The deadline for applications to the Artist in Residence Program has now passed and mentor Paul Crawford, who will also serve as a juror along with Peter von Tiesenhausen are busy reviewing all of the submissions. A decision will be made by the end of August, so stay tuned! Visit the  PLRAC AIR Website for all the details.

Meet the Jurors:

Paul Crawford

Paul Crawford’s journey into the world of art has been anything but a traditional one, one that has built the belief that a work of art is a piece of social history and its cultural and commercial value lies in the stories it tells with each piece serving as a bookmark in time, documenting the life of its creator and the world in which they lived and worked. Growing up in a household with little interest and engagement in the arts, Paul’s education came through firsthand experience starting with a string of inspiring teachers, public art installations, community public art projects, stamp collecting and the connection between an object and its story. It’s been a non-conventional journey and one that when I started reached back to the foundations of our western tradition of art here in British Columbia right up to the present day. 

Over the past twenty years Paul Crawford has worn many hats in British Columbia’s rich cultural community, volunteering as a co-producer and curator of the ArtsWells Festival, founder and producer of the International One Minute Play Festival, publisher with BC Musician Magazine and has produced and hosted numerous concerts and productions across British Columbia. He has served on the boards of Island Mountain Arts, in Wells and the Okanagan School of the Arts in Penticton, Boundary District Arts Council, The Victoria Arts Council, the City of Penticton’s Public Arts advisory Committee, owned a commercial gallery, served as a private art consultant and is often invited to serve as a juror and lecture on BC Art History and his collection. His current day job is the Director/Curator of the Penticton Art Gallery 2006, arriving here after serving in the same position at the Grand Forks Art Gallery from 2002 – 2006.

Paul will also serve as mentor for the 2019 Artist in Residence Program.

Peter von Tiesenhausen

Peter von Tiesenhausen’s multi-media work deals with concepts of time, life, voyage, death, spirit, nature and humanity. His practice has grown from landscape painting to sculpture, performance and complex media installations. These are often an expression of where he finds himself and a utilization of what is at hand. Peter claims copyright on his land as an artwork. In the early 90s he started making boats of ice on bodies of water surrounding his studio and home, now no longer possible due to the wildly fluctuating climate. His film Island explores the meaning and significance of the human compulsion to strive in the natural world despite its changing ecosystems.

Peter has lived and worked in the boreal forest of northwestern Canada for most of his life, where he pursues his interest in sustainability. Peter has exhibited across Canada, in Europe and in the U.S. in public galleries and throughout the landscape. In 2016 he participated in Watershed+ Embedded Artist, City of Calgary, the Banff Centre Leighton Studio Residency; and led the CO2 Residency in Demmitt, AB. Peter received the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist Award in 2015. In 2018 Peter’s solo exhibition, Songs for Pythagoras at the Art Gallery of Alberta was accompanied by a significant hardcover publication with texts by Lucy Lippard, Natasha Chaykowski and Ellie Epp.