By James Raiswell
Mark Marsters is building a boat.It’s being swallowed by an octopus, who’s smoking a pipe.
“Right now, I’m planning on powering the boat with Alka-Seltzer tablets so that not only will it float, but it will have some kind of mobility,” he says. “But we’ll see how it turns out.”
Marsters is one of 30 artists who are working on pieces for the Ottawa Art Gallery’s third annual fund-raiser, April 23.
The gallery holds its fund-raisers with the aim of creating awareness of Ottawa’s art community and to generate money to add to what it gets from corporate sponsorship and government grants.
Nancy Burgoyne, the gallery’s communications director, says the fund-raisers have become quite popular within the local arts community.
“Our spring fund-raiser is like a big party,” she says. “It generates real excitement among collectors, artists and the public at large.”
Each of the previous fund-raisers have had themes. In 1996, artists were asked to create pieces based on chairs and last year, the theme was plates. This year’s theme is boats.
Burgoyne says the annual themes are starting points for the artists.
“The themes for our fund-raisers are not rigid,” she says. “It’s more of a concept. We’ve asked artists to build boats, but the pieces do not necessarily have to float.
With our chair auction in 1996, the pieces did not have to be functional, but they did have to be based on the concept of a chair.”
The fund-raiser is being run as a silent auction. Artists are asked to produce works and submit them to the gallery for display.
Guests at the fund-raiser invited to tour the gallery and look at the works. Guests can write down their bids on a sheet of paper next to each of the pieces, instead of bidding to an auctioneer.
Burgoyne says this makes for a much more relaxed atmosphere.
Guests can bid on as many pieces as they want, and as many times as they want on one piece.
CBC reporter Ken Rockburn will emcee the fund-raiser this year. He got involved two years ago when he hosted a TV show about the local arts community.
“These fund-raisers are always a lot of fun to get involved in,” he says.
“I first got involved in 1996 when the staff at the gallery asked me to help out.”
The gallery hopes to raise around $10,000 from this year’s fund-raiser. In 1997, it raised over $15,000 and the year before, $12,000. Burgoyne says that this year’s take might be less than in past years for one key reason.
“In 1997, all of the pieces we auctioned off were donations from the artists. This year,” she says, “we’re giving as much as half of the sale price as commission to the artists.”
Along with its fall wine auction, which the gallery co-ordinates with the Arts Court, its spring fund-raiser is a major source of revenue for the gallery.
“It’s an ongoing process we’re going through to raise money for all the programming we do here,” says Burgoyne. “We’re having to cut some corners. Right now, for instance, we only have four staff members.”
Tickets for the auction are $35 and can be purchased by calling the gallery at 233-8699.