Do you think that there is a pure place in art?
I don’t know why but when I read this question I just thought of my perineum — I thought it might be nice to start these questions off with a little free association. Looking for truth or purity in oneself through making art is like [...]

Today, we lost a legendary photographer - a photographer whose work the architectural photography world is greatly indebted to. His name: Julius Schulman. Here he is, photographing Pierre Koenig’s Stahl House, and the fruit of his labour further below.

Shulman began his career in 1936 when he photographed a Richard Neutra house with a vest-pocket camera. [...]

I often hear of negative impressions of life in China. Many people not only bad-mouth China’s current and past political landscape, but ridicule contemporary Chinese art, business practices, and indeed, mentality! A lot of these impressions are based on hearsay and so-called “documentaries” seemingly peppered with personal vendetta; these people have never actually stepped foot [...]

Yuan Shikai (September 16, 1859 – June 6, 1916) was an important Chinese general and politician famous for his influence during the late Qing Dynasty, his role in the events leading up to the abdication of the last Qing Emperor of China, his autocratic rule as the second President of the Republic of China, and [...]

“Looking at the history of China over the past century, we see a society which has had its culture and politics changed and remade three or four times. Many of these changes have come with conflict and trauma for all the Chinese people. Connections with a long and proud past have been shaken and severed. [...]

In recent years, contemporary Chinese artists have rise to the main stage and are becoming critically acclaimed for the work they produce. I did not grow up in China, but having been through the tough Math/Science-focused curriculum typical of Asian education systems, I can say with confidence that artistic inclination is not recognised as such [...]

At the beginning of the 18th century, five thousand opium chests a year were entering China; by 1838, that number had reached forty thousand. The fact that the import and use of opium was illegal in China meant it had to be bought with silver. The huge profits made from its sale gave rise to [...]

Besides the Canadian Mounties and the maple leaf, what could be more iconic of Canada than Niagara Falls? So it is fitting that the first photograph of Canada is of the Niagara Falls. And it is!

This image of Niagara Falls was discovered twelve years ago in a box at Newcastle University in England. The box, [...]

Michele Marieschi (1710-1743) was an Italian landscape painter who painted veduta (vistas) mostly in Venice. One of his patrons was noted collector,Field Marshal Count Johann Matthias von der Schulenburg (1661-1747), who bought at least two canvases from the painter for 50 and 55 gold sequins respectively. This is one it, called “The Courtyard of the [...]

In the past few days, I have been playing around with colour for a project and experimenting with its inherent emotive qualities. It still never ceases to amaze me how much expression the entire spectrum of colours can produce. In doing this project, I was reminded of a painter whose work I encountered a few [...]