RMG Friday: Emerging Visions

Join us in celebrating the works of the third-year graduating students of the Fine Arts Advanced program at Durham College. This evening will feature a curated experience designed by Tanika iNsight Circles, and an art activity with artist Bria Elizabeth.

Schedule
7pm – Doors Open
7pm – Art Studio Activity with Bria Elizabeth Starts
7:30pm – Welcome Remarks
8pm-9:15pm – Voices & Vibes: A Journey Through Story, Soul & Connection by Tanika iNsight Circles

Voices & Vibes: A Journey Through Story, Soul & Connection
“Voices & Vibes: A Journey Through Story, Soul & Connection” is a powerful one-hour (1:10 to be exact) curated experience designed by Tanika iNsight Circles to uplift, heal, and unite through the arts. This event blends spoken word poetry, personal storytelling, interactive community-building activities, and a soul-stirring performance by powerhouse R&B singer. Centering on themes of resilience, self-expression through arts, and collective healing through community, this gathering will create a vibrant space for inter-generational authentic connections.

Where: The Isabel McLaughlin Gallery (Main Floor)

Emerging Visions
EMERGING VISIONS is an exhibition that presents thesis projects by the third-year graduating students of the Fine Arts Advanced program at Durham College.

Where: Gallery A (Ground floor)

Art Activity
Join local guest artist Bria Elizabeth to explore simple science into the unknown void. Participants will select a shape that resonates with them and use metallic markers to create lines and dots of particle movements that highlight different states of matter. Simple techniques will create a high contrast in colour and finish between the metallic markers and Black paper.

Where: Art Studio (Ground floor)

About

Tanika iNsight Circles is an award winning Creative Intellect, Speaker, Trainer, Host, Artist, Event Curator, and HIP HOP EDU Creator at HIP HOP TIL INFINITY.

Bria Elizabeth is a local artist who has led community projects with non-for profit organizations in the Oshawa area. She has her degree as a specialist in Media/Studio from UTSC where she was first introduced into facilitating community arts projects. Her current practice involves exploring negative space and mark making using multimedia art supplies. She currently has been involved with local arts collective Ruckus for the past few years and is passionate about art accessibility for marginalized communities and people groups. She believes that art is for everyone or anyone whether the art is created and stays in your home, in community spaces or galleries.

RMG Fridays
An anchor of the cultural calendar in Durham Region, RMG Fridays are community events that bring together various art forms. Designed for all ages they feature a variety of live music, performances, exhibition tours, artist talks, and highlight community partners and local businesses.

Curatorial Tour: Resistance

Join Curator, Sonya Jones, for a tour of the exhibition “Resistance”. This permanent collection exhibition explores how artists throughout history have used art to resist and disrupt social and political structures– including within the art world.

Thursday Curatorial Tours are free and open to everyone. They provide deeper insight into the themes, context, and content of our exhibitions. Seating options are available. For more information about access and our facilities, please visit this page or contact Sonya Jones at [email protected] with any specific requests.

No advance registration required.

Tom Dean: GOOD-BYE Opening Reception

Join us in celebrating the opening of Tom Dean: GOOD-BYE! The artist and curators will be in attendance. Please RSVP using this form.

Coming from Toronto? We’ll pick you up! Save your seat on the art bus shuttle using the RSVP link above. The bus will collect guests from Factory Theatre (125 Bathurst St, Toronto) at 11:30am and return around 5pm.

Refreshments provided.

Read more about the exhibition here. This event is free and open to everyone. If there are ways we can support your participation, please contact Hannah at [email protected].

RSVP

Holiday Tea at the RMG

Join Berry Hill Co. for Holiday Tea at the RMG!

For 3 Days only this year, Berry Hill Co. will be upstairs in Arthur’s hosting a delightful holiday event.

Reserve your spot!

Reservations and any queries must be made directly through Berry Hill Co.

Expressive Arts Workshop: Transformation Collage

“Make Art. Feel Better.“

Presented in partnership with PeaceLove and Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences, join us for an Expressive Arts Workshop focused on how art can promote mental well-being. The evening will start with a tour of the exhibition Breakthrough featuring the art of Jack Bush who found healing and joy through his art. The workshop will provide a safe space for participants to share, self-reflect, grow and heal through artful collage. No art experience is required. All materials and aprons will be provided.

Registration is required.

Register

About PeaceLove
PeaceLove promotes mental wellness by using creativity and expression to inspire, heal, and communicate. We believe everyone deserves a safe space to share their emotions. Our workshops are a place to create fearlessly and honestly without judgement. A place to be vulnerable, celebrate, and empower each other.

About Ontario Shores
Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences is a leader in mental health care, providing a range of specialized assessment and treatment services for people living with complex mental illness. Patients benefit from a recovery-oriented environment of care, built on compassion, inspiration and hope. Ontario Shores engages in research, education and advocacy initiatives to advance the mental health care system.

In Conversation with Christina Leslie

Come out to hear Christina Leslie share insights and reflections on Likkle Acts with exhibition curator Hannah Keating. The talk will shine a light on Leslie’s practice, research, and the innovative photographic processes that she used to create the works in Likkle Acts.

Join us at 1pm for a reception catered by Starapples. The artist talk will begin at 2pm.

Likkle Acts is an exhibition by Pickering-based artist Christina Leslie featuring three recent projects inspired by Leslie’s relationship to Jamaica and the medium of photography. In this work, Leslie embraces experimentation and seeks to represent Jamaica and its history through the people, places, and experiences that are personally significant to her and her family.

This event is free and open to everyone. Seating will be provided for all guests.

For more information on our facilities, please click here. If you have questions about the event or other requests, please email Hannah at [email protected].

Christina Leslie is an artist based in Pickering, Ontario. She earned her BFA in 2006 at OCADU in Toronto and her MFA at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, USA in 2022. Her photographs have been featured in numerous publications and exhibited both nationally and internationally. Her latest series “Sugar Coat” has been exhibited virtually on Ain’t Bad Magazine (2021), Featureshoot.com (2022), PetaPixel.com (2022), and in-person at BAND Gallery (2023). She has exhibited nationally and internationally at GAMU (2009), Royal Ontario Museum (2010), Pier 21 (201, Art Gallery of Windsor (2017), Peel Art Gallery Museum and Archives (2020), Prefix ICA (2021), and McMaster Museum of Art (2022). Much of her photographic practice revolves around the themes of de-colonialism, identity, immigration, issues of marginalization, history, memory, race, and her West Indian heritage. She often utilizes text and alternative and historical photographic processes to produce her photographs. She is a member of an all-female photography collective, Silver Water Collective and is represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery in Toronto.

The gallery thanks Ontario Tech University’s Faculty of Social Science and Humanities and Starapples for sponsoring this event.

Christina Leslie: Likkle Acts is presented by Partners in Art with additional support provided by the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Arts Council and Alterna Savings.

Curatorial Tour: Christina Leslie: Likkle Acts

Walk through the exhibition Christina Leslie: Likkle Acts with exhibition curator Hannah Keating. Hannah will explain how the works were made and the stories and ideas that motivated Christina to create them.

Curatorial Tours are free and open to everyone. They provide deeper insight into the themes, context, and content of our exhibitions. Seating options are available. For more information about access and our facilities, please visit this page or contact Hannah Keating at [email protected] with any specific requests. No advance registration required.

Christina Leslie is an artist based in Pickering, Ontario. She earned her BFA in 2006 at OCADU in Toronto and her MFA at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, USA in 2022. Her photographs have been featured in numerous publications and exhibited both nationally and internationally. Her latest series “Sugar Coat” has been exhibited virtually on Ain’t Bad Magazine (2021), Featureshoot.com (2022), PetaPixel.com (2022), and in-person at BAND Gallery (2023). She has exhibited nationally and internationally at GAMU (2009), Royal Ontario Museum (2010), Pier 21 (201, Art Gallery of Windsor (2017), Peel Art Gallery Museum and Archives (2020), Prefix ICA (2021), and McMaster Museum of Art (2022). Much of her photographic practice revolves around the themes of de-colonialism, identity, immigration, issues of marginalization, history, memory, race, and her West Indian heritage. She often utilizes text and alternative and historical photographic processes to produce her photographs. She is a member of an all-female photography collective, Silver Water Collective and is represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery in Toronto.

Christina Leslie: Likkle Acts is presented by Partners in Art with additional support provided by the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Arts Council and Alterna Savings.

The Neighbours Art Hive with the LivingRoom Community Art Studio

The gallery invites you to join us for artmaking and community connection in The Neighbours Art Hive between 12-3:30pm every Friday from January 10 to February 14, 2025. Passionate and helpful volunteers from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio will be onsite to support your creative explorations and cultivate a warm and welcoming environment for all. Participants are welcome to take their projects with them or hang them up for everyone to enjoy!

The Neighbours Project, installed at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery (February 2024).

What to expect:

Everyone is welcome; no art experience required.

These drop-in events are free.

You’re welcome to come and go as you please.

Coffee, tea, and light snacks will be served.

What is an art hive?

Art Hives are safe, accessible spaces that enable people of all ages to participate in free public relaxation. In an Art Hive, traditional hierarchies, processes, and ways of being can be deconstructed and re-imagined in playful, personal, and compassionate ways.

The Neighbours Art Hive is a temporary installation at the RMG that transforms the gallery into an active studio space with help from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio. Outside of these facilitated sessions, we also invite all our neighbours to drop in any time during operating hours to make use of the free art materials on their own time. The RMG is located at 72 Queen Street, Civic Centre in Oshawa, across from the McLaughlin Branch of the Oshawa Public Libraries. The Neighbours Art Hive is in Gallery A, which is located on the lower level of the RMG. It is accessible by stairs or elevator. Between the elevator and Gallery A, you’ll pass our public washrooms. We have an accessible single-stall washroom as well as gender-inclusive multi-stall washrooms. Read more about our facilities here.

Upcoming Sessions:

Friday January 10, 2025

Friday January 17, 2025

Friday January 24, 2025

Friday January 31, 2025

Friday February 7, 2025

Friday February 14, 2025

Presented by The Catherine and Maxwell Meighen Foundation.

Seniors Spring Social Event

Let’s celebrate spring together! Back by popular demand, this free event encourages seniors (age 55+) to spend the afternoon curating their own program.

Participants may choose do the exhibition tour then have tea and snacks, do one or both of the workshop activities, do one of the workshops and then go on an exhibition tour, it’s a matter of preference.

Event options include:

Tours of the RMG current exhibitions at 1pm and 2pm
Two different drop in art making workshops
Light refreshments available in our onsite Arthurs Restaurant 1-3pm

In the Lookout (lower level) join guest artist instructor, Jade Wysotski from 1:30pm-2:30pm to create an adorable realistic kitten!

Working with black and white drawing media on toned paper, this piece will have a soft and realistic look. Participants will be provided with simple line art and use mark making techniques to communicate texture and form. This activity is suitable for all drawing abilities!

In the studio (lower level), participants are encouraged to make unique cards! Create stamp printed leaves on a watercolour background. This workshop is supported by the Learning and Engagement team!

In Arthurs, enjoy light refreshments.

Join us at 1pm and 2pm for tours of our current exhibitions.

Seniors Programming has been made possible thanks to the generous support of Sienna for Seniors Foundation.

Bright and Merry Warming Station

We’ll be open from 5-7pm during the Bright & Merry Market!

Drop by for some cozy beverages and treats, enjoy a tour of our new exhibitions, and find holiday gifts at the RMG Shop.

Feed the Need Donation Box will be at the gallery for your donations.

The RMG reserves the right to cancel this event due to circumstances beyond RMG’s control or not reasonably anticipated, including but not limited, to weather, or inability of Facility to host Event.