Diane
Maclean: Lovely Weather
January
15 to April 18, 2004
The Macdonald Stewart Art Centre presented the first Canadian exhibition by internationally acclaimed Scottish sculptor and environmental artist Diane Maclean. Lovely Weather was an innovative, multidisciplinary exhibition featuring mechanical umbrellas, word art, large scale photography, video, and a permanent outdoor sculpture installation. For this exhibition curated by Judith Nasby, Maclean produced a new body of work that was at once timely and timeless, inventive and serene, scientific and emotive.
Diane Maclean created entirely new work in collaboration with professors at the University of Guelph: poet and veterinarian David Waltner-Toews (Population Science); photographer and meterologist Terry Gillespie (Land Resource Science); and William M. Schertzer (Adjunct Professor, University of Guelph) and his colleagues at the National Water Research Institute (Canada).
The sculpture Weather Station was the 28th permanent outdoor installation in the Art Centre’s Sculpture Park. Weather Station has over 1600 LEDs (light emitting diodes) and it receives a constant live feed from a roof mounted anemometer that measures wind speed and direction. The LEDs are mounted in an oval-shaped formation over 11 feet high on the northface of the building close to the Art Centre’s main entrance. With its brilliant, everchanging lights, Weather Station can be viewed day and night by gallery goers and passersby. Weather Station was commissioned with funds donated by Ron and Jean Higgins with support from the Florence G. Partridge Fund in consultation with the School of Biological Science and Campbell Scientific (Canada) Corporation. Claude Labine, President and CEO of Campbell Scientific (Canada), was instrumental in the donation of the anemometer and related equipment.
Diane Maclean: Lovely Weather began its international tour in the spring at Peterborough Digital Arts (Peterborough Museum and Art Gallery), Preistgate (England) and continue to the Crawford Arts Centre, St. Andrews (Scotland) in the fall. The exhibition catalogue includes an interview with Diane Maclean by Judith Nasby, Director, Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, as well as written contributions by Terry Gillespie; David Waltner-Toews; William M. Schertzer; Giles Askham, Director, Peterborough Digital Arts; and Doug Benn, School of Geosciences, St. Andrews University (UK).
The
exhibition and catalogue were presented with the support of the Ontario Arts
Council and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Images:
1. Claude Labine (President and CEO of Campbell Scientific (Canada) Corporation), artist Diane Maclean, and Terry Gillespie (Land Resource Science, University of Guelph) test the LEDs prior to the installation of Weather Station, the 28th permanent outdoor installation in the Art Centre's Sculpture Park.
2. Diane Maclean, Clouds (2004)
3. A video still from Diane Maclean's How Water Moves created in consultation with William M. Schertzer and his colleagues at the National Water Research Institute (Canada).
4. A preliminary drawing for Diane Maclean's Weather Station unveiled on January 15 during the opening reception for the exhibition Lovely Weather.
Related writings:
Changing Skies by Dr. Doug Benn
How Water
Moves
From Nepal by David Waltner-Toews
From Peru by David Waltner-Toews
From Uganda by David Waltner-Toews
Water Becomes Us - A poem in three parts by David Waltner-Toews