From graffiti to treasures of ancient Greece

by Marni Friesen

In 2001, the Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery was filled with the dynamic, technicolour urban creations of local graffiti artists, part of a collaborative exhibition and fundraiser with the Victoria police's Rock Solid Foundation.

"Some of the work was fabulous," says Maltwood director Martin Segger, though he recalls, "we did get some nasty calls about why we'd display graffiti in an art gallery."

The exhibit, which led to the Maltwood's ongoing relationship with Rock Solid and Esquimalt's outdoor Trackside Art Gallery, is a good example of how the museum continues to make cultural connections with the community around it.

"I like to stretch the concept of who and what an artist is, and who gets displayed in a gallery," adds curator Caroline Riedel.

The art museum and gallery marks its 40th birthday this year. Its original benefactor was Katharine Maltwood, a sculptress born in Victorian England, who amassed an extensive collection of fine and decorative art during her lifetime. Initially housed in "The Thatch," Maltwood's Tudor-style cottage in Royal Oak, UVic moved the collection of paintings, sculptures, furniture and curiosities to its present University Centre location in 1978.

The current gallery space, tucked behind the auditorium, is one of dozens built across the country in the late ‘70s. Funded by the federal government, the gallery and storage facility was built to National Exhibition Centre standards, including a 3,000-square-foot exhibition space and carefully controlled storage and display areas designed for best preservation of artifacts and artwork.

Through the ‘80s and early ‘90s, exhibits as diverse as treasures from ancient Greece and arts and crafts from Papua New Guinea could be ordered out of an annual catalogue from the National Gallery of Canada.

"Free exhibits would simply arrive on our doorstep," remembers Segger, who has been connected to the gallery since his years as an art history undergraduate at UVic in the late ‘60s. "Often, these were exhibits that had come to Canada on loan."
Availability of funding for such lavish projects declined throughout the 1990s. But at the same time, decades of gifts from generous donors were building up the Maltwood's own collection. One of the most exciting donations in the gallery's history came in 2000 with the Michael Williams estate and its 1,200 works of art - many of them masterpieces by well-known Canadian artists such as Myfawny Pavelic, Richard Hunt and Toni Onley.

Today, Riedel estimates the gallery's holdings at about 15,000 items.

That extensive collection means the Maltwood has become a precious resource for UVic faculty and students, who use the collection as the basis for research projects. Last year alone, more than 500 students and staff used the gallery as a platform for research and study. Faculty are even curating exhibits, such as the current Nk'mip Chronicles, an ex-hibit put together by Dr. Andrea Walsh (anthropology), show-ing the multi-cultural influences at work in the art of Okanagan children during the 1930s and ‘40s.

"Over the years, the gallery has become more public generally," says Segger of the Maltwood's continuing evolution.

Items from the Maltwood collection are housed around the university and throughout Victoria. Hundreds of works are on display across the city, from UVic's McKinnon Library to Government House to Swans Hotel and Pub.

And with the advent of the Internet, people anywhere in the world can view much of the Maltwood's collection online. Soon, people will be able to take a virtual tour of Swans Hotel and view all of its resident artworks via the Internet.
The Maltwood is also stepping entirely outside the physical gallery in its pursuit of art. One example is its continuing involvement with the Trackside Art Gallery, where the work of young local artists is reproduced on a grand scale on the concrete walls bordering an Esquimalt stretch of train tracks.

And a research project currently underway is examining modern architecture of Victoria and the 1950s-era suburban neighbourhood of Topaz Heights. "We're making local connections to larger historical themes," says Riedel.

Muses Segger, "It raises the question, where does the gallery end and the community begin?"