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Critic Get Your Gun
Love it or hate it, LOLA, the ‘free’ visual arts mag that went belly up a couple of years back, was a boon for Toronto’s visual arts scene. It got people talking, writing and going to see art. And unlike other publications (ahem, Canadian Art) didn’t have to deal with institutional history, a national/international mandate, or pander to senior artists/board members/advertisers/etc. LOLA could stay local, stay fresh and stay true to its readership of local artists and art lovers.
One of Torontoist’s favourite features of the mag were the shotgun reviews. These potshots at shows, architecture and just about anything else art related gave a broad and often very opinionated view of what’s going on in the city and is sorely missed.
Toronto Life has arts briefs in its This Month section but you’ll be lucky if you see half-a-dozen in one issue. There’s also rumour that indie mag Broken Pencil might pick up the LOLA run and gun school of art criticism.
Torontoist also ran into Flack, a photocopied ‘publication’ that like us also misses LOLA. Run by three local visual artists, Mary McKenzie, Catherine Lathwell, and Stephanie Cormier, the first issue of Flack reviews everything from Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates to the Catholic influenced work of local painter Jennifer Linton. But with only seven reviews Flack is a bit on the light side, here’s hoping that Flack issue 2 can change that.