Speech (committee meeting)

{
    "time": "2012-02-14 11:55:00",
    "attribution": {
        "en": "Mr. Marc Mayer (Director and Chief Executive Officer, National Gallery of Canada)",
        "fr": ""
    },
    "content": {
        "en": "<p data-HoCid=\"2702656\" data-originallang=\"en\">Thank you, sir. Thank you very much for the invitation.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702657\" data-originallang=\"fr\">I would like to speak to you briefly about the National Gallery of Canada, which is now 132 years old. It was created in 1880 as a pantheon not only of Canadian art, but also of the choices Canadians have made on the international scene. The museum began by showing contemporary art. It exhibited contemporary art when it was created.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702658\" data-originallang=\"en\"> We have stayed fairly close to that priority ever since. Contemporary art is our priority; however, it isn't exclusively what we do. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702659\" data-originallang=\"en\">Our collecting areas are contemporary art, Canadian and international; old master European paintings, of which we have perhaps one of the most important on the continent, and certainly the most important in Canada; an extraordinary and very comprehensive collection of photography, Canadian certainly, with one small qualification that I'll make in a moment. We have a very large collection of 19th century French and British photographs and a very important collection of 20th century photographs. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702660\" data-originallang=\"en\">We have only been collecting Canadian photographs directly very recently, because there was a separate organization that did that for many years. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702661\" data-originallang=\"en\">At the end of the 1970s, a deal was struck that the National Gallery, Library and Archives, and the National Film Board couldn't all be collecting Canadian photography. So Canadian historical photography was collected, and still is, by Library and Archives. Canadian contemporary photography was collected by the National Film Board. That division of the National Film Board, the stills division, was merged with the National Gallery in the 1980s and is now part of our collection. We are speaking with Library and Archives in order to present Canadian historical photography.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702662\" data-originallang=\"en\">The other area where we are very involved is indigenous art--there again, only from 1985 to the present. Historical materials we borrow from other organizations.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702663\" data-originallang=\"en\">So those are our collecting areas.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702664\" data-originallang=\"fr\">It is the largest travelling art exhibition network in the world. We have a network of 40 museums with whom we share the national collection. I do not know of any other museum elsewhere that can organize between 35 and 38 exhibitions a year, sometimes more, sometimes less.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702665\" data-originallang=\"en\">That's really an enormous number of exhibition productions. We really are the world champions, and that's just because of the nature of Canada and the nature of our organization.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702666\" data-originallang=\"en\">Since I have been at the gallery one innovation has been what we call the branded galleries, but that's our colloquial expression. What we mean by that is the \u201cNGC at\u201d program. There is the National Gallery of Canada at the Art Gallery of Alberta in Edmonton. There was one that was named last year: the National Gallery of Canada at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto. We will be announcing a third one before the end of the year. This gives us a higher profile, and it is a true partnership, in that these museums tend to want their own exhibition program. They are not borrowing exhibitions from our catalogue of available shows.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702667\" data-originallang=\"fr\">This allows us to maintain a more direct relationship with those communities. This is based exclusively on our permanent collection, so as to keep costs down. We collect specifically to serve that network.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702668\" data-originallang=\"en\">We're not only collecting for our location here in Ottawa, but really it's to serve the entire network of Canadian museums, of which we are a very, very important part. That has been very successful. And those programs are not imposed on our satellite galleries; they are actually devised together. We work together with them. And what's been wonderful about their success is it helps us think about another community outside of Ottawa, outside of the more abstract notion of our abstract community, which is the whole country. We're working now with specific communities, and that's been very helpful in getting us to really internalize and understand the idea of serving an entire country, which we always have done.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702669\" data-originallang=\"en\">What we're planning for the 150th--I'm very excited about it--is a complete reinstallation of our Canadian permanent collection to integrate not only indigenous art seamlessly into the story that we tell of art-making in Canada, but also photography. With that, we've been in brief preliminary but very enthusiastic discussions with Library and Archives Canada and also with other organizations that can help us present material that we don't have in our collection.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702670\" data-originallang=\"en\">By reinstalling this way we want to tell the true story of art-making in Canada going back many, many centuries, as opposed to just the <em>ancien r\u00e9gime </em>in France, and forward. We think it's important for our identity and for us to really understand more clearly and more accurately what we mean by art-making in Canada. This is something we've been doing for thousands of years, not just hundreds of years. So that's very important to me. We have a named curator of indigenous art, and we have a department that has been working mostly with contemporary art,</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702671\" data-originallang=\"fr\">but also, increasingly, with historical material. Of course, we have to borrow expertise. However, it is very important to us to tell that story which gives a more comprehensive idea of artistic creation in Canada. Photography, of course, is part of that.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702672\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Temporary exhibitions are another project. In Ottawa and for our program of travelling exhibitions, we are very interested in 1917.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702673\" data-originallang=\"en\"> That is a very important year in Canada's history. It was the 50th anniversary of Confederation. That was 100 years ago. We're thinking of the 150th, but we're also thinking of the 100th anniversary since 1917. It's an important moment in Canadian art history as well as Canadian history. It's the year of all the great Canadian battles in Europe. It was the year that Tom Thomson died. It was one of his most productive years. Tom Thomson is a very important figure in Canadian art history. We plan to celebrate his 100th anniversary in a specific way.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702674\" data-originallang=\"en\">We want to tell the story of Canada from 1867 to 1917, and that specific exhibition project is called \u201cInvention of a Nation\u201d. We wanted to avoid the term \u201cBirth of a Nation\u201d because of the references that are not at all in keeping with the spirit of how we do things in Canada, so we found \u201cInvention of a Nation\u201d to be the correct term. But this is going to be in five years, and the titles in museum exhibitions tend to change quite a few times before we actually print the ads. That's one exhibition.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702675\" data-originallang=\"en\">We've been working on an exhibition about art-making in the Second World War to frame within an international context the Canadian project during that period specifically, because it's really a very important moment in Canadian art history. The project on the Group of Seven, which has now become more and more well known in the world, is really quite unique, not unique formalistically, but really as a social project. These were what we call the nationalist landscape painters, the Group of Seven, and 1917 is a very important date for them.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702676\" data-originallang=\"en\">We also have a commemorative publication.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702677\" data-originallang=\"fr\">This book will discuss art history in Canada, from 1867 to today. That represents 150 years of creation in Canada. It is a luxury commemorative publication which will be based on our permanent collection. I don't want to tell you more because you are still at the conceptual stage for the moment. We are quite enthusiastic about this project. In addition, a publication will accompany the reinstallation of the permanent collection.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702678\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Another recent initiative is a website device and an audio guide which do not discuss art history exclusively. We allow other voices to come forward and talk about these objects that make up art history in Canada. These are professionals from various areas who show us to what extent these objects, beyond their artistic and aesthetic function, can resonate with other ways of thinking and other professions. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702679\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Of course, we will be relating the history of art in Canada through the use of many voices and various methods, by using several avenues,</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702680\" data-originallang=\"en\">in order to multiply the points of access to Canadian visual culture. We also plan a publication specifically around the permanent collection of Canadian art. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702681\" data-originallang=\"en\">That, in a nutshell, is what we're planning for the 150th.</p>",
        "fr": "<p data-HoCid=\"2702656\" data-originallang=\"en\">Merci, monsieur. Je vous remercie beaucoup de nous avoir invit\u00e9s.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702657\" data-originallang=\"fr\">J'aimerais vous parler bri\u00e8vement du Mus\u00e9e des beaux-arts du Canada, qui a maintenant 132 ans. Il a \u00e9t\u00e9 fond\u00e9 en 1880 comme un panth\u00e9on non seulement de l'art canadien, mais aussi des choix que les Canadiens ont faits sur la sc\u00e8ne internationale. Le mus\u00e9e a fait ses d\u00e9buts dans l'art actuel. Il pr\u00e9sentait des oeuvres actuelles \u00e0 l'\u00e9poque de sa fondation.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702658\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous nous en sommes tenus d'assez pr\u00e8s \u00e0 cette priorit\u00e9 depuis. Cependant, si l'art contemporain est notre priorit\u00e9, ce n'est pas l\u00e0 notre int\u00e9r\u00eat exclusif. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702659\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous avons une collection d'oeuvres d'art contemporaines, canadiennes et internationales; une collection de toiles de ma\u00eetres anciens europ\u00e9ens, qui figure peut-\u00eatre parmi les plus importantes sur le continent et certainement au pays; et une collection extraordinaire et tr\u00e8s compl\u00e8te de photographies, \u00e9videmment canadiennes, au sujet de laquelle je ferai une br\u00e8ve observation dans un instant. Nous disposons d'une vaste collection de photographies fran\u00e7aises et britanniques du XIX<sup>e</sup> si\u00e8cle, ainsi que d'une collection tr\u00e8s \u00e9tendue de photographies du XX<sup>e</sup> si\u00e8cle. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702660\" data-originallang=\"en\">Ce n'est que depuis peu que nous recueillons directement des photographies canadiennes, car c'est une entit\u00e9 distincte qui l'a fait pendant longtemps. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702661\" data-originallang=\"en\">\u00c0 la fin des ann\u00e9es 1970, le Mus\u00e9e des beaux-arts du Canada, Biblioth\u00e8que et Archives Canada et l'Office national du film ont convenu qu'ils ne pouvaient pas tous tenir des collections de photographies canadiennes. C'est ainsi que le mandat de r\u00e9unir les photographies canadiennes historiques est revenu \u00e0 Biblioth\u00e8que et Archives Canada, mandat qui est toujours le sien d'ailleurs. La responsabilit\u00e9 des photographies canadiennes contemporaines a \u00e9t\u00e9 confi\u00e9e \u00e0 la division des photographies de l'Office national du film. Depuis l'int\u00e9gration de cette division au Mus\u00e9e des beaux-arts du Canada, dans les ann\u00e9es 1980, ses photographies font partie de notre collection. Quand vient le temps d'exposer des photographies canadiennes historiques, nous faisons appel \u00e0 Biblioth\u00e8que et Archives Canada. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702662\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous nous int\u00e9ressons aussi vivement \u00e0 l'art autochtone, un domaine o\u00f9 notre collection se limite, ici encore, \u00e0 la p\u00e9riode allant de 1985 \u00e0 nos jours. Nous empruntons les art\u00e9facts historiques \u00e0 d'autres organisations. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702663\" data-originallang=\"en\">Voil\u00e0 donc en quoi consistent nos collections. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702664\" data-originallang=\"fr\">C'est le r\u00e9seau d'expositions itin\u00e9rantes d'art le plus important du monde. Nous avons un r\u00e9seau de 40 mus\u00e9es avec qui nous partageons la collection nationale. Or, je ne connais pas d'autre mus\u00e9e ailleurs qui puisse organiser entre 35 et 38 expositions par ann\u00e9e, parfois plus, parfois moins.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702665\" data-originallang=\"en\">C'est un nombre vraiment impressionnant d\u2019expositions. Nous sommes vraiment les champions du monde \u00e0 cet \u00e9gard, de par la nature m\u00eame du Canada et de notre organisation. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702666\" data-originallang=\"en\">Depuis que je travaille au mus\u00e9e, nous avons innov\u00e9 en instaurant ce que nous appelons famili\u00e8rement les expositions de marque, qui s'inscrivent dans le programme d\u2019expositions itin\u00e9rantes du MBAC. Nous avons organis\u00e9 des \u00e9v\u00e9nements \u00e0 l\u2019Art Gallery of Alberta, \u00e0 Edmonton et, l\u2019an dernier, au Mus\u00e9e d\u2019art contemporain canadien de Toronto. Nous annoncerons une troisi\u00e8me exposition avant la fin de l\u2019ann\u00e9e. Ce programme contribue \u00e0 notre rayonnement et constitue un v\u00e9ritable partenariat, puisque ces mus\u00e9es ont tendance \u00e0 mettre en oeuvre leur propre programme d\u2019exposition au lieu d\u2019emprunter celles propos\u00e9es dans notre catalogue d\u2019expositions. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702667\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Cela nous permet d'entretenir une relation plus directe avec ces communaut\u00e9s. C'est bas\u00e9 exclusivement sur notre collection permanente, de fa\u00e7on \u00e0 r\u00e9duire les frais. Nous collectionnons justement pour servir ce r\u00e9seau.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702668\" data-originallang=\"en\"> Nous ne constituons pas de collections seulement pour le mus\u00e9e d\u2019Ottawa, mais pour tout le r\u00e9seau de mus\u00e9es canadiens, dont nous formons un maillon extr\u00eamement important. Cette entreprise remporte un franc succ\u00e8s. Et ces programmes ne sont pas impos\u00e9s \u00e0 nos mus\u00e9es satellites, mais bien organis\u00e9s en collaboration avec eux. Nous travaillons main dans la main. Ces succ\u00e8s ont l\u2019avantage de nous permettre d\u2019\u00e9largir nos horizons au-del\u00e0 d\u2019Ottawa pour appr\u00e9hender le concept plus abstrait de notre communaut\u00e9 spirituelle, c\u2019est-\u00e0-dire le pays tout entier. Nous travaillons maintenant avec certaines communaut\u00e9s, ce qui nous a aid\u00e9s \u00e0 int\u00e9grer et \u00e0 comprendre l\u2019id\u00e9e de servir tout le pays, ce que nous avons toujours fait.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702669\" data-originallang=\"en\"> Nos projets en vue du 150<sup>e</sup> anniversaire, que je trouve fascinants, pr\u00e9voient la r\u00e9installation compl\u00e8te de notre collection canadienne permanente afin d\u2019int\u00e9grer harmonieusement au rendu que nous faisons de l\u2019art au Canada non seulement des oeuvres autochtones, mais \u00e9galement des photographies. Nous avons eu \u00e0 ce sujet des \u00e9changes pr\u00e9liminaires brefs, mais passionn\u00e9s avec Biblioth\u00e8que et Archives Canada et d\u2019autres organisations qui peuvent nous aider \u00e0 exposer des art\u00e9facts absents de notre collection. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702670\" data-originallang=\"en\">En r\u00e9am\u00e9nageant notre collection, nous voulons donner une image juste de l\u2019art au Canada depuis des centaines d\u2019ann\u00e9es au lieu de ne traiter que de l\u2019art en France depuis l\u2019ancien r\u00e9gime. Selon nous, une telle initiative est essentielle \u00e0 notre identit\u00e9 et \u00e0 une compr\u00e9hension plus claire et plus juste de ce que nous entendons par activit\u00e9s artistiques au Canada. L'art nous occupe depuis des milliers d\u2019ann\u00e9es, pas seulement quelques si\u00e8cles. C\u2019est donc un projet cher \u00e0 mon coeur. Nous avons nomm\u00e9 un conservateur de l\u2019art autochtone, et un d\u00e9partement s\u2019occupe presque exclusivement d\u2019art contemporain,</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702671\" data-originallang=\"fr\">mais aussi, de plus en plus, avec du mat\u00e9riel historique. \u00c9videmment, on doit emprunter l'expertise. Toutefois, il est tr\u00e8s important pour nous de raconter cette histoire, qui donne une id\u00e9e plus globale de la cr\u00e9ation artistique au Canada. La photographie, bien s\u00fbr, en fait partie.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702672\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Les expositions temporaires sont un autre projet. \u00c0 Ottawa et pour notre programme d'expositions itin\u00e9rantes, ce qui nous intrigue, c'est l'ann\u00e9e 1917.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702673\" data-originallang=\"en\">C\u2019est une ann\u00e9e cruciale de l\u2019histoire du Canada, celle du 50<sup>e</sup> anniversaire de la Conf\u00e9d\u00e9ration, il y a 100 ans. Nous pensons au 150<sup>e</sup> anniversaire, mais \u00e9galement au 100<sup>e</sup> anniversaire depuis 1917. Il s\u2019agit d\u2019une date importante de l\u2019histoire et de l\u2019art de notre pays. C\u2019est aussi l\u2019ann\u00e9e o\u00f9 ont eu lieu toutes les grandes batailles auxquelles les Canadiens ont particip\u00e9 en Europe. C'est \u00e9galement l\u2019ann\u00e9e du d\u00e9c\u00e8s de Tom Thomson, l'une de celles au cours desquelles cette personnalit\u00e9 tr\u00e8s importe de l\u2019histoire artistique du Canada a \u00e9t\u00e9 la plus prolifique. Nous avons l\u2019intention de souligner son 100<sup>e</sup> anniversaire avec \u00e9clat. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702674\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous voulons raconter l\u2019histoire du Canada de 1867 \u00e0 1917, dans le cadre du projet que nous avons appel\u00e9 \u00ab Invention d\u2019une nation \u00bb. Nous voulions \u00e9viter le terme \u00ab Naissance d\u2019une nation \u00bb, qui ne cadre absolument pas avec l\u2019esprit dans lequel nous faisons les choses au Canada: nous avons donc jug\u00e9 qu\u2019\u00ab Invention d\u2019une nation \u00bb convenait mieux. Mais l\u2019initiative doit avoir lieu dans cinq ans, et les titres des expositions mus\u00e9ologiques tendent \u00e0 changer plusieurs fois avant que nous n'imprimions la publicit\u00e9. Voil\u00e0 ce qu'il en est de cette exposition. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702675\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous travaillons \u00e9galement \u00e0 une exposition sur l\u2019art pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale afin d\u2019int\u00e9grer le projet canadien dans un contexte international durant cette p\u00e9riode pr\u00e9cise, car il s\u2019agit d\u2019un volet tr\u00e8s important de l\u2019histoire artistique canadienne. Le projet sur le Groupe des Sept, dont la renomm\u00e9e ne cesse de cro\u00eetre dans le monde, est vraiment unique, du point de vue non pas formel, mais social. Nous avons qualifi\u00e9 les artistes du Groupe des Sept de paysagistes nationaux, pour qui 1917 constitue une ann\u00e9e charni\u00e8re. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702676\" data-originallang=\"en\">Nous pr\u00e9voyons en outre pr\u00e9senter une publication comm\u00e9morative. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702677\" data-originallang=\"fr\">C'est un livre qui va parler de l'histoire de l'art au Canada, de 1867 \u00e0 aujourd'hui. Il s'agit de 150 ans de cr\u00e9ation au Canada. C'est une publication de luxe comm\u00e9morative qui sera bas\u00e9e sur notre collection permanente. Je ne veux pas vous en dire plus parce que nous en sommes pour le moment \u00e0 l'\u00e9tape conceptuelle. Nous sommes assez emball\u00e9s par ce projet. En outre, une publication va accompagner la r\u00e9installation de la collection permanente. </p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702678\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Comme autre initiative r\u00e9cente, nous avons un dispositif Web et un dispositif audio-guide au moyen desquels on ne parle pas exclusivement de l'histoire de l'art. On permet \u00e0 d'autres voix de s'exprimer et de nous parler de ces objets qui font l'histoire de l'art au Canada. Il s'agit de professionnels de domaines diff\u00e9rents qui nous montrent \u00e0 quel point ces objets, au-del\u00e0 de leur fonction artistique et esth\u00e9tique, peuvent cadrer avec d'autres fa\u00e7ons de penser et d'autres professions.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702679\" data-originallang=\"fr\">Bien s\u00fbr, on va raconter l'histoire de l'art du Canada par l'entremise de plusieurs voix et de diverses fa\u00e7ons en utilisant plusieurs pistes,</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702680\" data-originallang=\"en\">afin de multiplier les points d'acc\u00e8s \u00e0 la culture visuelle canadienne. Nous pr\u00e9voyons \u00e9galement une publication portant exclusivement sur la collection permanente d'art canadien.</p>\n<p data-HoCid=\"2702681\" data-originallang=\"en\">Voil\u00e0, en quelques mots, ce que nous comptons faire pour le 150<sup>e</sup> anniversaire.</p>"
    },
    "url": "/committees/canadian-heritage/41-1/22/marc-mayer-1/",
    "politician_url": null,
    "politician_membership_url": null,
    "procedural": false,
    "source_id": "6601908",
    "document_url": "/committees/canadian-heritage/41-1/22/",
    "related": {
        "document_speeches_url": "/speeches/?document=%2Fcommittees%2Fcanadian-heritage%2F41-1%2F22%2F"
    }
}