City Daily Photo Theme Day: Smiles

 The first day of each month is a theme day for members of City Daily Photo, and for February, that theme is Smiles. See how others are interpreting that theme right here.

I'm relying in part on archive shots, starting with this one taken at Arts Court downtown in 2015 during Nuit Blanche. Allison Blakley, a member of a local dance company, did a performance piece through the night at Arts Court and gave me this shot following one of those performances, with a splendid smile.

2017 was the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, and there were multiple events to mark the occasion that year in the city. One of those events, running through the year, was Ottawa Welcomes The World, held at Lansdowne Park in the Glebe. It was a series of events held by embassies to showcase their countries. One such occasion for Columbia featured this woman, Pilar, part of a chocolate consortium, with a bright smile.

Another occasion, profiling the country of Uruguay, featured candombe dancers with bright smiles and high energy.

Another event held that year was MosaiCanada, which was done over on the Gatineau side of the Ottawa River in Jacques Cartier Park. Part of the park hosted large topiaries in 2017 and 2018. They included a majestic First Nations version of Mother Earth with a gentle smile.

Doors Open is an event usually held here in Ottawa at the beginning of June. We'll see if it happens this year. In 2019, I happened to be at the National Arts Centre on stage and took this shot at the right moment, with a woman at the conductor's position holding the baton.

And then there's the smile. In 2019, the Canada Science And Technology Museum, another of our national museums, hosted an exhibit marking the 500th anniversary of the death of Leonardo da Vinci, examining his art, inventions, and concepts from a scientific perspective. That included an in depth analysis of his most famous painting, presented in multiple visual spectrums, with a look beneath the surface of the work, and an actual sized replica of the painting, front and back.

What is Mona Lisa smiling about?

Now for some fresh shots, these brought out smiles or laughs from me. First, this sheet I've come across showing the proper and improper way of masks in the Covid era, Gotham City style.

This is in a restaurant window in Centretown.

And this is the front billboard for a church in the Glebe.

City Daily Photo Theme Day: Favourites

For the last theme day for City Daily Photo, the theme is Favourites, and you can see other interpretations of the theme right here. 

I decided to select several from over the years. This first one was the first shot I featured in the blog back in 2013. The Peace Tower on Parliament Hill is nicely framed from within the entrance of East Block. It's not possible to take this shot right now, what with restoration work being done on Centre Block and in East Block; this entrance is presently fenced off.

Parliament Hill in a different manner: each year during the summer a multimedia show is projected onto Centre Block (not this year, but Covid might have a lot to do with that). This shot is from near the end of one such show.

This shot is from September of 2015. For several years Ottawa featured an all night event on a given Saturday night called Nuit Blanche (which I wish they'd bring back). I was out and about that night taking in arts events at various spots, including Arts Court, where Allison Blakley, a member of a local dance group, was putting on an audience participation performance mixing together the pinata and Beethoven's Sixth Symphony. After the performance, I got this shot of her, with a marvelous expression.

One of the big festivals each year is Winterlude, held both in Ottawa and Gatineau, and this shot features a large snow sculpture in Jacques Cartier Park over in Gatineau.

Another festival is of course the Tulip Festival, and this shot is taken in Major's Hill Park here in Ottawa during a previous year.

2017 was the year of Canada's 150th anniversary of Confederation, and there were multiple events that year. One of the biggest weekends featured La Machine, a street performance company that  held this event over several days with giant machine animals moving through the city streets towards an inevitable confrontation. This was the first time the company performed in North America, and one of the two beasties was a spider.

The other was a dragon horse. This shot was taken as it passed Parliament Hill.

Another event that year was MosaiCanada, a display of giant topiaries over in Jacques Cartier Park. They included my favourite, a First Nations take on Mother Earth, surrounded by animals. She was huge.

Another of the events usually held each year is Doors Open, which brings visitors into over a hundred different buildings and facilities over a weekend in June. This year it wasn't held, but this shot from last year stuck with me. I was in the National Arts Centre on stage, and happened to take this shot of a woman holding up the conductor's baton. Her smile made the shot.

This shot is from 2017 before Christmas, a vintage shop not far from where I live. This cat was sitting in the window at the time. It's the same cat I featured in a post a few days back, dozing in the same window.

Here we have a shot from last year, taken at the University of Guelph while I was visiting southern Ontario. The gryphon in the background is the school symbol. My brother and I are both miscreants, scoundrels, rogues, and rascals. And proud of it.

I finish with two shots taken in the fall of 2018, on the same day in the Gatineau Hills. The Mackenzie King Estate is in the heart of Gatineau Park, gifted by Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King to the country. Along with the homes on the estate are several follies that King had erected, using parts of other buildings. This one is called the Abbey.

Not far away is the Champlain Lookout, where the Hills have a dramatic overlook of the Ottawa River Valley as the river comes from places further west and north. 

City Daily Photo Theme Day: Photo Of The Year

The first day of each month is always a theme day for members of City Daily Photo, and as is always the case with January, the theme happens to be Photo Of The Year, a theme chosen by Jack. You can see which favourite photos other members chose from at this link.

As usual, I can't narrow it down to one, so here we start roughly chronologically through the year. Winterlude is our February festival marking the best season of the year, and ice carvings can be found in Confederation Park as part of the celebrations. This one was my favourite ice sculpture.

Another major Ottawa festival is the Tulip Festival in May. This first shot is from the tulip beds on Parliament Hill.

This second tulip bed is across the Ottawa River in Gatineau, facing the Hill and the Ottawa skyline, from the grounds of the Museum of History.

This bust of one of our former governor generals, Lord Elgin, was on display inside the museum as part of a temporary exhibit. I wasn't supposed to be taking pictures (again, sorry, didn't see the sign until I was leaving), but the way the bust is lit like this had such a dramatic look to it.

In June, we had our annual weekend Doors Open, which sees more than a hundred buildings of significance opened to the public to come and have a look at. This year I stopped at Earnscliffe, the official residence of the High Commissioner of Great Britain. Back in the day it was home to our first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald, who died in one of its rooms.

I stopped a couple of times at Rideau Hall, the official residence of Canada's Governor General. The first shot is from the outside. The second shot is within the Ballroom.

It seems appropriate to end this with a curtain call. Allison Blakley is a member of the Ottawa Dance Directive, and here at Arts Court, she was putting on a performance mixing together a child's bedroom, the pinata, and Beethoven's Sixth Symphony as part of the one night Nuit Blanche arts festival. Allison's take on Fantasia was my favourite act of the evening, and her expression just makes the shot work marvelously.

City Daily Photo Theme Day: Ephemeral

The first day of each month is always a theme day for members of City Daily Photo. For November, the theme is Ephemeral, or short lived, a theme that was chosen by Kay at Sequim Daily Photo. For other interpretations of the theme, click here.

I had several photos taken over the last few months that qualified for this, and so were left aside. This ice sculpture is from Winterlude, our festival in February. The sculptures are erected and left in place until the end of the festival, hence a rather short (if beautiful) life.

This view of Central Park in the Glebe includes the tiny blue flowers that are the first to bloom, and only then for a few days.

Also from spring, this spot is near the Rideau Canal and near my home. The trees were just starting to leaf out, and the grass had dandelions all over, something that is also quite brief here.

This is from early fall in the Glebe. These berries ripen, but short work is made of them- squirrels and birds have a field day feasting on them.

Last month I had a series on Nuit Blanche, the one night arts festival here in the city. This large hydraulic and light display was one of the installations, and I held back a second shot of it from when I posted about it.

And we finish off with fall colours, which last only a brief time before they're all on the ground. I have a good many fall shots that I'll be showing later in the month.

Art In The Rectory

Finishing off my series from Nuit Blanche 2015 today, this is the Rectory Art House, located next to St. Brigid's. Both buildings were involved in Nuit Blanche- the former church was closed down by the archdiocese and took on new life as St. Brigid's Centre For The Arts. This view is in daylight.

The rectory is now studio space for several artists, who were participating.

I photographed three of the installations here, and popped into the kitchen at the back of the rectory.

This first studio had an installation entitled Nocturne, by the artist Sharon Lafferty.

Lori Victor did this next work, entitled Object of Speculation. She mentioned that the idea grew out of last spring's run by the Ottawa Senators, and this explores hype through hockey culture.

This last room was put together by Karen Bailey, and is called When Guide Dogs Dance. I got there late in the evening- I'd heard the dog in question, a Lab named Stanley, had been present earlier in the evening, and I'd missed him by about twenty minutes. Karen filled this room with paintings of seeing eye dogs at work and at play, as well as a video screen with these dogs engaged in play. We're so used to guide dogs of whatever kind being stoic and professional that we don't see them just being dogs and having a ball.

The School Of Art

In yesterday's post I mentioned the Ottawa School Of Art. Here's the downtown building itself, the day after Nuit Blanche. During Nuit Blanche, it was a busy hub in the Market for visitors, with exhibits and activities on all four floors.

Clay pottery was being done in this workshop, with the artist speaking about the process while working. When one seriously gets to working on pottery art, he explained, it can take up the entire day. I spent a few minutes moulding clay in my hands, something I haven't done since high school art classes.

Another spot inside was occupied by visitors working on cartoon panels. Previous panels from earlier Nuit Blanche evenings were on one wall, while people were spread out at tables.

Downstairs on the ground floor, this small gallery space looking out on the street was a curiousity- the artist Claudio Ghirardo conceived the idea of spontaneous writings and drawings on the glass, changing throughout the night.

This was my favourite part of the various installations in the school. Artist Lilly Koltun created this art-performance piece entitled 'In My Other Job'. The walls in this room were covered with various sentences, some applying to men, others to women- things that visitors could at least find something they'd relate to (I really liked "in my other job, I'm the devil"). A mass of balloons with red ink had been offered up earlier in the evening to visitors who could throw darts (hence what looks like blood). Fans of Peanuts will recognize a familiar line in this set.