Christmas and New Year’s in Ottawa
So maybe you’re planning a visit to Ottawa over the holiday season… or maybe you live here and are looking for some suggestions of what to see and do. This is a starting guide of what awaits — watch for updates as December progresses!
FREE STUFF
Christmas Lights Across Canada – last year’s launch on Parliament Hill
Everybody loves free stuff, especially when there are so many other demands on your wallet! Be sure to wander the downtown Ottawa and Gatineau streets between December 2, 2010 and January 7, 2011 and admire the Christmas Lights Across Canada program — more than 300,000 coloured lights decorate Parliament Hill, the National War Memorial and other scenic sites.
Read more at letsgoottawa.ca
Gallery’s Pop Life exceeds expectations
Peter Kovessy, Ottawa Business Journal
Rabbit, by Jeff Koons (Image courtesy the National Gallery of Canada)
While that’s on par with other temporary exhibitions, Gallery officials say they only forecasted 45,000 visitors, adding the strong turnout is “encouraging.”
The exhibit was “front and centre” in tourism marketing materials this summer, says Jantine Van Kregten, director of communications at Ottawa Tourism.
The gallery also sponsored the Bluesfest stage in the ByWard Market, a partnership Mr. Shaughnessy calls “unprecedented.”
Ms. Van Kregten says she hopes the Pop Life exhibit raises the profile of the Gallery’s diverse offerings, as well as the abundance of smaller galleries and studios throughout the city.
Plase read the full story on the OBJ website: Gallery’s Pop Life exceeds expectations
The ByWard Market has the only Bluesfest shows today!
Bluesfest enthusiasts need not wonder what to do tonight. The ByWard Market offers the only Bluesfest concerts this evening (Monday)at the FREE POP Life Stage on York Street (at Sussex) followed by live entertainment inside ByWard Market venues – the Chateau Lafayette and the Rainbow Bistro.
FREE programming starts at 6:00 pm. Live on stage tonight:
6:00 pm – JW Jones – One of Canada’s top blues guitar stars.
7:15 pm – Jason Collett – Canadian indie-rocker known as the ‘wise big brother’ figure in Canada’s Broken Social Scene, he’s currently on a solo tour with his backing band Zeus.
8:30 pm – City and Colour – Dallas Green vocal, guitar and piano – better known
as the dulcet voice of Alexisonfire, is presenting his solo material in this intimate performance.
FREE programming continues until tomorrow (Tuesday) night. For additional information please visit www.byward-market.com.
O Ottawa. When did you get so hip? Discovering Canada’s cool capital
Michael Kaminer, Special to The Washington Post
In fact, if anything now characterizes the city, I’d say it’s an unselfconscious cool. There’s a proudly indie aesthetic in its neighborhoods, but without the hipster posturing of Toronto. Unlike language-obsessed Montreal, the city has a relaxed attitude toward bilingualism — everything here comes in both official languages — that lends Ottawa an easy cosmopolitanism.
Oh, yes: Ottawa also boasts Canada’s Parliament, along with the National Gallery, the Royal Canadian Mint, the Canadian War Museum, Rideau Hall, the Canadian Museum of Nature, the Canadian Children’s Museum, the Canada Aviation and Space Museum and the Canadian Museum of Civilization. They’re all gleaming, serious attractions, with collections often lauded as some of the world’s best.
They used to be the reason for a visit to Ottawa, with restaurants and shopping an afterthought. These days, don’t be surprised if you find the opposite to be true.
Read the full article in the Washington Post: O Ottawa. When did you get so hip?
Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest forms new partnership with the National Gallery of Canada
The Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest organization and the National Gallery of Canada—which features their exciting summer exhibition Pop Life: Art in a Material World—have formed a partnership. Pop Life will become the presenting sponsor of the sophomore edition of the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest ByWard. This popular, free music programming on an outdoor stage in the ByWard Market was introduced for the first time in the summer of ’09. It was a big hit bringing in almost 75,000 Ottawa residents and visitors to Ottawa to see a wide variety of acts. Pop Life is also a key new feature on the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest website that allows patrons to preview the exhibition and add its dates and surrounding events to their personal Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest calendars.
Pop Life Presents the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest ByWard from July 8 through July 13. Pop culture enthusiasts can check out Pop Life: Art in a Material World at the National Gallery of Canada then stop by the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest ByWard Pop Life Stage on York Street for some free musical entertainment! Officials from both organizations feel that this partnership adds an extra dimension to their respective events and creates a “win win” situation for music lovers and art enthusiasts alike.
The Ottawa Bluesfest ByWard line-up includes: City and Colour; Doc Walker; Taj Mahal; Wintersleep; Stereos; Tokyo Police Club; Junior Brown; Born Ruffians; Amanda Rheaume; Peter Voith; the Mighty Popo; Jhevon Paris; JW-Jones; Jeff Rogers; and Abandon All Ships.
Go to: www.ottawabluesfest.ca for a link to all the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest ByWard programming details.
Pop Life: Art in a Material World
June 11 through September 19, 2010
SPECIAL EXHIBITION GALLERIES
Pop Life: Art in a Material World explores the complex relationship between contemporary art, commerce, marketing and the mass media that has evolved since the late 1980s when Andy Warhol uttered his provocative maxim that “good business is the best art.” Featuring artists often known as much for their notoriety as for their art, the exhibition traces how Warhol, Jeff Koons, Richard Prince, Keith Haring, Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst, Takashi Murakami, Martin Kippenberger and numerous other high-profile figures from the international art world from the 1980s to today have developed iconic, at times even famous, signature “brands” using their artistic persona as much as their art.
Organized by Tate Modern, London, in association with the National Gallery of Canada.
For more information and Gallery hours, visit the exhibition website: www.gallery.ca/poplife/
Video: Ottawa Festivals’ Info and Ticketing Centre
Here is a video showcasing Ottawa Festivals’ new Info and Ticketing Centre located in our office space at 47 William Street in the Byward Market. Special thanks to Tasha Waldron who produced the video for us on a VERY short deadline.
Ottawa Irish Week – St. Patrick’s Day Events in the NCR
March 17
St. Patrick’s Day Dinner Dance with Gail Gavan & Friends
National Irish Canadian Cultural Centre
314 St. Patrick Street
Ottawa, ON
Starts: 8 pm with entertainment, food and drink.
Tickets: $50.00
Information: www.saintbrigidscenter.ca
or 613-591-3764
March 17
Mayfair Theatre
Come for a double-bill of Dublin-born Director Jim Sheridan’s
“In the Name of the Father” (1993), starting at 7 pm
“The Boxer” (1997) starting at 9 pm
Mayfair Theatre (Ottawa’s home of stuff you won’t see anywhere else)
1074 Bank Street
Ottawa, ON
613-730-6552
March 17
Daniel O’Connell’s Irish Pub (stop in for a daytime of authentic Irish music)
1205 Wellington Street in Hintonburg (Ottawa)
613-725-2200
Any Day – Ol agus Ceol! (Drink and Music!)
Visit The Irish Village in the Byward Market or your local Heart and Crown any day of the week for a variety of specials and live music during the Ottawa Irish Festival.
Irish Village owners seek to change route of St. Patrick’s Day Parade for 2011
Ottawa East EMC
By Desmond Devoy
EMC Events – The owners of Ottawa’s largest chain of Irish-owned pubs are hoping that next year’s St. Patrick’s Day parade will terminate in the historic ByWard Market instead of its normal end point, Lansdowne Park.
“Eventually, we’re hoping that the parade will end up on this end of town,” said Larry Bradley, a native of Omagh, County Tyrone, during an interview in The Irish Village, where four of his pubs are housed at 67 Clarence Street.
“The City didn’t want it (the parade) coming down Rideau Street,” said co-owner Pat Kelly, of Ballygar, County Galway.
“It used to come down this way,” said Kelly. “We’re hoping next year.”
“It used to be nice for the business people here,” said Bradley, before adding quickly that “we don’t care about making money. We care about making friends.”
(The 2010 Ottawa St. Patrick’s Parade will start at 11 a.m. from Ottawa City Hall, 110 Laurier Avenue West, proceed along Laurier, before turning left and heading south along Bank Street, ending at Lansdowne Park around 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 13.)
The move would not only funnel people into the ByWard Market, and to their bars, but it would also direct people to the nearby St. Brigid’s Centre for the Arts and Humanities, home of the National Irish Canadian Cultural Centre, 314 St. Patrick Street, an initiative the two men have been helping move to fruition for a number of years.
Full article: Irish Village owners
Red Wall Gallery Presents “Fragments” – Jan. 29/10
RED WALL GALLERY presents FRAGMENTS – SOLO SERIES 2010
Artist: Alli Asudeh
Vernissage: Friday, January 29th, 2010, 17:00 – 20:00
On View: January 29th – February 9th, 2010
Mon – Fri: 10:00-18:00, Sat: 10:00-15:00
“Fragments” by Alli Asudeh is a polaroid collection that explores the unspoken beauty in her everyday surroundings.
These photographs are the fragments of Alli Asudeh’s everyday life. She finds serenity by viewing life through a camera lens. Intrigued by the ordinary, she explores her surroundings, showing her audience the beauty of simplicity by using the medium of Polaroid to capture the bits and pieces that shape and form her life. These static images are tangible evidence that now become part of her memory.
The Red Wall Gallery is located in the School of the Photographic Arts Ottawa (SPAO) at 168 Dalhousie, at the corner of Bruyère, in the Byward Market, Ottawa, ON.
For more info, call 613.562.3824 or email info@spao.ca.
Olympic Torch in Ottawa
The 2010 Olympic Torch Relay passes by our offices on William Street in the Byward Market.
Photo courtesy of Paolo Copelli.
