and then I’m told they’re boats. Little wooden rowboats. And then it begins to make more sense, on a larger scale. Both artists seem drawn to nautical symbols. That’s not the only symbol- ism they both share. There is the idea of metamorphosis. Walz has butter- flies, Chrzan has chickens and eggs. The water, implied and stated, that moves cities, that grows cities and washes them out. Change. They even share medium. Paintings. But I’m not sure their themes are best served on such a flat medium. Walz achieves a great deal of texture, Chrzan uses colour, rich, intense colour, to achieve depth. But would November 15 Douglas Gallery what they’re saying gain any imme- diacy if they had chosen, instead, to punch their ideas off the canvas any other way than with a brush and thickly laid paint? Connection with the audience is not achieved with the medium, instead it is achieved with content. Nudity is a pretty good way to shock, to get the surface interest, but the issues below the surface are hidden, I only wish, if could stand in front of them forever, that I could get behind the surface. Because it feels like there is more to be said, that there is more the paintings are trying so hard to say. "Heather Hay, cello _ dane Hayes, piano November 21& 28 & Dec 5 Student Show- _case Recital The Other Press October 29 1996