Tanis Browning-Shelp

On the morning of Saturday, September 23, the streets of Old Ottawa East (OOE) will once again be teeming with local artwork. From 11:00am to 3:00pm, many of our community’s gifted artists and photographers will display and sell their work in the front yards of their homes. The rain date for the event will be September 24, also from 11:00am to 3:00pm.

A long list of talent local artists and photographers have confirmed their participation in A Walk of Art, OOE’s 4th annual outdoor art tour. Photos Supplied

“A Walk of Art is a wonderful way to spend an afternoon and a chance to meet neighbours and friends and discover their talents,” says long-time OOE resident Patsy Royer. “I have visited several artists and learned about their inspiration and their techniques. I always look forward to opportunities to see art outside of gallery walls and just wish I had more wall space in my home for these lovely works!”

A Walk of Art 2023 is presented by The Mainstreeter and designed to expose local artists to residents of OOE and other nearby communities. “We want strollers to cover as much of OOE as possible,” says Lorne Abugov, Editor of The Mainstreeter. “Besides the growth in the number of participating artists, which was 26 by press time, the art tour’s footprint has also grown, with exhibits planned from Graham to Riverdale avenues (north to south), and from Echo Drive to the Rideau River (west to east). Cartographer and artist Steve Fick, one of the event’s founding exhibitors, has once again created the fantastic event map that allows strollers to plan their browsing route throughout the community.

“In addition to the support of The Mainstreeter, the costs of staging the event are fully covered by business sponsorships. This year’s sponsors include AOV Surveying, Ears on Main, Merriam Print, Ottawa Physiotherapy & Sports Clinic, Oat Couture and Montgomery’s Scotch Lounge, and Watson’s Pharmacy & Compounding Centre.

Angie O’Connor, owner of hearing health clinic and event sponsor Ears on Main at 139 Main Street, will host A Walk of Art 2023 Preview Gallery on her clinic’s wall space during the month of September (see box article at the end of this page).

According to co-organizer Whitney Bond, this year’s tour will include more group displays, including new locations at The Corners on Main and Bower Street. “I am also thrilled to report that young artists will exhibit their art this year at the Children’s Garden on Main and Clegg streets on the day of the tour! We also have a young artist, Hanna Haghbin, who will be participating with some friends at her parents’ home on McNaughton Ave,” says Bond.

Steve Fick, a Drummond Street resident who will exhibit again this year, reminisces about how the art tour began. “Artist and neighbour Rosie Cusson was over visiting outdoors at the height of the pandemic. I was bemoaning how long it had been since I’d had an art show. Rosie suggested we exhibit in our front yards. We contacted our mutual friend/artist Kathleen McCrea about joining us,” Fick recalls. “We didn’t have a whole lot of energy to do something bigger, so we kept it small. People loved it! It brought some semblance of normalcy and human connection through art to an otherwise troubled time.”

Fick also singled out The Mainstreeter for praise, noting that the newspaper has placed a very high priority on promoting the artwork of OOE’s many talented artists. Fick’s view is shared by the newspaper’s Main Street Sketches columnist Tim Hunt, who will be participating in A Walk of Art for the first time this year.

“I started my Main Street Sketches column during the pandemic, so it was more than a year before I met the Editor, Lorne Abugov in person. But I had already been impressed by the amount of space The Mainstreeter dedicated to local art,” Hunt says. “When we met for the first time, we chatted about the prospect of a calendar showcasing the sketches of Old Ottawa East from my column. But it was through the support I received from Lorne and others at the newspaper, connecting the right people and preselling the idea at last year’s art tour event, that the project snowballed and became a successful fundraiser and a springboard for a number of great stories featured in The Mainstreeter.

“The Mainstreeter’s newspaper box art project has also been a real connector between community members and the artists who painted them,” says Hunt. “From the cold winter night when volunteers dropped off the unpainted newsbox at my back door to meeting up with me to return the box to its appointed spot after its storied fall from the Flora Footbridge and its dramatic rescue from the Canal ice, the behind the-scenes support from everyone at The Mainstreeter has really elevated the profile of the arts in OOE.”

The paper’s focus on the arts has also benefitted young and emerging local artists. “I was given the opportunity to design and paint a newspaper box for The Mainstreeter,” says artist, student, and OOE resident Sydney Shelp. “Despite these boxes being an emblem of The Mainstreeter and our neighbourhood, there was never any hesitation from anyone at the newspaper in placing their trust in the artists, giving us complete artistic control, without any restrictions on our designs or any attempt to impose a cohesive colour scheme. Instead, everyone was excited that each artist could take the project in a direction that was unique to them. I felt assured that whatever I made would be accepted. As a young artist, I was really grateful to have been included in this project.”

“Artists in Old Ottawa East are lucky to have The Mainstreeter help champion their cause,” says portrait artist Sarah Lacey, who will be a returning exhibitor at A Walk of Art this September. “It’s one thing to say that you support the arts, but the local paper goes above and beyond. Not only does the newspaper’s staff and the board of directors create wonderful opportunities for artists to have their work seen, but The Mainstreeter volunteers generously take on the dozens of administrative tasks that need to happen behind the scenes to pull these events off. It is such a gift.”