Vicki Dodds was an avid arts supporter and book lover. When she died last year, her friend and fellow artist Kate Brown wanted to honour her memory with a book collection featuring Canadian artists.
“(Vicki) had been a librarian and was also a much beloved arts activist – it just seemed natural that a collection of Canadian art books would be a fitting legacy for her,” says Brown.
The collection is now more than 100 books strong, thanks in large part to a generous donation from the Dodds family that has allowed the library to buy books from a list Brown compiled. Almost all of the books in the collection circulate rather than simply being reference material.
This will be where people can come to look at their heritage and their art – it can go on and on as a wonderful creative conversation. And I hope that Vicki’s spirit is very much imbued in this collection.Artist Kate Brown
“(The list) came from a long and laborious research project,” says Brown. “There aren’t hundreds and hundreds of books on Canadian artists to choose from. We have a rather small population here and not a very large market for art books and many art books don’t stay in print for very long.” The collection includes artists from every province and territory from five categories: painting, drawing, sculpture, new media, and conceptual art.
Ones that have been purchased in Dodds’ honour so far that Brown is particularly pleased about include Emily Carr: A Biography by Maria Tippett, Challenging Traditions: Contemporary First Nations Art of the Northwest Coast by Ian Thom – a book of works by contemporary First Nations artists who have taken traditions of their people and carried them forward into the 21st century, “a fascinating experience to see what they have created,” says Brown – and A First Book of Canadian Art by Richard Rhodes. “He was the editor of Canadian Art Magazine for 20 years. This book is basically a primer, made for older children, but it doesn’t talk down to you and it is brilliant in the way it lays out the history of art in this country,” says Brown.
Several artists have also donated art books to the collection – Charles Pachter, who participated in the first Nuit Blanche North in Huntsville, donated The Illustrated Journals of Susanna Moodie by Margaret Atwood which was illustrated by Pachter, and Nova Scotia’s John Devlin contributed his book of drawings Nova Cantabrigiensis.
“With the holiday season coming, people can donate money to the collection and the library will buy a book on their behalf in honour of someone,” says Brown. “It’s a fun way to get involved.”
Brown hopes the collection will become a destination for local students and artists, art lovers and scholars alike. “It’s very difficult to find a collection on Canadian art. The high schools can take tremendous advantage of it and it will give so many of our talented local artists an opportunity to learn about some artists they may never have heard of before.”
For the future, Brown has been talking with Deborah Duce, Huntsville Public Library’s CEO and Chief Librarian, about offering artists’ residencies, “where they would interact with the collection and study it and perhaps give lectures on some of the books, as well as exhibit their own work and talk about how it connects to some of the work in the collection.”
To learn more about the Vicki Dodds Memorial Art Book Collection and how to donate, visit the library’s website here.
Read more about the collection on Doppler here and a tribute to Vicki Dodds here.
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