Mar. 05, 2008 - Issue #646: Steve Earle
Harcourt House
After two decades, Harcourt House still makes the art grow fonder
One of the initiatives of that dark time was the WECAN Society: Where Edmonton Community Artists Network. They organized an art auction to help victims of the tornado and then devoted their attention to creating an arts centre. Harcourt House opened a year later.
Twenty years later, the artist-run arts centre is thriving, offering 42 inexpensive studios for practicing artists and non-profit organizations, as well as two gallery spaces for contemporary visual art. The gallery attracts artists from the local to the international art community and hosts up to 13 annual exhibitions.
However, Harcourt is best known for the series of workshops, classes and drop-in sessions for artists of every description and calibre. Vince Gasparri, the executive director of Harcourt House, says that this element of art education has been present in the WECAN Society since the beginning. “We offer drop-in sessions for every level,” he says, “from the amateur to professional artists honing their skills.”
Gasparri says that the live drawing and sculpture drop-in sessions are popular, but the workshops are the greatest draw. “People have the chance to create something over the course of an afternoon, something they can take away,” he explains.
The workshop subjects are as varied as the accredited instructors invited to teach them. Lee Bale teaches the basics of silkscreen printing, David Shkolny offers pastel guidance and Nancy Corrigan teaches the art of collage. There is a three-session course in making mosaics for $110, which invites students to bring any material—from beach glass to broken china—that they want to include in their project. Another artist offers a hot beeswax process called “encaustic painting”.
“There is an obvious desire from the community for certain classes,” explains Gasparri. “We also continuously survey the students to find out how to improve the sessions or what other ones to offer.”
The prices for workshops start at $25 and go up from there, with most course fees including supplies. Each workshop is intended to teach the basics, to give the student a taste of the act of creation, and provide the opportunity to explore a craft. The popular drop-in sessions for life drawing, figurative sculpture and long poses round out the briefer offerings.
Many students find themselves inspired after a three-hour class, and Harcourt House has options available for them as well, offering more in-depth courses which are generally six classes, one evening per week.
The more prosaic “Learn to Draw” course teaches the five basic components of drawing and explores still life, figure, perspective and portrait drawing. The intent is to learn to draw with confidence and enthusiasm. Other courses include silk screening, website creation and clay sculpture. Another offers instruction on building an artist’s portfolio.
Course fees range from $160 to $330. As with any of the Harcourt House offerings, sufficient community interest would lead to courses in any number of subjects.
In fact, public demand fuels the Art Xpressed summer camp’s five-day intensive, which welcome nine-to-12-year-olds into the discovery of a wide range of visual art and media types, including drawing, painting, printmaking and sculpture. The summer camps also include field trips and visits to the Harcourt House art gallery, and have proven so popular that Gasparri says they have had to increase the time they offer the camp to four weeks.
The summer sessions are intended to help find a new generation of Harcourt House supporters. Gasparri says that the gallery is driving hard for new members, who receive preferred pricing and the knowledge that they are supporting something special in the arts community. At $25 for adults and $15 for seniors or students, the price is certainly right to join the Society’s existing support base of about 340 members.
The membership fees help support Harcourt House’s outreach activities, such as free drop-in sessions for people who suffer from financial, physical or mental challenges. The Society sponsors public arts talks, an artist-in-residence program and instruction held at the Boyle Street Co-op and women’s shelters. Members also support the gallery’s philosophy of having an artist-run, non-profit space available in the city.
“That it’s artist-run maintains a certain subversive democracy,” laughs Gasparri. “There’s not much left in the word that’s subversive any more, and Harcourt House keeps the do-it-yourself mentality.”
They rely on corporate and government funds as well, but the more robust the membership base, the freer the organization is to be guided by a simple vision of being a vital centre for the arts on the Edmonton scene. V
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