BIO

Glenn Lewis was born in Chemainus, British Columbia in 1935. He studied at the Vancouver School of Art, obtaining an Honours degree in 1958. He then obtained a teaching degree from the University of British Columbia in 1959. He continued his studies under Bernard Leach, the artist-potter in Cornwall, England from 1961 to 1963. He then founded a pottery in 1964, Longlands, with John Reeve in Hennock, Devon, but in the same year left to teach ceramics in the Education Faculty, 1964-67, and the Fine Arts Department, 1971-74, at the University of British Columbia with a break as Visiting Professor in 1970-71, to teach in undergraduate and masters programs, New York State College of Ceramics, Alfred University, Alfred, N.Y. Although an intensely important part of his artistic repertoire, his work with traditional pottery evolved with an interest in the progressive avant-garde in the 1960s, with conceptual and performance art. Always questioning the dialectic between conventional objects and art, social obligation and natural instinct, function and wonder, his past experience with sculpture was important in his new projects.

Much of his work between the 1960s and the 1980s included some aspect of sculpture or positioning as a questioning of the dichotomy between the static and the transient. He was fascinated with seeking commonality and human links revealed by conventional items and popular myth. He worked with photography, film, video, and performance, becoming increasingly interested in nature and topiary. He was involved in a number of artists’ collectives and artist-run centres, which included Intermedia, the New Era Social Club in 1968 and the Western Front in 1973 as one of its founders. Many of his works were collaborative and included members of these collectives, often questioning the perception of reality by a public manipulated by the media. Much of this work became known as conceptual art. New media in all types became the catalyst for much of his work through the 80s, an investigation into its power to influence and broadcast, and yet limit perception at the same time. He was awarded with 5 Canada Council grants throughout this period. His attention to new media eventually led to his appointment as Head of Media Arts at the Canada Council in 1987 until 1990 and was awarded the prestigious “Emily” award from the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in 2000. From 1993 to 2006 he built a plant nursery called Fragrant Flora on the Sunshine Coast and founded The Sunshine Coast Botanical Garden. All of this was an outgrowth of his photography in gardens around the world based on his research of the elements inherent in paradise myths that he did in the 70s and 80s. In 2006 he moved from Roberts Creek to Vancouver and devoted himself full-time to his artistic practice. His 2010 exhibition at Presentation House in North Vancouver was notable for showing his 1970 ceramic mural “Artifact” on the wall for first time.

He has shown throughout Canada as well as in London, New York, Oakland, Los Angeles. France, Germany, Holland, Spain, Poland, Hungary, Austria, and Belgium.

CV

The following is written in an abbreviated CV/biographical form to combine various events and history into a chronological timeline rather than separating the different media and events into their own timelines.

1935

Glenn Lewis was born in Chemainus on Vancouver Island during the Depression. The grandfather on his mother’s side worked as a waiter at the Empress Hotel in Victoria. The other grandfather on his father’s side was a homesteader in Patagonia at the turn of the Century, part of the Welsh colony in the Chubut Valley that had escaped coal mining in Wales. Glenn’s family moved to Harrison Hot Springs, B.C. from 1936 – 39 when his father joined the navy in the Second World War. Glenn, with his mother returned to Victoria to be near her family. After the War the family moved to Kelowna, BC where his father ran a laundry business.

1953

In his last year of high school, Lewis worked as a dishwasher and salad cook at the Cascade Hotel in Banff during the summer. Through the help of a roommate who was the photographer at the Banff Springs Hotel, Lewis took a number of photos of Marilyn Monroe at a publicity shoot by the Bow River, his first pre-conceptual art work.

1954

With a small scholarship from the Canadian Legion, Lewis enrolled at the Vancouver School of Art. Four years later he graduated with honours in painting, drawing and ceramics. To earn his living, he was a live-in caregiver to three children in Shaughnessy during the first year. He then took over the coffee concession and sold day-old buns for the remaining three years, working as a purser on the CPR ferries during the summer. In 1959 he attended the Education Faculty at UBC and then taught Art and Social Studies in a junior high school in Haney (now called Maple Ridge) from 1960 to 61.

1961 – 63

A colleague from art school, John Reeve, arrived back in Vancouver from Cornwall with interesting stories about the Leach Pottery. Inspired, Lewis wrote Bernard and Janet Leach and was accepted as an apprentice in 1961. He worked at the Pottery in St. Ives becoming skillful in producing the workshop’s handmade standard ware pottery and his own work during the two years there. It was also a time for aesthetic and spiritual growth under the mentorship of the Leaches. At the end of this period, John Reeve came back to England, and Warren MacKenzie (another Leach potter), Reeve and Lewis bought an ancient house and barns, Longlands (listed in the Doomsday Book). Having built a pottery workshop there, they began producing their own pots in 1964.

1964

Lewis received a letter from Gordon Smith at the UBC Faculty of Education, asking if he would be interested in teaching both ceramics and art teaching methods.

From 1964 – 67 Lewis taught in the UBC Education Faculty. He had some talented students there, including Gathie Falk, Charmian Johnson and Darcy Henderson. He continued to make pottery and had a solo exhibition in 1965 at the Bau-Xi Gallery, Vancouver.

1966 – 67

Lewis was experimenting sculpturally with ceramics, producing a number of unique works using porcelain and plastic. They were exhibited extensively during a single year:

  • “B.C. 67”, Vancouver Art Gallery
  • “Vancouver 5”, Isaacs Gallery, Toronto.
  • “Perspective 67”, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. (Prize winner.)
  • “Joy and Celebration”, Fine Arts Gallery, University of B.C., Vancouver. (Catalogue by Alvin Balkind.)
  • “Birth and Rebirth of Objects”, Fine Arts Gallery, University of B.C., Vancouver.
  • Canadian Pavilion, Expo 67, Montreal

In 1967 – 68 (with the assistance of a Canada Council grant) he traveled in Japan for 4 months, researching the ancient origins of the foot ring on pots, visiting Japanese masters and studying first hand the intimate connections between life and art in traditional/contemporary Japanese culture.

1968

Lewis continued his porcelain and plastic sculptures, introducing partly mirrored boxes from coloured Plexiglas which he had obtained in Japan. 1968 For his one-man show in at the Douglas Gallery, Vancouver, he exhibited many of the sculptures, transforming the gallery into an installation by covering the walls with mirrors. He contributed to various exhibitions, across Canada, in 1968:

  • “Spectrum 68”, Vancouver Art Gallery, prize winner.
  • “Winnipeg Annual”, Winnipeg Art Gallery, prize winner.
  • “Canadian Artists 68”, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. Catalogue
  • “Younger Vancouver Sculptors”, Fine Arts Gallery, University of B.C., Vancouver.
  • “Younger Vancouver Cross Section 68”, Art Gallery of Victoria.

From 1968 to 1972 Lewis lived and worked at his studio, the “New Era Social Club” in Vancouver’s “Japan Town” (Powell Street), along with several other artists. He also became involved with many other artists in the experimental collective, Intermedia, which was influenced by Marshall McLuan and Buckminster Fuller, technology, the “back to the earth movement”, and such new, international innovations as Fluxus, Performance and Conceptualism, in the arts. Performance artists Deborah Hay, Steve Paxton and Yvonne Rainer came to Intermedia from New York — they worked with other artists (including Robert Rauschenberg in the Grand Union ) to give performance art workshops in Vancouver.

In 1968, as a result of Hay’s workshop, Lewis produced an artist’s real-time process/performance work, one of the earliest in Canada, entitled “Flour Piece” at the Vancouver Art Gallery, and then “Rice Krispee” at the Intermedia Building on Beatty Street.

In 1968 – 69 Lewis was awarded another Canada Council grant to continue with his experimental, innovative work. He visited New York City (associating with artists Yvonne Rainer, Deborah Hay, Steve Paxton, Robert Rauchenberg, Ray Johnson, Marjory Strider, Rosemary Castoro, curator and writer Lucy Lippard and many others).

1969

In 1969, Lewis contributed to the following exhibitions:

  • “Across the Border”, Henry Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle.
  • “Six Man Show”, Douglas Gallery, Vancouver.
  • “Intermedia Exhibition – Electrical Connection”, Vancouver Art Gallery. Catalogue. This was the second of 3 hugely attended exhibitions that transformed the Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • “Intermedia Sculpture Exhibition”, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria
  • “New Art of Vancouver 1969”, Newport Harbor Art Museum, Balboa, California; Art Gallery, University of California, Santa Barbara. Lewis showed “Closet Works”. Catalogue.

Lewis assisted in the production of Yvonne Rainer’s performance “West Coast Fractions” and his own piece, “Canadian Pacific” (presented at the Vancouver Art Gallery; Mills College, Oakland, and the Old Music Conservatory, Los Angeles).

Other performance work he produced included:

  • “Rice Krispee Piece”, Arts Club, Vancouver
  • “400 Yards of Burned Paper in a Square”, University of Calgary campus
  • “Canadian Pacific” in “Intermedia Exhibition – Electrical Connection”, Vancouver Art Gallery
  • “Ribbon Run”, Vancouver Art Gallery
  • “Rice Krispee Piece” and “Cards on the Floor”, Festival of the Arts, U.B.C., Vancouver

1969 also marks Lewis’ very early video art work, “Japanese Pickle”. Intermedia had acquired a Sony Portapack , and this was used to record the work. The work was restored at Western Front Media in 2003. Doug Christmas (Ace Gallery) had brought Robert Smithson to Vancouver in 1969 to work on several projects. Lewis remembers the friendship and influence of Smithson. Lewis drove Smithson to Roberts Bank where he saw how the trucks backed up, dropping their loads of gravel to make the pier¾the method Smithson later used in his “Spiral Jetty”.

1970

In 1970 Lewis was commissioned to produce a ceramic sculptural wall mural, “Artifact”, 22 ft x 8 ft., for the Canadian Pavilion, Expo 70, Osaka, Japan. His concept entailed making foot-square dated tiles (eight a day for twenty-two days) attached, by glazing, to white porcelain salt and pepper shakers, kiln-fired at the Crane toilet factory in Burnaby. Most of the salt shakers were broken before glazing and it presented a kind of “lunar” aspect. The mural became controversial when the Canadian Commissioner General (detecting controversy due to the obviously “phallic” nature of certain parts of the mural), refused to have the work installed at the Canadian Pavilion. It was shipped back (without full payment) and subsequently purchased by Lewis (from an architectural salvage dealer in Ottawa who had bought it at Crown Auction). In 1986 it was acquired by the Vancouver Art Gallery.

1970 – 1972 Lewis also became involved with the correspondence art network, primarily through Image Bank (a concept collective started by Michael Morris, Vincent Trasov and Gary Lee Nova) and his own concept, the New York Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver. These concepts were based primarily on a network of many artists across the globe who shared ideas, images, collections, and meetings on a dynamic but “ordinary” art scale, with connections to collage work, and which in many ways forecast the later development of a dispersed internet and e-mail. Pseudonyms were most often used and Lewis (known as Flakey Rrose Hip on the network, a intellectual moniker in reference to food and art) carried on this international correspondence art activity with Image Bank, the New York Correspondence School (Ray Johnson), Chicken Bank, Fanzini, General Idea, Fat City School of Finds Arts (Lowell Dowling), Dadaland, Max Ernst Fan Club, Ant Farm (Chip Lord), N.W. Mounted Valise, Ace Space Co (Dana Atchely) and many others. This also foreshadowed the common use of pseudonyms on the internet.

This year, Lewis served on the Intermedia Board until 1972 and was the Co-ordinator-Curator of the Intermedia Exhibition and Nine Evenings of Performances at the Vancouver Art Gallery, involving all of its 7 galleries.

Lewis had a solo exhibition, “8 Closets”, at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Each of the 8 plywood closets had a door opening to show a base-lit semi-mirrored plexiglass box which showed the contents reflected to infinity. The contents included ashes, ancient clay shards, etc., the traces of human existence that may or may not carry on.

Other exhibitions and performances included:

  • “B.C. Almanack”, National Film Board, Ottawa.”B.C. Almanack”, National Film Board, Ottawa. Glenn’s section entitled, “Seashells in the Forest at Storm Bay With Bedroom” in the photographic publication
  • “Realisms”, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. His installation included a live cow and paintings of cows from the museum collection (collaboration with Michael Morris).
  • “Art in the Mind”, Allen Art Museum, Oberlin College, Ohio
  • “Simulation for Vancouver”, a performance at the Vancouver Art Gallery
  • “Taping Pieces”, a performance using coloured flagging tape on the street, New Westminster
  • “Simulation for New York City”, a performance at the Loeb Student Centre, New York University
  • “4 Intersections” films. Shown in the corners of a gallery during “Intermedia Exhibition and Nine Evenings of Performances”,  Vancouver Art Gallery. This was one of the very first experiments with film as installation.

Lewis’ film, “Forest Industry”, a 2 hour performance of Lewis stringing blue tape through the woods at Roberts Creek in a rectangle (1 mile x 1/4 mile x 1 mile x 1/4 mile) was shot by David Rimmer. The performance speaks about the “work” of the artist, and the use of the tape mimics the film itself unrolling and the surveyor’s practice of “drawing” on the landscape as the first step in land division. The film screening/performance was shown at the Vancouver Art gallery in a rectangle, completing the circuit in the same time it took to do the performance and make the film. There was a sound track by Martin Bartlett using a harmonium.

Lewis’ collaborative piece with Michael Morris, “Taping of the International Art Critics”, a performance on the Vancouver Art Gallery in 1970 was performed by wrapping up the art critics in blue flagging tape on the front steps of the Art Gallery. A silkscreen edition was made from the newspaper photograph of the event which is an inversion, using the media as the artistic source.

1970 – 71 Lewis accepted a teaching position as Visiting Professor at the NY College of Ceramics, Alfred University, Alfred, NY, to replace Daniel Rhodes who took a sabbatical for a year. Lewis also visited with artists in New York City during this time and

1971

In 1971 screened his film, “Forest Industry” at Millenium, New York on the recommendation of Smithson and Nancy Holt.

Returning to Vancouver, Lewis drove across the U.S.A. from Alfred, N.Y. with Yvonne Rainer and Barbara Dilley (Lloyd), photographing the trip. He produced “A Performance” at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

1971 – 72 Lewis was appointed Projects Co-ordinator at Intermedia.

He was included in the “Image Bank Postcard Show” at the Fine Arts Gallery, UBC, Vancouver (One card and two others in collaboration with Michael Morris).

From 1971 – 1974 Lewis taught full-time, Ceramics, Sculpture and Drawing, Fine Arts Department, University of B.C. Some of his students included: Barry Jones, Theodore Wan, Chick Rice and Brian Mulvihill.

1972

In 1972 – 73 Lewis organized weekly swimming meetings of the New York Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver at the Vancouver Aquatic Centre where the sponge dancers did “Esther Williams strokes” wearing shark fin bathing caps made by Kate Craig from rubber inner tubes.

This year, the City of Vancouver, through a public art program, commissioned an outdoor sculpture from Lewis. He produced a bronze dog, “R. Mutt” (on the name tag), an effigy of his own dog, Grin, an offspring of Laica, Robert Rauchenberg’s dog. Lewis wanted the sculpture placed outside the Carnegie Library at Main and Hastings but the City Engineering Department objected and ever since it has been rented out to offices, primarily the Vancouver Canada Employment Insurance office.

Lewis produced a suite of 9 silkscreen prints, “Sponge Step Alphabet”, part of a series of artists’ alphabet prints organized by Image Bank.

A performance tour was organized to Halifax by Roy Kiyooka with Glenn Lewis, Image Bank, Mr. Peanut, Gerry Gilbert, Gathie Falk, Carol Itter, Gary Lee Nova and others participating. Lewis showed the performance film, “Forest Industry” at the Nova Scotia College of Art as part of the “Vancouver – Halifax Exchange”. Lewis carried on to New York with Image Bank where he staged another performance event, the “N.Y. Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver Food Meeting”, produced at Food Restaurant, New York City in SOHO with an appetizing B.C. menu.

1973

In 1973, with the dispersal of Intermedia, Lewis, along with Kate Craig, Eric Metcalfe, Michael Morris, Vincent Trasov, Martin Bartlett, Henry Greenhow and Mo Van Nostrand bought a large old Knights of Pythias building and set about organizing a multidisciplinary art program as one of the first artist-run centres in Canada under the banner of the “Western Front”. This was a significant change, challenging museum-galleries over the control of the direction of the arts and the voice of the artist. The German State TV network directed by Dr. W. von Bonin were interested and filmed the opening of the Western Front and were themselves part of the performance that Lewis (as chef) produced, “German T.V. Dinner”, complete with potato dumplings and schnapps and the German TV crew filming themselves!

Lewis traveled to London, Nice (to visit Ben Vautier, the Fluxus artist) and Paris as part of the “Canada Trajectoires 73” at the Musee moderne de la ville de Paris. He exhibited N.Y. Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver material from a correspondence art event, “Send French Kisses, French Letters and French Toast to Paris”. Catalogue.

From 1973 to 76, Lewis was elected to the Board of Trustees of the Vancouver Art Gallery and is a life member.

A mural was commissioned from Lewis by the Federal Government for the new National Science Library in Ottawa. The mural, “Great Wall of 1984”, was installed in 1974. It is 25 ft. x 8 ft. long, composed of 365 plexiglass boxes, filled with an amazing assortment of materials sent to chosen boxes by the network of artists from the NY Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver. It was installed by Lewis in 1974. The concept for this work relates strongly to the origins of museums – the curiosity cabinets of early collectors, as well as the concept of a library, but it also might be the first “democratic” mural.

1974

In 1974 Lewis wrote the “Mondo Artie Episode #1681” script and performed as one of the M.C.’s, at the “Hollywood Decca Dance and Art’s Birthday” in the Elks Building, Los Angeles. This was a large meeting for the correspondence art network modeled on the Academy Awards ceremonies. It was produced by Image Bank, General Idea, Lowell Darling, Willoughby Sharp and others. A video and film were made of the event. Lewis also gave a lecture at Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles. The “Hollywood Decca Dance” video was screened at “Project 74”, Kolnischer Kunstverein, Koln, Germany and an exhibition of material from Hollywood Decca Dance, “Surfacing on the Subliminal”, took place at the Western Front.

Lewis took part in the exhibition “Open Encounter on Video”, Institute of Contemporary Art, London, England and Place Cardin, Paris.

Other performances of Lewis’ were:

  • “Hitler” for “Towers Beach Show”, U.B.C. Fine Arts Gallery, Vancouver.
  • Performance and organizer of “B.C. Open Art Race”, part of C.B.C.T.V. “Access Series”, shown nationally.
  • “Chinese Rice Garden”, A Space, Toronto. A video document was made of the performance.
  • Performed in cast of radio play, “A Clear Cut Case”, Western Front. Hank Bull and Patrick Ready were the impetus and producers of the Luxe Radio Players. Glenn usually performed in unison with Kate Craig as the “Sony Twins”.

From 1974 – 1976 Lewis initiated and administrated the Video Program, at Western Front Society, This was one of the first centres in Canada to obtain video equipment and produce tapes for artists. These early black and white tapes form valuable documents of the poetry readings, music concerts and performance art at that time.

1975

In 1975 he represented the Western Front and helped found the Association of National Non-Profit Artist Centre in Ottawa which published Parallelogramme for a number of years.

Lewis was in the following exhibitions and performances:

  • “Chairs”, Art Gallery of Ontario
  • “Current Energies – British Columbia 75”, Saidye Bronfman Centre, Montreal.
  • “A Pictorial History of the World”, Kemper Gallery, Kansas City Art Institute.
  • Reading from “Mondo Artie” scripts, A Space, Toronto.
  • Performed in cast of Luxe Radio Players, “Murder in the Fog”, A Space.
  • Performed in cast of radio play, “A Bite Tonight”, Western Front.

Some of the exhibitions and performances Lewis took part in include:

  • “International Postcard Show”, Arizona State University Art Dept. Gallery, Tempe, Arizona
  • “Bated Breath”, Fine Arts Gallery, University of B.C.
  • “Canadada Postcards”, University of Manitoba Gallery, Winnipeg.
  • “The Last Correspondence Show”. California State University Art Dept., Sacramento, Ca.
  • “Celebration of the Body”, organized by the N.E. Thing Co., Agnes Ethrington Art Centre, Kingston, ON.
  • “West Coast Waves”, Winnipeg Art Gallery.
  • Performed in cast of radio play, “Habitart or How to Live With Your Just Desserts”, Vancouver Art Gallery.
1976

1976 – 77 Lewis was awarded a Canada Council Senior Arts Grant to travel and photograph gardens in Greece, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, India, Sri Lanka, Kashmir, Pakistan, Italy, France and England and was accompanied by the photographer Taki Bluesinger. The photographs were based on Glenn’s research on the origins of paradise, locating those myths in gardens that were in turn evocations of human beings’ birth in the natural world and the nostalgic memory of those origins.

1977

1977 – 79 On his return, Lewis became the Curator of the Performance Art Program at the Western Front.

1977 In his ongoing research into gardens and the mythology of paradise, Lewis discovered that African pygmies and their intimate relationship to their forest environment also had a paradise myth, perhaps the original. Robert Filliou, a French Fluxus artist, had been visiting the Western Front working on a video and his theory of equivalence – “well made, badly made and not made”. Lewis brought these two inspirations together in “Three Pygmy Arias” in a 1977 performance at Pumps in Vancouver.

1978

The Canadian Shadow Players, a performance art group based at the Western Front led by Hank Bull and Patrick Ready (HP) also included Kate Craig, Martin Bartlett, Jane Ellison and Glenn Lewis. In 1978 they traveled to perform “Vis a Vis” at A Space, Toronto, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Art Gallery of Greater Hamilton, Carleton University, Ottawa and Open Space in Victoria. Lewis performed a memorable pygmy aria in this piece called “Pygmy Ad Lib”, written by Hank Bull and using the Group’s “Universal Words”.

Lewis produced the text for “Journey Through an Earthly Paradise” with photographs of gardens by Taki Bluesinger for a monograph issue of Impressions Magazine, 34 pages, Toronto. The photographs and text were a result of the research trip to India, Turkey, Italy, etc., in 1976-7.

He mounted a one-man exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery, “Bewilderness, the Origins of Paradise” with a catalogue of the same name, 64 pages, written by Lewis. This explores the primitive origins of humans in nature and how that gives rise to paradise myths in different cultures.

Lewis also taught a ceramics class in miniaturized sculpture at the Summer School, Emily Carr College of Art and Design in Vancouver. During the year, he:

  • Traveled to Los Angeles. Panel member at conference, The New Artspace, first meeting of alternative galleries in U.S.
  • Gave public slide lecture, Journey Through an Earthly Paradise, Van Dusen Botanical Gardens, Vancouver
  • Produced a video, “We All Sing the Same Song”, Western Front Video Production.
  • Performed in “Vis a Vis”, Canadian Shadow Players, Music Gallery, Toronto; Vehicule, Montreal
  • Participated in “Rolling Landscape Show”, T.T.C. Subway car no. 5780, Nightingale Arts Council, Toronto.
1979

1979 – 81 Lewis curated, edited the catalogue and arranged the tour of “Art and Correspondence from the Western Front”. It toured to Vehicule, Montreal; Confereration Art Centre, Charlottetown; Dalhousie University Art Gallery, Halifax; A Space Gallery, Toronto; Art Gallery of Greater Hamilton; Nickel Art Museum, Calgary; Open Space, Victoria.

In 1979 Lewis also:

  • Wrote a section entitled “Performance Notes From the Western Front” for the book, “Performance by Artists”, Art Metropole, Toronto, pp. 270-287.
  • Mounted an exhibition with Taki Bluesinger of photographs, “Journey Through an Earthly Paradise”, at A Space Gallery, Toronto.
  • Co-curated “Living Art Performance Festival”, Vancouver, with Paul Wong and Kim Tomczak. This was a large festival of local performance artists done in several locations. A catalogue was produced.

Lewis had an exhibition of silkscreen prints called “Survival Paradise” at the Nova Gallery, Vancouver. This was done as the same image of a house on Richards Street adorned with miniature houses among the climbers along its front porch. A different colour Xerox image on rag paper of a garden (from Lewis’ paradise garden photos) was affixed to the bottom of each print, an innovative, new use of the materials. A set of these is in the collection of the National Gallery.

1979 – 87 Lewis served as the Director of the Western Front. He mentored Karen Henry taking over this position in 1987.

1980

The “Survival Paradise” prints, 33 of them, were included in an international exhibition, “Architectural References”, at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Catalogue.

Lewis’ video “We All Sing the Same Song” was screened in an exhibition of Canadian video tapes, Sony Tower Building, Osaka; Zebra House, Sapporo and Tokyo, Japan.

He took part in “Yesterday and After / Hier et Apres” at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, curated by Normand Thériault and Diana Nemeroff, Besides Lewis, who showed “Pairidaeza”, photographs of the nine stages of the garden/paradise with text, the exhibition also included the work of Vito Acconci, Alice Aycock, Bernd & Hilla Becher, Colette, Hanne Dorbovem, Hamish Fulton, Raymond Gervais, Joan Jonas, Beryl Korot, John Massey, Anne & Patrick Poirier, Klaus Rinke and Keith Sonnier. Catalogue.

Lewis gave slide lectures on the mythology of gardens for the Architecture Faculty, Carleton, University, Ottawa; Landscape Architecture Dept., University of Toronto; Architecture Faculty, McGill University, Montreal; Art Dept., Alfred University, Alfred, N.Y., and for the Foundation Dept. Resource Workshop, and Painting Dept., Emily Carr College of Art, as well as exhibiting photographs (with Taki Bluesinger), “Journey Through an Earthly Paradise”, at the Western Front Gallery, Vancouver.

From 1980 – 81 Lewis served as Vice President of the Association of National Non-Profit Artist Centres (ANNPAC).

1980 – 83 For the traveling exhibition, “Paradise/Le Paradis”, Lewis showed his garden photographs. The exhibition was organized by and shown at the Photo Gallery, National Film Board, Ottawa and traveled to the Art Gallery of Peterborough; Canada House Gallery, London, England; Owens Art Gallery, Sackville, N.B.; Mount St.Vincent University Art Gallery, Halifax; Saidye Bronfman Centre, Montreal; and the Canadian Cultural Centre, catalogue.

1981

In 1981 Lewis produced a slide lecture on the mythology of gardens for B.C. Association of Landscape Architects, Planetarium, Vancouver, and presented a lecture and was a panelist on Art & Architecture for the joint meeting of American and Canadian Societies of Architectural Historians, Empress Hotel, Victoria

1981 – 82 Lewis was awarded a Canada Council Senior Arts Grant and traveled to Japan to photograph “paradise elements” in over 160 gardens. He also worked with the Canon Co. headquarters in Tokyo using Japanese papers to produce editions from his photographs on Canon colour copy machines.

1982

In 1982 Lewis wrote an article with photos, “Japanese Gardens”, for Impressions magazine, Toronto, issue 28/29, winter 82, pp. 36 – 43

1983

The Canadian Shadow Players traveled to perform the shadow play, “Akanada” at the “Okanada” exhibition, Academie der Kunste, Berlin; the Galerie St.Barbara, Hall, Austria; Humi Gumi in Lienz, Austria; the Music Gallery, Toronto; the National Gallery, Ottawa; and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

Lewis continued on to Prague, Vienna, Graz, Zurich, Avignon and Rome to visit artists, research exhibitions and photograph gardens. Lewis curated the Western Front Historical Exhibition, and installed it at the Kunstverein, Stuttgart, as part of the Canadian exhibition. He also give a slide lecture at the Kunstlerhaus. In 1983 Lewis also traveled to Toronto, Hamilton, Paris, Milan and northern Italy for exhibitions and to photograph gardens.

For his solo show at La Chartreuse/CIRCA, Villeneuve-les-Avignon, France, Lewis exhibited a series of the fan-shaped Japanese garden prints he had made at the Canon headquarters in Tokyo.

Lewis created a large sculptural installation “ Four Gateways to Locate the Centre”, using the commonly manufactured trellis lath. This outdoor exhibition, “Artworks in the Gardens”, at the Royal Botanical Gardens, was curated by the Art Gallery of Greater Hamilton.

In Toronto, Lewis exhibited a holograph at A Space, produced at the holographic studio of Michael Sowden.

Documentation of Lewis’ “Great Wall of 1984” was included in “Museums by Artists”, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, and the Musee d’art contemporain, Montreal. Other artists in and contributors to the exhibition and book are: AA Bronson, Peggy Gale, Jean-Christophe Armann, Michael Asher, Marcel Broodthaers, Benjamin Buchloh, Daniel Buren, Robert Filliou, Vera Frankel, General Idea, Walter Grasskamp, Hans Haacke, Wulf Herzogenrath, Daniel Spoerri, Image Bank, Donald Judd, On Kawara, Garry Neill Kennedy, Joseph Kosuth, Les Levine, George Maciunas, Piero Manzoni, N. E. Thing Co. Ltd., Claes Oldenburg, Harald Szeemann, James Lee Byars, Ursula Wevers and Gerry Schum..

Lewis produced three articles on gardens with colour photos for Ville Giardini magazine, October, November and December, 1983 issues, Electa Periodici, Milan, Italy.

He showed a number of works in the huge exhibition, “Art in Vancouver 1931 – 1983”, at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Large comprehensive catalogue.

1984

Lewis was awarded a Canada Council grant for Artist-in-Residence at La Chartreuse, Centre International de Recherche, de Creation et d’Animation (C.I.R.C.A), Villeneuve-les-Avignon, France and traveled to Avignon for a 6 months residency. He prepared drawings for the installation of a garden in one of the courtyards and traveled extensively in France and England to photograph gardens, continuing his paradise myth research.

He was a panel member on “Regionalism and Internationalism” at the “Warehouse Show”, Vancouver.

1985

The Canadian Shadow Players traveled to Valladolid, Spain to present “Corpus Colossus” at Muestra Internacional de Teatro; to Riviera Remont Theatre in Warsaw; to the Mucsarnok Palace of Exhibitions in Budapest; to Kijkhuis, Den Haag; to the Holland Festival, Belview Theatre in Amsterdam; and back home to present it at the Western Front in Vancouver.

Lewis wrote a text with photos, “The Mythological Design of the Garden Path”, Section A magazine, Toronto, August, Vol.3, No.3, pp. 37 – 39.

He presented a series of 3 slide lectures on Mythological Garden Design for Simon Fraser University at Van Dusen Botanical Gardens.

1986

In 1986 Lewis exhibited in a two-person show, a series of garden photographs at the Coburg Gallery in Vancouver. Geoffrey James also showed a series of photographs.

Lewis co-ordinated a joint project for Western Front, Grunt Gallery, Avenue for the Arts Society and the Mount Pleasant Citizens Planning Committee on “Introducing Brewery Creek – A Mount Pleasant Centennial Celebration”. This was a project that involved large street murals, on-site sculptures on the street, children’s art workshops and exhibition, and a historical exhibition of old photographs of the area and a scale model of possible redevelopment plans for the area and reintroduction of Brewery Creek into a linear park scheme.

He was asked by German organizers of the Cologne Art Fair in 1986 to curate a show of Canadian video art to coincide with the Canadian exhibition Willard Holmes was curating. The show, “New Video Realities”, included 9 artists, exhibition essay and notes on the 9 artists were shown.

From 1986 – 1987 Lewis served as Curator of the Exhibition Program at the Western Front Society, Vancouver, having mentored Daina Augaitis who was leaving the position, and Annette Hurtig who was assuming the position in 1987.

In 1986 Lewis also

  • Contributed to “Making History – Recent Art of the Pacific West”, Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • Presented a slide lecture on mythology of gardens for 2nd year painting class, Emily Carr College of Art.
  • Gave critique (with Doris Shadbolt) to senior ceramic classes, Emily Carr College of Art.
1987

In 1987 Lewis was editor with assistance from Annette Hurtig of B.C. section of “From Sea to Shining Sea” catalogue, Power Plant, Harbourfront, Toronto. He also exhibited a large marble sculpture, ‘Classical Toy Boat’ displayed tipped up, as if sinking.

Lewis gave a lecture on mythology of gardens at Sound Sculpture Exhibition, High Park, Toronto, organized by Music Gallery.

He traveled to Germany: attended Documenta at Kassel, international sculpture exhibition at Munster; visited artists in Cologne; photographed gardens at Kassel, Hanover, Munster, Cologne and Dusseldorf.

1987 – 90 Lewis accepted the position as Head of Media Arts, Canada Council, Ottawa. He was responsible for introducing a Video Distribution Program, Video Production Centres Program and computer media and sound art grants in that time.

1989

In 1989 Lewis was one of three jurors of architectural proposals for the ‘Digestor Tower’, National Museum of Civilization.

1990

In 1990 Lewis returned to BC and took up residence in Roberts Creek.

1991

Lewis produced the installation entitled, “Application of Development” for “Private Addresses”, on-site exhibition of installations at various locations in Vancouver, produced by Association of Noncommercial Culture.

His piece had a typical ‘development sign’ erected on the site with Lewis as the ‘developer’. The sign stated, “Object: to develop habitats in the urban environment which will allow butterflies to survive. Butterflies depend on specific plants for their food. A number of these plants have been planted on this site.” Some of the other artists included: Ana Chang, Henry Tsang, Margot Butler, Lorna Brown, Barbara Cole.

1991 – 1992 Fundraiser and Managing Director of “Masque of the Red Death”, produced by Public Dreams Society and Grunt Gallery, Vancouver. This was a very large theatre/performance work done in a wharehouse. The audience walked through tableaus and performances.

Lewis performed in the video, “Legal Memory” by Lisa Steele & Kim Tomczak.

He was a panelist with Western Front Society, Conversations About Artist- Run Centres in Vancouver, organized by U.B.C. Fine Arts Students Society, U.B.C. Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver.

1992

1992 – 93 Lewis was awarded Visual Arts Grants, B.C. Cultural Services.

1993

1993-2006 Lewis opened a nursery, Fragrant Flora, in Roberts Creek, BC. His research into gardens and plants led to his experiment with an actual specialist nursery and garden concerned with fragrance, butterflies and hummingbirds. The design also incorporated the 4 paths and bower concept.

During 1993 Lewis was an artist in residence, Western Front Media Arts, Vancouver. He worked on computer graphics to photographic output.

Lewis had an solo exhibition at the Burnaby Art Gallery, “Utopiary, Metaphorest and Bewilderness: Selected Works from 1967-1993”, included 2 on-site installations (Bower and Signscapes) in the park near the gallery, a slide lecture on mythology of paradise and gardens and a performance, “F. Scott Fitzgerald Tea Reunion”, Catalogue.

He produced an edition of 6 photographic prints of Marilyn Monroe that he took in 1953. The prints and a text story print, “Watch Out You’re Supposed to be Crippled”, were published by Prior Editions, Vancouver. These were exhibited at Prior Editions and also shown at the Los Angeles Art Fair and Seattle Art Fair.

Lewis exhibited performance photographs at “Transient Moments: Vancouver and the Performance Photograph”, Presentation House Gallery, North Vancouver.

1999

In the 1999 exhibition, “Making it New, The Big Sixties Show”, Glenbow Museum, Calgary; Art Gallery of Windsor, Windsor, curated by Robert McKaskell. Lewis showed a live cow, “Did You Ever Milk a Cow” (1970), and silkscreen “Taping the Critics” (1970), (both collaborations with Michael Morris); “Forest Industry”, Lewis’ 1970 film was shown. Some of the other artists in the exhibition were: David Askevold, Iain Baxter, John Boyle,Tom Burrows, Greg Curnoe, Rae Davis, Gathie Falk, Murray Favro, Gerald Ferguson, Gary Richard Kennedy, Les Levine, Michael Snow. Lewis traveled to Windsor for the opening and visited with Les Levine.

Other exhibitions in which Lewis participated:

  • Several sculptures from the VAG collection in the show, “Out of This Century”, Sixties Section, curated by Douglas Coupland at the Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • Designed a set of plates for a project at the Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design using xerox images from actual lilies transferred to glazes on the plates. They were exhibited on Robson St. and Canadian Craft Museum.
2000

Lewis gave a slide Lecture on the Leach legacy in ceramics and his own work for the Clay Symposium, Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, Burnaby, BC.

He wrote an essay (Mondo Artie script #6070) on 60s, 70s performance in Vancouver for the book on performance art, ‘Live at the End of the Century’, produced by grunt gallery, Vancouver.

The ‘Emily’ award was presented to Lewis by the BC Lt. Governor at the Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design.

2001

Lewis performed this script, “Mondo Artie #6070”, for the opening performance of “Vancouver Performance Art Biennial”, organized by grunt gallery. The performance about the history of performance in Vancouver in the 60’s and 70’s had 18 performers, with cameo performances by Gathie Falk and Kate Craig at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

2002

Lewis was creator and curator of Exhibition, “New Media, Vancouver Art from the Sixties and Seventies”, Gallery at Ceperley House (Burnaby Art Gallery). He wrote the catalogue essay, “Pandora’s Box”. The exhibition showed the connections between Vancouver art of the sixties and artists’ work of the late seventies such as Ian Wallace and Jeff Wall.

In 2002 Lewis visited gardens in Holland, England and Wales and took photographs for his continuing research on the mythology of paradise.

2002 – 05 Along with other horticulturalists, Lewis spearheaded the founding the Sunshine Coast Botanical Garden Society in 2002. He was elected President of the Society until 2006 . Since then the Society acquired land and grants, and is creating a botanical garden.

2003

In 2003 Lewis showed his video tape “Chinese Rice Garden” in the exhibition, “Test Kitchen” at the Belkin Satellite, Vancouver.

2004

Lewis contributed many ceramics of his own and others to “Thrown: Influences and Intentions of West Coast ceramics”, a large historical exhibition regarding the influence of Bernard Leach with over 800 works from about 14 artists, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, UBC, Vancouver. Drawings, photographs and writings were shown as well as Lewis’ video, “Japanese Pickle”. Lewis gave a lecture, “Making Art Ordinary”, in connection with the exhibition.

He was part of a video exhibition, “Eternal Network – Videos From the Western Front Archives 1973 – 2001”, screened at Videographe, Montreal; Video Pool, Winnipeg; Western Front, Vancouver and at a number of locations internationally. Lewis’ tape “New York Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver at the Blue Horizon” was shown in the Nicole Gingras (curator) program. Catalogue in English, French and Japanese.

2005

Exhibitions this year included:

  • “Stucco Floor Divided”, remounting of installation from 1969, curated by David Bellman, organized by CAUSA (Collective for Advanced and Unified Studies in the Visual Arts) at Belkin Satellite Gallery, Vancouver.
  • “Walls Graphs”, remounting of installation from 1969, curated by David Bellman, organized by CAUSA at Belkin Satellite Gallery, Vancouver.

Lewis served as one of judges of the demonstration garden designs for the Van Dusen Botanical Garden’s June “Vancouver Garden Show”.

2005 – 06 Lewis’ “Blue Tape Around a City Block”, a 16mm film from 1968 transferred to DVD, was shown in the historical archive section of the exhibition: “Intertidal: Vancouver Art & Artists”, MuHKA – Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp, Belgium, curated by Dieter Roelstrete and Scott Watson. This was a very early work combining performance and a looped film installation. Unreeling the blue surveyors tape around a city block describes a “drawing” on the urban landscape and references how development is initiated and viewed in the city.

2006

At the end of the year, Lewis sold his house and gave up his nursery at Roberts Creek, moving to Vancouver. This was done to devote his time more fully to working on art projects.

Lewis took up a residency at Oboro in Montreal for several weeks to research the parameters of a future residency to edit video and sound works and a possible exhibition.

2007

For two weeks, Lewis made it almost a daily pilgrimage to the National Gallery in London to see the Cézanne exhibition, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of his death. Lewis also visited with Justine Brown, the writer, the artist, Peter Daghlish and Emmanuel Cooper, writer of books on Bernard and Janet Leach.

In France, Lewis was briefly in Lyon and was introduced to a large graffiti co-operative. In Paris he met with filmmakers Jo Béranger and Dominique Aru, Canadian artist, Keith Donovan, and art and architectural historian and curator, Babs Shapiro, who was a knowledgeable guide to the Cézannes at the Musée d’Orsay and the Musée de l’Orangerie.

On the way to Aix-en-Provence, Lewis stopped at in the Drome region to visit the filmmaker, Doris Buttingnol.

In Aix, Lewis spent two months doing further research on Cezanne, visiting his atelier, walking, tracing the steps to the Chateau Noir and Les Lauves where Cézanne did his last paintings of Montagne Sainte Victoire. Lewis met Jean Biagini, past Director and Head of the International Program at l’Ecole d’Art Superiore d’Aix-en-Provence. He was most helpful, facilitating Lewis’ art project and introducing him to a number of people such as Denis Coutagne, the Director of the Musée Granet, an expert on Cézanne, who showed Lewis the actual Cézannes in the Musée collection. Lewis performed in two video tapes and a number of photographs in a Cézanne costume. This material will subsequently be edited and shown at Oboro.

In the last two weeks of March, Lewis visited the Minervois and Corberies areas, near Narbonne, working on the transfer of text from letters to the computer for an essay as part of the book on the “Thrown” exhibition being produced by the Belkin Gallery. Lewis then went to Morocco to visit an old friend and artist, Nancy Patterson, who was a fellow student at the Vancouver School of Art, fifty years ago. She has built a unique establishment at the end of the road on the edge of the Sahara. This was a time for Lewis to reflect on the work from Aix and contemplate future work in this new environment.

After returning, Lewis found a new place to live in Vancouver, very close to Trout Lake and not far from the Commercial Drive area. He spent the summer in his cabin at Storm Bay, up Sechelt Inlet.

Lewis served as one of judges for various garden design awards for the Van Dusen Botanical Garden’s June “Vancouver Garden Show”.

2008

Established a studio space at 21 E Pender St in Chinatown with Elisha Burrows, LIVE Performance Festival (Randy Gledhill), and Todd Davis.

Lewis traveled to Toronto in October for a performance residency at 7a*11d International Festival of Performance Art and then performed a three-part performance called “A Sweeping Statement” in which he swept two large rectangles on the city streets and collected the trash in a wheeled dustbin. Subsequently at the Toronto Free Gallery he built an eight-sided structure with lattice panels and a tower made of cast off furniture in the middle. Then he dumped the trash he had collected on the floor of the structure and invited members of the audience to do a little circle dance with him. On Nov. 6th he took a train to New York City for a week and visited a huge number of private galleries in Chelsea, and most of the museums (MOMA, Metropolitan, Whitney, Asia Society, American Museum of Natural History, Rubin). From New York he took a train to Montreal to do residency at Oboro to complete two video projects started in France in 2007.

2009

For his exhibition at Oboro in Montreal Lewis showed a 4-projector video installation that stretched 40 ft. on the wall, entitled “I Won’t Take Your Hand Monsieur Manet, I Haven’t Washed in Eight Days”, another single video called “Purloined” (both shot in Aix en Provence in 2007, two sets of photographs, a sculptural installation of Cézanne’s cloak, hat and skull on an easel, an installation of a photograph of a reproduction of Cézanne’s “Bathers” lithograph on an easel that was in the “Purloined” video, and a small shelving unit displaying Poe’s book, “The Purloined Letter”, antique sunglasses and some loose collage in a sketchbook, entitled “Cézanne Collage Kit”.

In September and October 2009, Lewis traveled to Norwich, England, and then close to Verona to stay with friends, visiting museums in Norwich and the Venice Biennale. Travelled to Berlin, visited the great museums, and accompanied by Antonia Hirsch, many galleries and exhibitions. He was asked to submit documents of past work for the upcoming Berlin Biennale, but was not among the final choices.

A website was released: “Ruins in Process”,  www.vancouverartinthesixties.com, an exhibition on the art in Vancouver during the 60’s and 70’s, a collaborative project from the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, UBC and Grunt Gallery, Vancouver, curated by Lorna Brown.

2010

This was a busy year.

An interesting historical exhibition, “to show, to give, to make it be there Expanded Literary Practices in Vancouver: 1954 – 1969”, was curated by Michael Turner at Simon Fraser University Gallery, Burnaby, with a small catalogue. Some of Lewis’ “Mondo Artie” scripts were included from 1973; Lewis conceived, curated and performed in “Procession of Performing Circles”, a large event, part of “Bright Light”, a coalition of 14 arts organizations doing events in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, funded by the City of Vancouver, brochure.

“Recipes for an Encounter”, exhibited, “Japanese Pickle”, 1969 video, Dorsky Gallery / Curatorial Programs, Long Island City, NY, curators: Berin Golonu & Candice Hopkins, small catalogue;

Presentation House Gallery in North Vancouver Lewis’ solo exhibition “Flakey: Early Works of Glenn Lewis 1965 – 1972”, which included film, video, photographs, sculpture, installation and performance (one, a reworking of the 1968 “400 Yards of Paper in a Square”, this time performed on the beach at Spanish Banks), and 3 solo installations, “Room Divided”, “Four Intersections”, and “Forest Industry” at the Satellite Gallery, Vancouver. An eBook catalogue has been produced in 2013.

Also in 2010 -2012, in the travelling “Traffic — Conceptual Art in Canada 1965 – 1980”, I exhibited film installations (on DVD) “Blue Tape Around a City Block”, 1969, and “Forest Industry” 1970, organized by Barbara Fischer, Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Hart House, Toronto, opening in Sept/2010, at University and Public Galleries, traveling to Halifax, Art Gallery of Alberta, Edmonton, Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Concordia University, Montreal, and the Vancouver Art Gallery. Catalogue.

2011

In 2011 Lewis bought and moved to a house at 2044 Turner St., off of Victoria Dr, near Commercial and Hastings in Vancouver. During this year, he:

  • Had a solo show, “Glenn Lewis — Signs of Life”, new photographs and photo-collages, at Chernoff Fine Art, Vancouver;
  • Presented an illustrated lecture “Fifty Years in Fifty Minutes” at Vancouver Art Gallery, including digital photos and video;
  • Worked at Martin Peters’ studio in Dunbar making pottery, particularly 6 large bowls for installation at Western Front;
  • Produced “Taxonomies”, an installation at the Western Front, Vancouver – exterior of building, 6 large pots with the 3 BC major coastal economic tree species; on the landing of the interior stairway, three panels of plywood, made from same 3 species, with attached photo-collage prints depicting the 3 species, wooden buildings in Vancouver and archival photographs of sawmills on False Creek;
  • Exhibited “Mobilicity”, a series of small box sculptures in a group show, Trench Gallery, Vancouver;
  • Exhibited “Unreal from the collection”, 3 sculptures from 1968, Vancouver Art Gallery;
  • Presented “Background Vancouver” from 1972, representing artist’s views of Vancouver on Michael De Courcy website,   http://www.michaeldecourcy.com/background-vancouver/project.htm
  • Presented an illustrated lecture, “Fifty Years in Fifty Minutes” at Vancouver Art Gallery, including digital photos and video.
2012

Lewis presented 12 serigraphs, ‘Sponge Step Alphabet” in “Immaterial; Pictorial Sensibility”, an 8-person exhibition, in a pop-up space, 1387 Richards St., Vancouver. During 2012, Lewis:

  • Was represented in “Again and Again and Again…Repetitive Actions and Serial Formats” with “Artifact” a large ceramic mural from 1969, Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • Gave a presentation on the panel “The West Coast and Conceptualism: Performance Art”, in relation to exhibition “Traffic” at the Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • Exhibited “The Artist As A Fraud”, photographs of Lewis in performance as various personas, and sculpture at Trench Contemporary Art, Vancouver, and “I Won’t Take Your Hand Monsieur Manet, I Haven’t Washed in Eight Days,” a 4-channel video installation at East Van Studios, Vancouver.

In 2012-13 Lewis worked at the Ceramics Studio, Capilano University, producing ceramic work, particularly bowls for part of exhibition at The Commons.

He presented “Glenn Lewis: Bowls and Horizons,” a 2-man exhibition with Hank Bull, at The Commons Gallery, Vancouver;

The book and catalogue Traffic: conceptual art in Canada, 1965-1980, (Grant Arnold and Karen Henry, editors) was released in 2012, Mentions of G. Lewis pp. 89, 97, 98, 125, 136-139, 161.

Lewis travelled to London, England to install a panel of 9 black and white photographs of the 9 elements in the garden paradise, and two videos, Blue Tape Around City Block and Purloined. in the exhibition project “Wild New Territories” held at the Camley Street Natural Park on Regents Canal near Kings Cross. He also presented a slide lecture on the garden – paradise at Canada House.

2013

In 2013 Lewis exhibited 2 serigraph prints “Survival Paradise” from 1980 and video, “Blue Tape Around City Block”, and outdoor photographs of 9 elements of the garden-paradise in several venues in the traveling exhibition “Wild New Territories” in Vancouver, sponsored by Simon Fraser University Gallery. During the year, Lewis:

  • Travelled to Karlruhe, Germany for opening of “Continental Drift” and oversaw the installation of the 1969 work, “Blue Tape Around City Block” at Badischer Kunstvereign. This was a selection from “Traffic – Conceptual Art in Canada 1965 – 1980” exhibition (see 2010 – 2012).
  • Continued his long-standing research project connecting photographs of elements in gardens with elements in the mythology of paradise. The garden photographs were taken in Karlsruhe, Bruschel, Heidelberg and Schwetzingen;
  • Showed text and photographs of ‘Artifact’, in “Full Frontal”, Satellite Gallery, Vancouver.
  • Travelled to England to be an Artist-in-Residence at Leach Pottery and Museum, for 2 weeks, St. Ives, Cornwall
  • Travelled to Berlin to install outdoor photographs of the 9 garden-paradise elements and a the video “Blue Tape Around City Block” in the travelling exhibition “Wild New Territories” at the Berlin Botanic Garden. He also visited the many museums and galleries in Berlin and photographed in some gardens.
  • Visited the Venice Biennale.
  • Was included in “Special Collection Acquisitions and Archives”, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, UBC, Vancouver, catalogue.
  • Was featured in a photo essay by David Wisdom and Stephen Osborn, “Glenn Lewis: The Artist As a Fraud”, in Geist, No. 88, Spring, 2013, pp. 37 – 46.
  • Participated on a panel discussion with Michael Decourcy and Grant Arnold on “Background Vancouver” in the exhibition “Background/This Place/Vancouver”, Grunt Gallery.
  • Participated in “Full Frontal”, a group exhibition curated by Katie Schroeder, contributing texts and photographs of ‘Artifact’ mural, Satellite Gallery, Vancouver

2013-14 Lewis participated in“Archiving”, 5 works shown, Trench Gallery, Vancouver.

2014

Lewis was Artist-in-Residence in Ceramics at Comosun College, Victoria, BC. In particular, he worked on lidded pots with animal knobs, related to his interest in the roles that animals played in human life. This year, Lewis:

  • Travelled to Amsterdam to help install exhibition, “Glenn Lewis and the New York Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver”, and current work (texts, photographs, ceramics, prints, performance). He did a lecture with Luis Jacob at the Stedelijk Museum and a performance with 8 swimmers using the Shark Fin Bathing Caps at Mirandabaad, Amsterdam.
  • Had a solo exhibition “From the Leach Pottery and St. Ives 1962/2013”, at the
  • Participated in Trench Contemporary, Vancouver showing photograph/ceramic installations.
  • Showed ceramics with Debra Sloan, Warren MacKenzie, Jeff Oestrich, in “Across the Pond” Leach Museum Pottery Gallery, St. Ives, Cornwall.
  • Had work in “Get Hold of This Space
: A Geography of Conceptual Art in Canada”, Canadian Cultural Centre, Paris. A selection from “Continental Drift” and “Traffic” .
  • Had some work from the collection, “Salon Hang”, Kunstverein Amsterdam.

2014-15 Lewis travelled to Japan, spent 2 weeks in Yokohama and Tokyo, visited Tim Porter and Michael Goldberg and a number of museums, such as the Mingei Museum and the Nezu Museum. He then took up a 3 month residency at the Institute for Ceramic Studies, Togei no Mori, Shigaraki, one of the ancient kiln sites in Japan. He produced a body of ceramic work fired in the tradition wood kilns and some Shino work, and had an exhibition there, “Glenn Lewis Pottery”, of work made during the residency. He then moved to Imbe, Bizen to work at another residency at the Togei Center for 3 months. He used the traditional clay and wood firing (that date back to before the 12th century) to produce another body of ceramic work.

2015

At the end of his time in Japan, Lewis stayed in Tokyo for a month, having an exhibition, “Glenn Lewis: Pottery and Japanese Garden Images, Shaping the Bernard Leach Legacy” at the Wakayama Museum, Tokyo. This exhibition paired Japanese garden photos he had taken in Japan in 1981 with the ceramics he had made during the 2 recent residencies in Japan. He visited Mashiko briefly to view the Hamada Museum complex and the new museum residence building and kiln.

  • Lewis was included in the exhibition, “The Poetics of Space”, with the video installation, “Blue Tape Around City Block” at the Vancouver Art Gallery.
  • Lewis’s serigraph print, “The Brute Saxes at the F. Scott Fitzgerald Tea Party” was included in “Material Future: The Architecture of Herzog & de Meuron and the Vancouver Art Gallery”.
  • Lewis travelled to Toronto for a month to install his exhibition, “Glenn Lewis Survey: The Corres Sponge Dance School of Vancouver and Other Works”, Kunstverein Toronto. This included a performance with 8 swimmers wearing the Shark Fin Bathing Caps at the Hart House Pool in collaboration with the Justina Barnicke Gallery, University of Toronto.
  • Exhibition of same artists’ work who were part of the book, a reprint of B.C. Almanac(h)C-B, Lewis exhibited a photograph of an early collage work, Presentation House, North Vancouver;
  • Lewis continued to mentor ceramicist Maggie Boyd for 2 months (after 1 month in 2014) and moved to his new studio and a shared studio with Maggie Boyd and Julia Chirka at 1654 Franklin Street
2016

Lewis sold his house at 2044 Turner St and moved to a loft at 2556 East Hastings St. He also moved his studio to 1654 Franklin St., Vancouver. That year:

  • “Glenn Lewis Form Being Foreseen, Pots of Place”, a renewed solo exhibition of the same artwork shown in Tokyo in 2015, was shown, with an artist’s talk at the gallery, Franc Gallery, Vancouver.
  • In April Lewis travelled to China for 2 months to produce ceramics in Jingdezhen at San Bao, a residency facility on the outskirts in a small rural valley. He met Brian Mulvihill (Trolly Bus) there who was working on his calligraphy, both on paper and porcelain. photograph gardens in Shanghai, Hangzhou Kaihua and Suzhou.
  • Lewis’ marble sculpture, “Classical Toy Boat” was featured in a public sculpture opening, situated in the pool in front of the Arthur Erikson building (Graduate Student Centre) at UBC.
  • Lewis travelled by bus to Banff, met brother Tom, we drove to Medicine Hat, Alberta to take up a ceramics residency at the Medalta Museum to produce pottery and clay body tests using native claysf rom Plainsman Clays (affiliated with Medalta) and firings with gas reduction, salt, soda, electric and wood.
  • He travelled with Gailan Ngan to drive to the Writing on Stone Monument, Alberta to take photos of the landscape of petroglyphs and hoodoos, and drove with brother Tom to photograph rocks at Red Rocks Coulee Park, Alberta .
  • He travelled from Medicine Hat to Calgary for Mountain Standard Time Performance Festival and meeting of national Performance Art Presenters .
2017

Lewis traveled to Ottawa to receive Governor General’s Award in Visual Arts. As well, he traveled to:

  • Winnipeg for exhibition at Winnipeg Art Gallery of Governor General’s 2017 Visual Arts Award winners.
  • England, to St Ives residency at Leach Pottery to make pottery, visit and photograph Cornish gardens, Tremenheer, Trewidden, Trengwaiton.
  • With Alex Lambley to visit and photograph gardens at Heligan, Glendurgan, and Godolphin.
  • Photograph garden and roses, Queen Mary’s Rose Garden, Regent Park, Eltham Palace Garden, Great Fosters Garden, and visited Tate Modern  Gallery, London; photographed garden at Stowe Park; the David Austin Rose Garden, Albrighton; the Veruleum Museum and park in St Albans.
  • Dortmund, photographed roses in Westfalenpark, and roses in the Europa Rosarium, Sangerhausen in Germany.
  • Dessau, Germany to photograph Bauhaus architecture.
  • Kassel in Germany to visit Documenta.
  • Toronto for Art Toronto Fair, showing at Franc Gallery Booth.
© 2022 Glenn Lewis