This is the June cover that New York based, Pulitzer prize winning Canadian illustrator Barry Blitt has drawn, a recognizable synopsis of where Prime Minister Trudeau now stands. It goes with an article in Canada’s heralded The Walrus (which just received 19 nominations for the 2024 National Magazine Awards). Blitt is best known for New Yorker covers like this “Class of ’24” (above) from a couple of weeks ago, and his endless digs at former president Donald Trump (below ). You can see all his works for the New Yorker here. Or on his website, here. For nearly three decades, the Montreal-born ..read more

Farid Rueda A few years ago, there was much excitement about Straat Museum, a huge, new, innovative showcase for street art planned for Amsterdam (see the Art Junkie post about it here.) Red tape, building concerns and the pandemic set completion back but it’s up and running now and it’s exceeding all expectations. Reviews of the museum say the exhibitions are superb. The latest is a solo show Take me Down by Mando Marie, known for meticulous devotion to hand-drawn and hand-cut stencils, below. Housed in an imposing national monument – the 8,000 square metre Lasloods building of the NDSM wha ..read more

Sara Caracristi’s new paintings are glimmering compositions that feel like vague snapshots of a shared past.  The Halifax-based artist is on exhibition through June 8 at Katzman Art Projects in Figures in the Landscape, A collection of Memories. Above View from the Guest House, 2024, 24 x 24″. Boating on the Yarra, 2024, 24 x 30″ The figures in Caracristi’s paintings “have a spectral quality, symbolizing the transitory nature of time and the evanescence of human life,” the gallery says. Farm to Table, 2024, 24 x 24″ For the work in this show I really wanted the paintings to have this gl ..read more

A rare abstract painting by Bob Dylan (circa 1968) is up for sale, featuring a vibrant abstract composition filled with musical notes, animals, and a prominent central figure of a bull. There is also a red outline of a man in a brimmed hat, reflecting Dylan’s self-image during that era, reminiscent of his “Nashville Skyline” album cover. “Bob Dylan’s visual art, like his music, draws from a deep well of cultural and personal expression. This painting from his Woodstock years is particularly evocative, capturing the vibrant and transformative spirit of the 60s,” explained Bobby Livingston of ..read more

These 2024 awards recognize the best single images on topics that include education, freedom, war and everyday life. All About Photo Awards – ‘The Mind’s Eye’ explores new talent and a celebrates outstanding work from photographers around the world. The right to know – Zanzibar, Roberta Vagliani First place photo competition winner Roberta Vagliani took this image in a school in Zanzibar, where there are no desks, chairs or school supplies. All these little girls own is a notebook and their memory. Knowledge is passed on to them by a single master. Les mariés de Mossoul – 21st of July 201 ..read more

Illustrator Nancy Liang says she “explores whimsy and magic” in her art, a passion that’s clear in these wonderful GIFs. “Using my interest in dioramas, my illustrations take shape through textures and colors from papers, found objects and other miscellaneous materials,” she says. See more on her website, here. Or her Tumblr, here ..read more

For Mother’s Day weekend, here is a selection of personal favourites and classic artworks that exemplify the mother-child connection we celebrate with this special day. My personal favourite, a portrait formed of light and shadow depicting a mother walking with her chubby-legged child is framed by neon bands of magenta and cyan in this work by London, Ontario-based artist Jack Chambers (1931–1978). Paraskeva Clark, Souvenirs of Leningrad: Mother and Child, 1955-56, oil on canvas, 86 x 90 cm The classic mother’s conundrum. In her early days, before she moved to Canada, Clark’s parenting and ho ..read more

If you’re an origami aficionado, you need to see these works by Madrid-based Gonzalo Garcia Calvo. He makes the intricate, folded animals and objects when he isn’t working his regular gigs as a musician. (Note the violin and grand piano that are part of his portfolio.) Origami Pegasus (alicorn) designed by Hojyo Takashi, folded using a square of mulberry paper 35x35cm For most of his works, he uses designs created by other origami artists, or patterns he’s adapted, but all the actual folding is his own.  (Owl, top of post: Tonight’s the Night, designed by Katsuta Kyohei). Origami Do ..read more

Nika Belianina, a mid-career artist, photographer and seasoned filmmaker, brings a surrealist twist to her cinematic photography with her exhibition ‘Enchanted Journeys of Desire’, as part of the 2024 Contact Photography Festival (go to her exhibition works here) Mirror, Mirror (details here) Through movement and predominantly in-camera techniques, Belianina creates characters full of magic and cinematic mystery, festival notes say. Rebirth (details here) She is represented by Abbozzo Gallery in Toronto, where the solo exhibition takes place through June 1. Below, from the gallery’s Instagram ..read more

An exhibition of rarely seen photos offers a candid and intimate portrait of life in Indigenous communities in Canada’s Hudson Bay watershed in the 1950s and 1960s. Henry Kechebra calling a moose, Mattigami Reserve, 1959, photograph, John Macfie fonds, Archives of Ontario The exhibition at the McMichael includes more than 100 photographs taken by John Macfie (1925–2018), a settler trapline manager who worked in Northern Ontario in those decades. He recorded life in Anishinaabe, Cree, and Anisininew communities far north of Lake Superior, in the territory along James and Hudson Bay. Seal blubbe ..read more