Gore Bay Museum
Exhibitions
Lynne Gerard:
Confluence
06/23/2018 - 09/30/2018
Thirty-four years ago, American born Canadian, Lynne Gerard, embraced her love of painting, poetry and calligraphy as a full time career. As a free-lance artist, in the early years, Lynne’s work was published internationally in the form of greeting cards and gift books by the C.R. Gibson Company and the Marian Heath Greeting Card Company. Lynne was also a popular figure in travelling art fair circuits.
After immigrating to Canada in 2005, Lynne opened up her Ravenseyrie Studio & Art Gallery in the Gore Bay Harbour Centre the following year, where she now self-publishes her fine art greeting cards in-house and offers her original paintings and rock art for sale.
Lynne’s creative output is heavily under the influence of such diverse sources as prehistoric cave paintings, master watercolourists John Singer Sargent and Alvaro Castagnet and more recently the abstract expressionist sumi-e of 104 year old Japanese painter/poet/calligrapher, Toko Shinoda. At the heart of Lynne’s painting and writing is Nature herself and one’s spiritual interconnectedness with all that is.
With an eclectically appointed studio and the amazing ambience of Lake Huron’s North Channel out her door, Lynne’s Ravenseyrie Studio and Art Gallery is not just a tourist destination but an inspiring creative experience. Come see for yourself! - Ravenseyrie Studio and Art Gallery is open year ‘round. Buisness hours for July and August are Tuesdays thru Sundays 10am to 4pm. Off season hours are Tuesdays through Saturdays 10am to 4pm.
Donald Moorcroft(1935-2015):
Natural Geometry- Wild Physics
06/23/2018 - 09/30/2018
For most of his life Donald Moorcroft was a professor of physics at the University of Western Ontario, doing research on the Northern Lights and teaching a wide range of courses. One of his hobbies was taking pictures. They were well done but not really remarkable. Then, ten years after coming to Manitoulin, he had an epiphany, as he put it. He felt that suddenly he could really see what was in front of his eyes, instead of the construct that his brain told him he was seeing.
At this point he started to take remarkable pictures. Partly he was inspired by living close to nature in his Manitoulin home. He was intensely interested by all the life around him, especially in birds and dragonflies. Another reason for his photography taking off was that he had recently acquired a digital camera. This allowed him to experiment with taking a wide range of pictures. Shortly thereafter he became fascinated with how this visible reality could be distorted, by fog for example, and especially in reflections.
As he developed as an artist Don concentrated more and more on capturing patterns in nature and his photography became more and more abstract. In some cases it becomes difficult to recognize what he is taking a picture of. He also began to manipulate his pictures on the computer, to create his own patterns. An example of this is Into the Void. It is interesting to speculate how his photography would have developed if he had lived longer.
Featured Exhibit
Lizzie's Shoes
Lizzie was the oldest daughter of W.E.N. Byres and Ellen Higginson, who lived in West Hawkesbury Township, Ontario, then known as Upper Canada. She was born in 1852. Her given name was Elizabeth Clarkson Byres, after her great grandmother, who had come to Canada from England with Lizzie's grandparents. These shoes look like they were never worn, or worn very little because they likely did not fit her for long.
Wismer Photography Collection
Joseph Wismer was a photographer of Manitoulin Island. See the full collection at the Gore Bay Museum today.
Were docked at James Purvis's Dock at Janet Cove, Gore Bay.
Joseph Wismer was a photographer of Manitoulin Island. See the full collection at the Gore Bay Museum today.