2024 - 2025 Regional Art Calendars
Our 2025 calendars will be arriving soon. Those of you on our mailing list will have received updates already. Canvas and Cork: The Regional Art Wine Calendar, will return in 2026. For 2025, our collections include Home & Away, Art of Nature, and a new (somewhat more literary) project, Mystical Shores (more on this later). Our fourth Gallery of Nature, skipped a year, as we have to re-adjust following the winding-down of the Bateman Foundation, but we are re-inventing our wildlife collection for 2026 (more on this later too). The 2025 calendars arrive in August, and these will be posted here soon. For now though, we hope you've been enjoying the 2024 collections; and thank you again for your support.
2024 collections
2023 collections
Canvas and Cork returns in 2026
Participating artists (in 2023) are as follows:
Ciba Karisik - Alan Bateman - W. David Ward - Tim Hough - Anja Karisik - Lyn Vik -
Barry McCarthy - Andrew Cheddie Sookrah - John Stuart Pryce - John Shea
Cover artist: W. David Ward
Our Independent Culture Calendars
In the spirit of The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter (the book of our times perhaps), our art seeks a new 'analog' expression – in an increasingly digital world.
Artists need their work to be seen, and this was challenging for a couple of years, even for those who have galleries. Art is meant to be experienced in the flesh, so to speak. No one can visit a gallery every day, but our calendars bring the 'gallery' to you., in a tangible way. Viewer can do more than simply 'swipe' through, 'liking' and 'commenting' as they go; they can live with the work. More than this, in fact. Each calendar purchase becomes a part of the creative process; purchasing another tube of paint, or a replacement brush. Your engagement, in a very real way, keeps our culture alive and meaningful.
Your purchase of an Independent Culture calendar will help us continue to develop our projects; supporting independent artists across the country while we tell the incredible story of Regional art. Thank you for your ongoing support.
Participating artists:
Mark Fletcher - Peter Rotter - John Ovcacik - Anja Karisik - W. David Ward -
April SGaana Jaad White - Colleen Glynn - Denise Antaya - George Raab - Barry McCarthy - Ron Bolt - Cover artist: Barry McCarthy
Participating artists:
Billy-Jack Milligan - W. Allan Hancock - David Foyn - Joseph Koensgen - Andrew Cheddie Sookrah - Angela Lorenzen - Dan St-Amant - Michael Dumas - John Maurer - Patricia Pepin - Michael Pape - Chris Bacon
Cover artist: Patricia Pepin
Read more about our PIBO fundraiser project, at: Art of Nature - Birds
Participating artists:
Robert Bateman - W. Allan Hancock - Michael Pape - W. David Ward - Kelly Dodge - Carleen Ross - John Stuart Pryce - Amélie Bonin - Mark Kelso - Clinton Jammer - Ric Sluiter - Julia Rogers
Cover artist: Mark Kelso
Our fundraiser project for the Bateman Foundation
By way of an introduction to these calendar projects (main page), the primary function of regional art is to counter the effects of Postmodernism. There is a summary of each separate calendar on the back panels of both the landscape and wildlife collections (See below). Since postmodern culture is referred to (among other things) as 'post-literate society', we make a point of including lots of text (along with our images) as a statement of sorts. Please continue reading below.
Home And Away
‘Home is where one starts from’, writes T.S. Elliot; we are all on a journey somewhere, literal or metaphorical. This idea lies at the heart of Regional art, for it is only possible to know our place in the world – to appreciate all that it is and all that it can be – by traveling away from time to time.
Travel with us and see our land through the eyes of our Canadian Regional artists. See the world beyond our city centres; the rural heartland and small communities, the farms and fields, the far-flung regions and hinterlands – almost always home to someone. See things even the locals no longer notice, or take for granted; for the outsider brings a new perspective to bear. Then we may all look back and regard our home, as though from afar, and see it afresh, through new eyes.
This is the goal of the Regional artist: to learn to see, and portray the world as it really is; home and away, good or bad. Realism is the expression of choice for these artists; ‘perspective’, ‘perception’ and an objective point of view. The central values of the ‘Romantic’ movement of the Nineteenth Century – beauty, nature and truth – are conveyed most effectively through the representational forms, and these timeless values inform regional painters of our day, as they did then.
Every few generations, regional art movements emerge in response to the time: Romanticism (England and the United States was followed by American Regionalism in the 1920s and ‘30s; then, in Canada, London Regionalism, in the 1960s and ‘70s. Today, a couple of generations on (as regular as clockwork) a new Regionalism has emerged. This latest incarnation springs out of the nature and wildlife art movements of the ’80s and ’90s, and is deeply rooted in the Romantic tradition – preserving those essential and timeless values.
Art Of Nature
A new Regionalism in art has emerged. Born of the nature and wildlife art movements of the 80s and 90s – and deeply rooted in the Romantic tradition – this movement carries forward the essential values of an earlier, more enlightened age. In the 'Art Of Nature' you will see our land, and the inhabitants of our wild spaces, through the eyes of three generations of nature artists.
Far removed from our city centers and the hubbub of modern life, this other world is often far from mind. And thus, it is easy to forget that our wild spaces are essential for the well being of us all; however 'far removed' we may feel, our ancestors understood well, we are all connected in a 'web of life'.
The central values of the ‘Romantic’ movement of the Nineteenth Century – beauty, nature and truth – inform Regionalist painters of our day, as they did in days gone by. This latest incarnation of the perennial art movement – the world's oldest and most enduring – is deeply rooted in the Romantic tradition, and seeks to preserve the traditional knowledge of our fore-bearers.
Every few generations, regional art movements emerge in response to the time: Romanticism (England and the United States) was followed by American Regionalism in the 1920s and ‘30s; then, in Canada, London Regionalism, in the 1960s and ‘70s. Today, a couple of generations on, a new Regionalism has emerged.
In an increasingly urban, technology based society, the role of the nature artist has never been so important: fostering a concern for, and understanding of, the natural world – particularly among the younger generations, who will inherit this world. The cultural thread that Regionalist artists maintain connects us to our roots, and to the traditions that emerged from our relationship with the land. Through this art, a reverence for nature might be preserved.
Away from the glitter, glamour, and trends of the big city ‘art scene’, Regional artists have not been distracted. They have maintained their focus and still speak to issues of importance; for the society in which they work and the world in which we all live.
Independent artists today are the eyes of society; theirs is an art for the people.
The 2022 Regional Art Collections
Cover Artists: Cyril Cox, Clinton Jammer and Patricia Pepin
The 2021 Regional Art Collections
Cover Artists: Terri Isaac, Derek Wicks and Clinton Jammer
The 2020 Regional Art Collections
The Art of Nature
Artists: W. David Ward, Derek Wicks, Billy-Jack Milligan, Rhonda Franks, Anja Karisik, Chris Bacon, Gary Landon, Patricia Pepin, Amelie Bonin, Michael Dumas, Daniel St-Amant, Robert Bateman
Cover: Chris Bacon
Home and Away
Artists: John Shea, Ciba Karisik, John Ovcacik, April 'SGaana Jaad' White, Mark Fletcher, W. David Ward, Sophie Lavoie, Angela Lorenzen, John Stuart Pryce, Tim Hough, Andrew Sookrah, Robert Bateman
Cover: Mark Fletcher
A gathering, in Ancaster, Ontario, to celebrate when our two 2020 Regional Art calendars (sample jackets at least) went to press. Seated, are the two cover artists: (on the left - The Art Of Nature) Chris Bacon and (right - Home And Away) Mark Fletcher. Behind (left to right) Gary Landon, Tim Hough and W. David Ward. Absent here, is the cover artist from the 2019 collection, Wayne Mondok.
In keeping with the central idea of Regionalism, the selection process was entirely democratic; the artists themselves selected the cover artist for each collection. Each artists has two votes, and the artist with most votes, naturally, appears on the cover. Since 2019 sold out so quickly, Wayne now has his calendar project - 2020 and now 2021.
The Art of Nature - 2019
Cover image: Wayne Mondok
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