Art in the Wild

I used to write for art journals, and about art, in newspapers. I’ve been out of that world for a while. It seems a little different when you’ve been on the outside, though I still feel at home in a gallery or museum. Not everyone feels that way!

Maybe I’m getting a little back into writing about art through these blog postings, and by visiting events. Even the comic convention. They’re all artists, striving, creating stuff that doesn’t have practical utility, and doing it for reasons they might not always understand. You can talk about the kind of art, whether it’s pleasing or not, and how much money it sells for, but all of it’s similar in some ways. Though the artists would never be able to agree on that.

Anyhow, here’s a yard I walk by often, on my way to the metro. It’s on my street, rue de Rouen, between Iberville and Frontenac streets in Montreal. There’s sometimes an angry dog barking at me from behind the fence, but also some funny things to see, made out of bits of welded junk, and other scraps.

It’s more pretty in the summer, when there’s a fountain running out of the rocking horse’s nose. Sometimes there are Christmas lights around, even during the summer. The gentleman who built the place was in the back, and I got him to pose for a picture.

Here’s a news flash. He tells me he’s turning this shed next door, which used to be a rehearsal space for some heavy metal bands, into a café, next year. I’ll keep you posted on how that turns out! The Café Touski was a bit of a run-down place when it started, and now it’s quite popular. The neighbourhood continues to change.

Speaking of changes, when I moved into the neighbourhood, this building used to be a “Value Explosion” kind of dollar store. Now it’s apartments, with big display windows. That’s where I found this chair, and window cat.

And then finally, speaking of art in the wild, here’s a great painting on the wall inside the Frontenac Metro!

Tags: Animals, cats, montreal, photos, visual art