Grand Launching of the 2006 Lineage Tour in Halifax:

After three months of intense production in my kitchen/studio in Halifax, driving my beloved fiancée Yolanda and young cat James up the wall with mess and stress, the three youngster reproduction suitcases were complete and ready to venture off on their own journeys, one to school at the Foreman Art Gallery of the University of Bishops, another, a little more restless was off to Australia to travel for a while, and the third decided to stay home for a while in the Maritime provinces of Canada. The original McCleave suitcase and I, now the proud parents of three new exhibition venues, were left to complete McCleave Gallery 2006 Lineage Tour on our own.

I must admit that I was a little scared and perhaps had a case of what most folks call ‘the empty nest syndrome’, but I knew that there were many adventures to follow and that life was always full of surprises and opportunities that were full of potential as long as I would allow myself to grow with them. I knew that I needed a place to start off this new adventure, and maybe feeling a little nostalgic and tied to my home community in Halifax, that it was important to start with what was around me and what I was familiar with in my immediate community.

I remembered a small red house tucked away in the North End of Halifax that my dear friend Kit Malo brought me to for a screening of animations that had been turned into a regional public ZINE archives and knew from the minute I walked into the place that it was a perfect venue to launch the 2006 exhibition season. I knew very little about ZINE’s and DIY culture but was surprised at how it all seemed too familiar to me. With the theme of Lineage that Adair and I chose for this year’s suitcase tour at the front of my mind, I became more sensitive to the daily gestures that have changed so rapidly in the minds of many young maritimers (and likely many others) today.

I realised how many times the mandate of the McCleave Gallery of Fine Art intersected that of the Anchor Archives and DIY culture in general, and became very excited to organize an event with them to explore each others ideas further. I think that with many maritimers who grew up being taught how to re-use a teabag, a milk bag, or a neighbourhood shopping cart, DIY culture was something that had not too long ago been not so much a decision, but a neccessary means of survival, and a way to cope with the declining economy in the maritime provinces of Canada that our parents and grandparents learned to live through. So although DIY culture perhaps is not too far away from the modern maritimer in terms of practice, our new tourist saturated economy distracts us from these important parts of our culture that places such as the Anchor Archives and Iris Porter's new publication 'DIY in HFX' remind us of so genuinely. It is this romantisization of the past that the Nova Scotia government has clung to and prioritised to project specific cultural stereotypes that have made it difficult for emerging artists to continue to engage with the culture that reamains a reality in our daily lives.

Being the only province without a provincial funding body for the arts, the ambitious ideas that are about our present situations are in many cases only made possalbe through the Nova Scotia Beaureau of Tourism and Culture, leaving those of us who's projects aren't of interest to the development of the tourism industry basically on our own. This is of course one of many situations that have left Nova Scotian artists to fend for ourselves, and have encouraged alternative venues such as the Wallet Gallery, the Bathroom Gallery, the Alopecia Gallery, and the Anchor Archives to erupt as venues that adapt independantly of outside funding and remain essential as cultural resources to the community.

It seemed that every time I returned to Halifax, there was a new alternative venue that had left as quickly as it had appeared and I found myself on this visit home, once again refreshed and inspired to have stumbled upon the Anchor Archive Regional Zine Project so randomly. Perhaps it was fate, or maybe a golden horseshoe up my arse, but either way I was more than delighted to witness the true romance that the 17 artists books, the McCleave Gallery of Fine Art and the Anchor Archives shared that fine March evening. Sarah and Sonya provided an excellent space for us that evening with a small crowd of about 20 people squished into the living room/library of the small house on Roberts Street in the North End of Halifax.

The launching began with a casual presentation and a ribbon cutting ceremony followed by a short viewing of the 17 artist's books. We then began an evening parade led by bagpipes and followed by sparklers, weaving through the streets between Agricola Street and Gottigen Street to meet the last remaining spawn ‘repro’ suitcase at the eyelevelgallery one last time before the proud parents left for our long voyage overseas to rediscover the history and lineage of the McCleave family. The eyelevel (ERI2) show was busy, and the McCleave repro suitcase 2/3 was busy shmoozing with some enthusiastic viewers and seemed comfortable amungst it's peers in the group show. The original McCleave suitcase and I knew that it was at last time to begin our journey and that the three young suicases were now ready to find adventures of their own, so we packed up our belongings, and booked a flight to London to begin our journey overseas.