News in Brief: McMichael Staff Changes, OAC Strategy, Vancouver Art Gallery Building

Our editors’ weekly roundup of Canadian art news.

The McMichael Canadian Art Collection’s board of trustees announced that, by mutual agreement, it would not renew Dr. Victoria Dickenson’s contract as executive director and CEO of the collection and president of the foundation. Nathalie Mercure will act as interim CEO while the board searches for a permanent replacement. Dr. Dickenson was appointed to her position at the McMichael in 2011.

The Ontario Arts Council announced that the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport has launched a “province-wide consultation to develop the first Cultural Strategy for Ontario.” The consultation process involves a number of town-hall meetings in communities throughout the province that will run throughout the rest of 2015 and on several online platforms. The outcomes of these consultations will “set the government’s priorities and prove the plan to support the culture sector over the next five years.”

Charitable organization Business for the Arts have announced recipients of their 2015 Canadian Arts and Business Awards. Among the recipients: the inaugural Peter Herrndorf Arts Leadership Award was awarded to Peter Herrndorf of the National Arts Centre in Ottawa; the Edmund C. Bovey Award was given to Philip Taylor; and the Arnold Edinborough Award was given to Jan-Fryderyk Pleszczynski.

Swiss architectural firm Herzog and de Meuron revealed their conceptual design for the new Vancouver Art Gallery building on Tuesday. The proposed building is a 310,000-square-feet wooden structure that is comprised of stacked, irregularly sized boxes with 86,000 square feet of exhibition space. Kathleen Bartels, director of the VAG, and Christine Binswanger, partner at Herzog and de Meuron, spoke with Canadian Art about the building, funding matters and the public’s initial reaction.