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The Catalyst Paper Mill (1910) at Powell River, British Columbia, was the first and largest newsprint manufacturer in Western Canada. The Powell Lake Dam is on the right.
St Peter and St Paul, Eye, Suffolk
I had not been back to Eye church for years. I had often passed through the town, often stopped here indeed, but the church was such a big project I had usually carried on to somewhere else. I finally tipped up here on the first Sunday in September 2018, a few minutes after High Mass had finished. The great church was full of incense, the bright summer light thrusting through it, claiming the interior for something greater and more numinous than mere congregational worship. As ever here I was made welcome.
There are three Suffolks. There is mighty Ipswich, a proud provincial town of 150,000 people. There are the scattered villages, hundreds and hundreds of them, their medieval parish churches forming the backbone of the county. And then, there are the small towns. Eye is perhaps the most robustly independent of Suffolk's smaller towns. It isn't big at all, but it is far from anywhere else of any size in the county, if you ignore Norfolk's Diss looming on the horizon. The railways reached it, bringing with them proud 19th century municipal buildings. Until the 1830s, the town returned two members to parliament, and it still gave its name to the parliamentary constituency until the 1970s. There is a castle (or, at least, what looks like a castle), some decent pubs, a theatre, and one of Suffolk's grandest churches.
The great flint-encrusted tower of St Peter and St Paul rises above a stunningly crafted interior. Here inside, we will find the nearest thing Suffolk has to a fulfilment of the ecclesiological aspirations of our great-grandparents' generation.
From a tiny spark, a glint in the eye of John Keble at Oxford in the 1830s, the sacramental revival in the Church of England spread like wildfire over the course of the ensuing century. The Church set about rediscovering its Catholic roots, and the preaching houses of the Hanoverians were stripped bare and filled with all the best that the Gothic revival had to offer. In many medieval churches, original artefacts were rediscovered and pressed back into service. Where this wasn't possible, the mass-production workshops of Birmingham and London could be called upon to provide what history could not.
Ironically, the catalyst for all this had been some of those very reform acts which had deprived Eye of its 'rotten borough' status. Catholic emancipation in the 1820s had been followed by grants to a Catholic university in Ireland. Keble, along with Pusey, Newman, Froude and the others, saw that the Church of England was in danger of being sidelined as a protestant sect. The Oxford Movement, as it became known, published a series of tracts to try and educate the middle classes about their lost past. Their intention was that the Church would recover its catholicity, and its destiny as a national church; the inevitable result was that some of the Movement, Newman among them, would leave the Church of England to become Catholics themselves.
The medieval past that they most admired was that of the early 14th century. This allowed them to see the later medieval period as an abuse-riddled downturn, from which the Church had to be rescued at the Reformation. However, as the Movement went on, there were many who asked if the Reformation had really been necessary at all.
The grandeur of Suffolk's biggest churches is an eve-of-the-Reformation wealth of the medieval industrial-heartland-of-England thing. Here at Eye it rebuilt the tower in the second half of the 15th century. As at Stradbroke, with which the tower has much in common, it was De la Pole money that rebuilt it, and the family arms are discernible still. Mortlock points out that you can see the shape of the windows change from late-Decorated to Perpendicular over the course of the 40 years or so it took to build. You can see the last windows, the pure rationalism of the late Perpendicular period, right at the top in the bell-stage. Beneath are some mystical Decorated windows, and below them the vast west window which bridges the gap between the two.
As the tower was being completed, so the rest of the church was undergoing an opulent rebuild. You can see evidence of the extension at the east end of the south aisle, where a blocked door sits beside the new one into the chancel. As at Lavenham, the parishioners here were left in no doubt about secular power and its might. Soon, the De la Poles, the Springs, the De Veres and so on would outgrow the middle ages, and the aspirations of wealthy families such as these would give rise to the Reformation, the nation state, and ultimately capitalism itself.
This was in the future. For now, the De la Poles invested in prayers as well as commerce, and although their south porch is a bit battered these days, it remains one of the loveliest in Suffolk, its brickwork echoing the gildhall on the other side of the church. You can only enter it from inside the church if you hope to see the dole table and fine 13th century doorway that survives of the earlier church, and you have to be there when it is open, for it now contains a shop.
Externally then, this is one of the great East Anglian churches. Here we see the late medieval Church in all its glory.
But in the 1530s, a collision of expediency and opportunity put an end to it all. Henry VIII took the church out of Europe; his son Edward VI enforced its protestant credentials, and Edward's sister Elizabeth I settled the whole thing by imposing a tyrannical oppression of the old ways, to bolster her grip on power. The past was subverted and lost, as first Anglicans, and then Puritans, overthrew the religion of their parents and grandparents, of the long generations. They all but obliterated the old order, the ancient faith. Much was lost, and much was forgotten. This was what the Oxford Movement tried to recover, but in the context of a national established church, with spectacular results.
By the end of the 19th century, the Anglo-catholic movement was in the ascendant. Most churches now saw Holy Communion as the main service rather than Morning Prayer; most churches became focused on the altar rather than the pulpit. Perhaps the formality and splendour of the high church aesthetic chimed with the pomposity and rhetoric of British imperialism; it is worth noting that the rise and fall of Anglo-catholicism as a mainstream tradition coincided almost exactly with the growth and decline of the British Empire. The movement reached its height in the early years of the 20th century, and probably the greatest exponent of Anglo-catholic fixtures and fittings was Ninian Comper. Comper will be familiar to manyfor his work at Lound and Lowestoft. He has also made appearances at Kettlebaston, Ipswich St Mary Elms, Ufford and Barsham, all beacons of early 20th century Anglo-catholic correctness.
All gone now, alas, alas. The ritualist tide has receded almost completely, and only the trappings and debris survive here and there, a reminder of what once was. An age that hovers on the edge of a public memory, when the formal vision of the established Church was at the heart of British daily life; an age of candles and incense, of richly coloured vestments and four-part choirs. An age of anthems, and war memorials, and processions, and coronations, and a liturgy that brought you to your knees.
Some of this still survives. Here at Eye the tradition has not completely receded.
You walk beneath the great tower with its wonderful fan-vaulting so uncharacteristic of Suffolk, and then into the open space of a large, civic church. As at Hadleigh, Halesworth, and other small Suffolk towns, the 19th century restoration here was pretty significant. However, into this created space have been placed furnishings of superb quality and design. The centre piece is Comper's magnificent rood screen and loft, built on the remains of the old one in the mid-1920s. The screen below is good, although not as good as some of the county's other late-15th century screens; the loft however, is easily the best 20th century work in Suffolk.
The figures on the dado screen must have been painted in 1500. Pevsner says, somewhat harshly, that they are all bad. It is true that they are doll-like, with nothing like the sophistication of those across the A140 at Yaxley, for example, but they have a certain naive charm. Curiously, the gessowork that forms a relief to the figures is really quite sophisticated. They are, from north to south: I: St Paul, II: St Helen, III: St Edmund, IV: St Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins, V: Henry VI, VI: St Dorothy, VII: St Barbara, VIII: St Agnes, IX: St Edward the Confessor, (the gap into the chancel is here), X: St John the Evangelist, XI: St Catherine, XII: St William of Norwich, XIII: St Lucy, XIV: St Thomas of Canterbury, and XV: St Agatha.
Many of these Saints had strong local cults in the late medieval period, and are familiar from other East Anglian screens. The less common St William of Norwich adds a little colour, standing as evidence of an anti-semitism that persisted well into the late middle ages, despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that the Jewish population had been expelled some two centuries previously. Two of the other images resonate strongly - the cults of Henry VI and St Thomas of Canterbury were particularly frowned upon by the 16th century reformers.
Up in the chancel, an entirely secular memorial recalls the Reverend Thomas Wythe, for fifty years Vicar of this Parish. he died in 1835, and the monument notes that he cordially believed, zealously preached, assiduously practiced. It is unlikely that the Reverend Wythe would recognise the inside of his church today. Much of what was foregrounded in this church by the considerable 1850s restoration was further adapted and enhanced by the higher church over the ensuing century. The most spectacular work is by Ninian Comper. As well as the rood and rood loft already mentioned, he produced the great east window depicting the Risen Christ flanked by St John, St Peter, St Paul and St Polycarp in memory of John Polycarp Oakey, parish priest here who died in 1926. Comper's also is the towering font cover, and the window of St George in the north aisle in memory of George Gerald Warnes, a 'Black-and-Tan' auxiliary who was gunned down by the IRA in Grafton Street, Dublin during the so-called 'Troubles' that preceded the Irish Civil War of the 1920s.
The process continues. The elegant tomb recess in the north aisle, for example, is host to Lough Pendred's 1960s Madonna and child. Pendred carved the same subject in a different composition for the lady chapel in the south aisle. To be honest, this kind of light wood romantic abstraction is very much of its decade, but there is a poignancy to its presence here in one of the surviving outposts of modern Anglo-Catholicism. Eye is one of the few Suffolk churches that still 'sports the big six'; that is to say, has six tall candles on the high altar.
Comper decorated the chancel roof, which glows magnificently in the morning light through the east window. Tucked away in two corners are two post-Reformation tombs to Nicholas Cutler and William Honyng, the first in the north aisle (it was originally in the sanctuary, according to Mortlock) and the second in the south aisle chapel. They are curious, because they appear to be almost identical, although whether this is a tribute to early-modern vanity, competing arrogance or mass-production I couldn't say.
This is a church in which to wander. It is full of interest, little details and quiet corners. A bit like Eye itself. Beside the church, the large, half-timbered building to the north is the former guildhall. For a long time this was a wonderful second hand bookshop, but that is now closed. On the corner post are the restored angels of the Annunciation - one only has been left unrestored. It is almost a symbol for this reinvented place.
Across the road is a rather urban 1960s red-brick modernist building that now houses the Eye Youth Resource Centre - one assumes it wouldn't get planning permission today. Above is the Castle Mound, now crowned by a late 19th century folly after the former windmill was demolished. You wander northwards into narrow streets of independent shops, and the sense of a community that supports and is at ease with itself. A proud little town. Its great church suits it well.
"Catalyst Location: Minnetrista Campus, 1200 N. Minnetrista Pkwy., Muncie, IN. Catalyst was commissioned for Minnetrista by Virginia B. Ball to honor her husband, Edmund F. Ball. The design represents partnership, giving and stewardship which were important ideals of Mr. Ball. It was also intended to represent a century of giving by the Ball family, their stewardship of the land, and Minnetrista as a catalyst in the community. The sculpture was dedicated in June 2004. The artist is Beverly Stucker Precious of Indianapolis.
The completed sculpture is comprised of 32,000 pounds of limestone, 17,000 pounds of stainless steel and 2,000 pounds of dichroic and plate glass. Forty-four hundred hours went into the fabrication of steel for Catalyst, which is 26 feet in diameter."
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McGee, Charles (1924–2021)
Abstract Drawing
Pastel and chalk on paper
Support size: 14 5/8 x 12 3/8 inches; Image size: 9 1/2 x 7 1/2 inches
During his long life Charles William McGee was an artist interested in diverse subjects and skilled with many different materials. He was also a dedicated teacher and active member of his community—a “mover and shaker”—who made art for public spaces, organized exhibitions, and taught college students, as well as local youths and incarcerated individuals.
McGee was born on a sharecropper’s farm belonging to his grandfather near Clemson, South Carolina. He had little formal schooling and no art education before his move to Detroit in 1934, another example of the Great Migration. Once relocated he took art classes at the public library and was given a scholarship by the Detroit Institute of Arts to take evening drawing classes. Students drew from works in the museum’s collection, about which McGee said: “the museum was freeing, and I was in heaven. It opened up a whole new world.”
Unfortunately, McGee’s formal education ended in the tenth grade with the death of his mother. He was employed on a Works Progress Administration painting project before taking a factory job in the foundry and learned how to handle metal—a critical skill that served him well later when he made large-scale sculptures. Between 1943 and 1947 McGee served in the United States Marines and was stationed in the South Pacific as part of an all-Black supply company. He also worked in the laundry where he became acquainted with different fabrics, information that proved useful when he began making collages. Following his military service McGee returned to Detroit and took another job on an auto industry assembly line until the early 1950s when he shifted to the United States Army Tank Automotive Center. He was employed as a draftsman there until 1967.
Using the GI Bill, McGee took classes as a part-time student for ten years at the Society of Arts and Crafts (now the College for Creative Studies). He also became involved in the Black art scene in Detroit where Hughie Lee-Smith was active. McGee continued to visit the Detroit Institute of Arts where in 1955 he saw Jacob Lawrence’s John Brown series. In late 1967 he quit his industry job and began a yearlong sojourn in Barcelona, enrolling first at the municipal Escuela Massana, but shortly afterward moving on to another school where he concentrated on printmaking. He saw work by Pablo Picasso and Joan Miró and became enchanted by “the texture of living, the colors, [and] the oldness of everything” in Spain.
Upon his return to Detroit, in 1969 McGee opened Gallery 7, for the specific purpose of exhibiting Black art and selling African masks. He also organized the Charles McGee School of Art, where volunteer instructors taught Black youth. The school remained active until 1974. During the spring term of 1970 he was one of twelve Black artists in residence at the University of Delaware. At Eastern Michigan University in Lansing he first served in a similar position in 1969 before becoming a tenured faculty member until his retirement in 1987. In 1978 McGee founded the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit and received the first Michigan Foundation for the Arts (now the Michigan Council) award. In 2008 the Kresge Foundation honored him with the first Eminent Detroit Artist award.
Initially a painter who depicted African and Egyptian infused imagery, McGee also enjoyed experimenting in a variety of materials and techniques: he had a non-objective phase on shaped canvases, made collages, and did large scale charcoal drawings; he also dabbled in plaster, which gave texture to his surfaces, as well as neon for reliefs. In addition, he was responsible for several large public commissions crafted from aluminum, both in relief and large, freestanding sculptures. He explained his goals: “Discovering solutions that transform mundane public spaces into lively, aesthetic, people-friendly environments is the will or force that motivates my work. … I am convinced that public art has a responsibility to educate, to maintain integrity, and to act in the service of its audience.”
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All the Small Things
TJC Gallery, Spartanburg SC
February 19, 2025 – April 4, 2025
thejohnsoncollection.org/all-the-small-things/
Size matters in art. The scale of a work when seen in person can be an essential ingredient in its visual impact. And the received canon of fine art in the West has a clear bias for BIG things—from the monumental statuary of antiquity to the massive canvases in the contemporary art scene. Indeed, for the past four hundred years, artists have been highly incentivized to “go big,” as larger works commanded more prestige. Within the hierarchy of art genres inherited from the seventeenth century and the standardized measurements that evolved in the art industries of the nineteenth century, the largest canvases and commissions have traditionally been reserved for imposing landscapes and full-length portraits. Against this grain, the present exhibition celebrates the wondrous world of small art—in this case, paintings of no more than twenty inches.
Why might an artist work on a small scale? For some the motivation may be economic. Larger paintings mean more material costs, from more paint to bigger frames and heftier shipping prices. Thus, the size of an artwork potentially reveals unequal financial challenges faced by, for instance, women artists, self-taught artists, or artists of color. At the same time, the cheaper costs of smaller works make them well-suited for preliminary studies (as with Aaron Douglas’s The Toiler) or for trial efforts with new styles and techniques (such as Theodoros Stamos’s experiments with abstraction in Flow). Smaller art is more portable, making it ideal for artists working in the plein-air tradition or those working rapidly for tourist markets. Finally, although petite paintings have historically been relegated to subjects considered mundane or insignificant, these small works can instead confer an intimacy and humanity for the artist and viewer alike.
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See also: www.flickr.com/photos/ugardener/albums/72177720322921517/
THE JOHNSON COLLECTION - A Private Collection for Public Good
thejohnsoncollection.org/the-collection/
Sharing the art it stewards with communities across the country is The Johnson Collection’s essential purpose and propels our daily work. Much more than a physical place, TJC seeks to be a presence in American art, prioritizing access over location. Since 2013, the collection’s touring exhibitions have been loaned twenty-five times, placed without fee in partner museums with a combined annual attendance of over 1.2 million visitors. In its showcase of over 1,000 objects, TJC’s website functions as a digital museum, available anywhere and anytime.
What began as an interest in paintings by Carolina artists in 2002 has grown to encompass over 1,400 objects with provenances that span the centuries and chronicle the cultural evolution of the American South.
Today, The Johnson Collection counts iconic masterworks among its holdings, as well as representative pieces by an astonishing depth and breadth of artists, native and visiting, whose lives and legacies form the foundation of Southern art history. From William D. Washington’s The Burial of Latané to Malvin Gray Johnson’s Roll Jordan Roll, the collection embraces the region’s rich history and confronts its complexities, past and present.
.The contributions of women artists, ranging from Helen Turner—only the fourth woman elected to full membership in the National Academy of Design in 1921—to Alma Thomas—the first African American woman to have a solo exhibition at a major national museum in 1972—are accorded overdue attention, most notably in TJC's most recent publication and companion exhibition, Central to Their Lives: Southern Women Artists in the Johnson Collection. Landmark works by American artists of African descent such as Benny Andrews, Romare Bearden, Elizabeth Catlett, Aaron Douglas, William H. Johnson, Leo Twiggs, and Hale Woodruff pay homage to their makers' barrier-defying accomplishments. Modern paintings, prints, collages, and sculpture created by internationally renowned artists associated with the experimental arts enclave of Black Mountain College, including Josef Albers, Ruth Asawa, Ilya Bolotowsky, Elaine de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, Kenneth Noland, and Robert Rauschenberg highlight the North Carolina school's geographic proximity to the collection's home.
Hailed by The Magazine Antiques as having staged a "quiet art historical revolution" and expanding "the meaning of regional," The Johnson Collection heralds the pivotal role that art of the South plays in the national narrative. To that end, the collection's ambitious publication and exhibition strategies extend far beyond a single city's limit or a territorial divide.
Since 2012, TJC has produced four significant scholarly books—thoroughly researched and beautifully illustrated investigations of Southern art time periods, artists, and themes: Romantic Spirits: Nineteenth Century Paintings of the South (2012); From New York to Nebo: The Artistic Journey of Eugene Thomason (2014); Scenic Impressions: Southern Interpretations from the Johnson Collection (2015); and Central to Their Lives: Southern Women Artists in the Johnson Collection (2018). These volumes are accompanied by traveling exhibitions that have been loaned without fee to partner museums with a combined annual attendance of over 1.7 million visitors.
Smaller curated presentations rotate at the collection's hometown exhibition space, TJC Gallery. Individual objects are regularly made available for critical exhibitions such as La Biennale di Venezia, Afro-Atlantic Histories, Outliers and American Vanguard Art, Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College, 1933-1957, Alma W. Thomas: Everything is Beautiful, Riffs and Relations: African American Artists and the European Modernist Tradition, and Bold, Cautious, True: Walt Whitman and American Art of the Civil War Era and featured in important publications and catalogues, including The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Art & Architecture, and The Civil War and American Art.
In 2016, the state of South Carolina honored The Johnson Collection with the Governor’s Award for the Arts, its highest arts distinction. The commendation paid tribute to the Johnson family's enduring contributions: "Equally dedicated to arts advancement and arts accessibility, the Johnsons generously share their vision, energy, passion and resources to benefit the arts in South Carolina."
"Who can say what ignites a passion? Was it those three red roses frozen in blue? An awakened connection to one's geographical roots? Perhaps the familiarity of the road to Nebo? The nucleus of what was to become our collection was formed by such seemingly unrelated catalysts. Looking back, it was always the sense of place that drew George and me to beautiful pictures—pictures that capture not only the glorious landscape of the South, but that also enliven its unique culture and dynamic history." ~Susu Johnson, Chief Executive Officer.'
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"If you’re looking for a vibe, this is where you’ll find it. Spartanburg is one of South Carolina’s most established, respected, progressive, and diverse art communities with everything from the fine arts—ballet, symphonies, and opera—to the cutting edge—street performers, graffiti, and dance mobs.
Experience the Cultural District
Downtown Spartanburg has even been designated as a cultural district by the South Carolina Arts Commission. Within the cultural district, you can walk to and enjoy world-class art galleries, studios, music venues, breweries, culinary arts, local literature publishers, coffee shops, libraries, museums, and more. Regardless of when you visit, you’re likely to encounter live music in the streets, featuring jazz, rock ‘n’ roll, or beach music.
Come experience how we put the art in SpARTanburg."
William McNamara, assistant professor of chemistry, and his students are working on creating cleaner, more efficient and more cost-effective ways to harvest energy by mimicking the way plants use sunlight to create their own energy.
Photo by Stephen Salpukas
William & Mary
Polymer film deposited on a TEM grid and dried under vacuum.
Courtesy of Dr. Angela Teixeira Neto
Image Details
Instrument used: Inspect
Powell River's 'raison d'etre' is this pulp and paper mill.
The old ships parked in front of the mill form a breakwater for the barges. It's actually claimed to be the largest floating breakwater in the world, with 9 floating wrecks, most built of concrete during WWII. Definitely taking the kayak out for a closer look next time I come!
The Texada Island ferry arrives in the foreground.
December 20, 2017 – February 25, 2018
The event series “Ars Electronica in the Knowledge Capital” in Osaka, Japan, invites business and creative people to be inspired by artistic perspectives with a mix of exhibition, lectures and workshops. In edition Vol. 8, from December 20, 2017, to February 25, 2018, the theme of this get-together is called “Artists as Catalysts”. The participating artists are Katia Vega who integrates technology into beauty products and Genta Kondo who produces a new type of robotic prosthetic arms. Ars Electronica is represented by Kyoko Kunoh, an artist and a researcher at Ars Electronica Futurelab.
Credit: Knowledge Capital
My Catalyst showing off its five killmarks, it would eventually get seven of them before it exploded.
June 2018 by Rixx Javix/Bryan Ward
Pour voir en grand : farm4.static.flickr.com/3067/3091707883_83e1e3d66f_o.jpg
Blogged here : www.leselucubrationsdeseverine.com/article-25574536.html