Horray for us!

This is from the Thunder Bay Source newspaper, last Thursday.


Treeplanting art show in Heart of the Harbour

by Jodi Lundmark


Thousands of young Canadians travel to the Thunder Bay area each spring for an experience that will change their lives – treeplanting.
And now everyone can see what the life of the hard-working planter is really like with a touring art exhibit that will be in Thunder Bay until July 22.BUGS: A Treeplanting Art Show can be found in the Heart of the Harbour downtown area in several businesses starting at Definitely Superior Art Gallery, where you pick up a map that will lead you on a walking tour.
The artwork of photographs, paintings, 3D pictures, sketches and even journal entries covers pretty much every aspect of treeplanting from camp life, working in the clear cut forests, fingers protected with duct tape and of course bush parties.
BUGS organizer and veteran treeplanter Lorne Roberts says artists are really drawn to the world of treeplanting.
“It’s such a different kind of life than living in the city. Because it’s such a unique world, people who are artists want to document it. It’s great subject material,” he said.
Roberts said for most artists, treeplanting is unique to anything else they ever do in their lives.
“No one else really ever says they have anything that’s like treeplanting once they’ve done it,” he said, adding that one artist in the show, Paul Zacharias, told him once that treeplanting was the stick he measured the rest of his life with.
“Most people find that it’s changed their lives, how they think, how they act and it changes their approach to work a great deal just because it’s so hard,” said Roberts.
Photographer Charlene Heath has portrait photographs in the exhibit and is working with the theme of the treeplanter as a Canadian myth.
“The treeplanter is something that is definitely associated with northern Canada and this rugged Canadian landscape that goes along with our entire history. It’s something that I’m working to tap into and see what I can bring back to earth,” she said.
Heath is just beginning her journey in exploring this theme but said she first began it by just wanting to document the people.
“A lot of the time the work you see is about the landscape and about how hard it is and sort of this inside struggle to put trees in the ground. I was more interested in the people and naming the people that put the trees in the ground,” she said.
The idea for BUGS came from Roberts, who works as an art journalist in Winnipeg and helps run an independent gallery, the Label Gallery.
“Because I treeplanted for so long, I’m so interested and I’d met all these artists who were treeplanters. I thought it would just be a good idea to put a show together.”
Roberts began researching and then emailing people he had worked with, asking them to contact people. It was a long process but it was worth it.The exhibit showcases the work of artists from coast to coast making it a very national show.
Thunder Bay is its first stop after Winnipeg and Roberts chose the city because of its treeplanting culture.
“I worked here for so many years as a treeplanter. I have so many good memories of days off in Thunder Bay,” he said, “I think it’s a good time to show it and I think it’s a really good place to show it. It’s the best place I would want to show it right now.”