Art Island S1E2: Tom Burrows - Sculptor
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ม.ค. 2025
- In Episode 2 of Art Island, we meet artist Tom Burrows in his handmade Downes Point home. Tom’s practice - which over 50 years has encompassed poly-resin colour fields, abstract sculpture, and designing and building unconventional dwellings - has become canon in Canadian art. He shares insights into his storied career and the legacy of 1970's counterculture on both his own work and society today. Tom's humble admiration for the artist Eva Hesse, continuing connection to contemporary art through his assistant Yasmine Whaley-Kalaora, and the fundamental tenet that ideas can be carried timelessly, can all be found in his own work and life today: striving for the freedom to live, and the freedom to build.
Historical Note: The Maplewood Mudflats in North Vancouver, BC, was the intertidal site of a squat community between the 1950s and 1970s where artists, hippies, and outsiders built and lived in stilt houses. Burrows built his own home and lived in the community for two years until the settlement was burned down by order of the District of North Vancouver in 1971.
[About Tom Burrows]
Tom Burrows is an internationally-recognized artist whose primary medium is cast pigment polymer resin. His current practice focuses on colour fields, which play with opacity and surface texture to give the illusion of a panel lit from within.
Burrows received a Bachelor of Arts in Art History and Sociology from the University of British Columbia in 1967, and continued post-graduate studies in sculpture at St. Martin's School of Art, London, England until 1969. He has held solo exhibitions in London, Tokyo, Berlin, New York, and across Canada. The artist's work is held in private, corporate, and public collections across Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Most recently, his polymer resin works were acquired for the permanent collection of Canada House in Trafalgar Square, London, and the HBC Global Art Collection in New York. Tom Burrows lives and works between Hornby Island and Vancouver, BC.
[Art Island: Perspectives from a Creative Community]
Who are the individuals that comprise the vibrant artistic community of Hornby Island? This 10-episode docu-series looks into the personal lives and artistic perspectives of local artists - our community members. Expanding on how they became artists, what inspires their art, challenges they've encountered, and how they persevered, Art Island is a deep dive into why artists feel art is important and how it has the power to affect us all.
[Credits]
Director & Cinematographer - Zsofin Sheehy
Associate Producer - Emma Walter
Assistant Director - Kris Krüg
Location Sound - Liam Wheatley
Sound Mix & Design - Nick Kold
Title Animation - Grigorii Kniagnitskii
Colour - Bogdan Mykytenko
Music:
Max Earchuck
Stefan Kartenberg
Los Amparito
Doctor Dreamchip
Jahzzar
Trans Atlantic Rage
Plasticine Cowboy
Crowander
Gregor Quendel
Images courtesy of:
Bau-Xi Gallery
Tom Burrows Fonds, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia
Tom Burrows
Elisha Burrows
Rachel Topham Photography
Michael R. Barrick
Jerry Williams
Bob Cain
Bo Helliwell
Michael McNamara
Rob Corder
Trevor Patt
Josh Burrows
Rick Morritt
Gina Tessaro
Marisa Kringwiwat Holmes
For more episodes follow the links below:
E1: Alina Milek • Art Island S1E1: Alina...
E2: Tom Burrows • Art Island S1E2: Tom B...
E3: Moragh Eilish • Art Island S1E3: Morag...
E4: Michelle Nyberg • Art Island S1E4: Miche...
E5: Tony Wilson • Art Island S1E5: Tony ...
E6: Alpen Kelley • Art Island S1E6: Alpen...
E7: Gordon Payne • Art Island S1E7: Gordo...
E8: Elaine Savoie • Art Island S1E8: Elain...
E9: Tom Knott • Art Island S1E9: Tom K...
New episodes coming soon - Subscribe to stay in the loop and watch more videos.
Thank you Dr. Andrew Mark for helping this project come to life by visioning and securing funding.
This project is supported by funding from Canada Council for the Arts and British Columbia Arts Council.
creativecommon...
©2023
I have throughly enjoyed every single video I’ve watched in this series. Thankyou to the artists and video makers.
Really enjoyed! Thank you Zsofin
old Chinese proverb. 'House finished, Man dead.' thanks for telling your story! All the best. watching from my studio.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, home, and art with us. Your life is your masterpiece.❤
What I don't understand is if there were no building restrictions and rules about building your own home back in the day why did the authorities burn it down.? I love that bohemian lifestyle. That's the trouble with this day and age authorities who think they are important and their red tape!!! Red tape and bureaucracy are why there are so many homeless people in the world today. Long live people like Tom Burrows and all of the artists on Hornby!! and thank you to the presenters of these amazing videos.
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Wow. How curious. Polyester resin is toxic, but he wear a t-shiro of Extinction Rebellion. Resins are quite common now in crafts world. As artists we had a lot of confrontations with our values and the "real living thing", yep, as we are part of the system (Sad story).
Little is known or said about how resins gas out and breakdown & are toxic. I read about it years ago. The other thing that breaks down & is toxic are foam pillows & mattresses. Scientist Hulda Clark wrote extensively about toxins in our environment, including scented candles, room sprays, perfumes, toothpaste, Soaps, and thousands of other things. So when working with sick patients she would test them for all these different chemicals & toxins, like molds, to find out what they were exposed to that was making them very sick.
One person might have breast cancer and be sleeping on a foam mattress with a foam pillow, with both gassing out constantly, & damaging the immune system. So Hulda would advise people on how to get rid of all the toxic stuff in their environment in order to heal. Benzene is one of the common chemicals in foods, & toothpaste & soda pop is high in. Hulda said without benzene the aids virus will not survive in the body. She is now deceased, but wrote three or four huge books about her patients & studies. Hulda was brilliant & way ahead of her time. One of her book is titled “A Cure for all disease” & the Dr. Clark Store is online.
Uh, so you saw the place and you decided that’s where you wanted to live, and you bought a piece of land? Or how did that work?
How can you call it working when it’s something you chose to do because of the love for it ?
Well it is still working: your mind and hands keep busy to create something! like any handwork: stone worker, timmerman etc...
The music is to loud and detracting. Its not the main point of the video so even getting rid of altogether, this goes for the other videos as well.
Interesting. I’m playing these videos on a regular iPad with no attached speakers and the background music is not intrusive at all. I guess it plays differently depending on one’s device.