December 2, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. It was her third show in her career as an artist. This time Cheryl Miles- Goldring was exhibiting the work that came out of her trip to Newfoundland last summer. Water, particularly steams and falls, are a challenge for the artist but she clearly caught the sense of the out ports that are bed rock of Newfoundland cultural history. There is something about a clothes line with items flapping in the breeze that has Newfoundland written all over it.
Everything about Newfoundland somehow gets summed up in a painting of a clothesline flapping in the salt air wind.
Miles-Goldring has a tendency to create small triptychs. She has done this in the past to wonderful effect and did it again with her Newfoundland collection.
Earlier in the week we crossed paths with the Mayor and asked how he was going to cover both the Santa Claus parade and be at the exhibit on Sunday – they were being held on opposite sides of the city. “I know where my responsibilities lay” said the Mayor who added that the parade is not something that requires his attendance. Well he got that one wrong – the Mrs. made it clear that the Mayor will be in the parade and he can scoot over to the exhibit when his day job is done.
We saw the Mayor at close to 3:30 in the afternoon trudging along James Street with Burlington Old Timers Hockey League paint can collecting donations within sight of city hall. It was going to be a bit of a dash to get to the Seaton Gallery out by RBG before the exhibit ended.
The Seaton Fine Arts Gallery has created a space where artists can hang their work during exhibits. Teresa Seaton, head honcho of the gallery does her stained glass work in the gallery as well.
The work that Miles – Goldring does is always shown at the Art in Action Studio Tour but is has a greater reach than just art shows and the walls of the people who buy her art.
Miles – Goldring makes small prints of some of her work and has ‘hasty notes’ made up with some of her art on the front.
As you can imagine her art adorns a large portion of the walls in the Mayor’s office as well. There is a tradition in the municipal world for small gifts to be given to visitors who call on the Mayor in some official capacity. Miles-Goldring came up with the idea of giving the Office of the Mayor a selection of framed prints and boxes of hasty notes that he could give as gifts to visitors. She pays for the framing and the printing and keeps meticulous records should anyone even suggest she is being paid for the gifts. The pity is that Miles-Goldring feels she has to keep records at all. If she said she pays for the work done that should be more than enough.
The Friends Wall featuring the Cheryl Miles-Golding Outport Tour collection.
The exhibit at the Seaton Fine Arts Gallery seems to be part of an initiative to make that location the place to exhibit local and visiting artists. The announced closure of the Artists Walk in the Village Square doesn’t leave too many locales for artists. The Village Square by the way is no longer for sale – was it ever really for sale?
What baffles many is the difficulty in booking the Fireside Room at the Burlington Art Centre. We hear far too many artists complaining about that problem. Is it just a scheduling problem?
For Miles Goldring the question is – what will she schedule next?
