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before we start, erin part of the couple who is staying in the lower studio of the pipe house, graduate of queen's, has never heard of the s.a.i.c. yet another nail in the coffin of the office of the president. better still the globe and mail travel section for the 9 july has an article on the loop - the air institute isn't mentioned - well there is a pyrric victory they mention the gene siskel film centre so the 'tute's website is there - artic.edu. the cultural centre is written about, the archicenter also but the world's greatest school with the museum attached wasn't mentioned.

the culture day didn't hold any surprises but made me question the idea of sense of place. after a morning of working on the web site and looking for carol's fountain pen, headed over to the art gallery of newfoundland and labrador at the university.

it has closed for inventory pending the move to the abomination of a building that is wrecking the st. john's skyline - the rooms . (note to self on pretension) the rooms , the school. it won't open until july 2004. the agnl will no longer be part of memorial university -but now will be run by the province. the rooms over look downtown st. john's and one will be able to have their double skim mocha decaf lattè while overlooking the narrows, never mind that it is built on an archaeological site. that the basilica is dwarfed by it.

headed downtown - passing the rooms, published the blog was stunned by the news of josh and headed out to the galleries.

eastern edge part of the network of artist run spaces across the country - now the only one in the city as the province thought that one artist run space was enough and stopped funding the resource centre for the arts.

work refreshingly didn't have a shanty, cod flakes, multicoloured houses or outports. in fact the work really had nothing to do with the province at all. a sign of progress as it means that artists here are thinking of things that are more universal and not tied to stereotypes of place. ceramics - that at first i misread as metal - anthropomorphic shapes or industrialised quotidian objects.

sculptures of tables that were pure façadism.

large paintings - three person show.

up to st, michael's printshop that i believe, will let you use their facilities in exchange for a work made their. here among other works were object/scenes that were newfoundland - a john hartman of pouch cove for $400, prints of dories, icons of everyday life. but not stereotypical . a lot of the work had a sense of place but it was personalised not stereotyped.

around the corner to the leyton gallery which was a potpourri of works of all sorts. a majority i had seen at the crafts centre on saturday. books by anita desai the typical impastoed paintings of big sky and bigger waves. but also andrea cooper who deals with living in a big small town , and bill rose. there the tourist art shop.

into auntie crae's to buy a partridge berry loaf and a globe -they only had the globe - where i turned around and ran into jesses from the school - notes to oneself on pretension the school, the rooms.

pretty strange almost as strange as hearing my name called out in st. michael's printshop and realising that the person was robert who was in the upper studio at the pipe house. met him when sharon dragged me over.

the walk past the duke and through george street with its bars empty as it was only 3pm. past the now gone mile 0 of the transcanada highway at city hall up the hill to christina parker.

her is possibly the only gallery outside of jim's that actually worries about what the art looks like. she has the names of the province. people who have just done something important - scott walden and his resettlement series, pratt's - forgot which one -cinema sized photographs of the landscape. tara bryan who makes books as well as paints. grant boland.

99% of the work shown is like hopper like in it relation to the province. lots of images of gros morne. big skies. it was here that i came to wonder where the line is between what i see as tourist art versus what is art using one's surroundings. there are two painters there that use newfoundland iconography but as a result of living here. one whose name escapes me places ikons on a shelf - shell, rock, inukshuk and native plant in a glass of water reducing objects down to their associative meanings.

grant boland makes new iconography, a painting of the inside of the duke, the george street bar scene, etc. the rest make work that straddles that line.

finally the epitome of the tourist art gallery emma butler. haven't been here in a year and i don't think more than two paintings have been shifted. dark stomy nights, fishermen, folk tales illustrated christopher pratt, mary pratt, and barbara pratt wagansky. outport after outport after outport with nary a convenience or an irving gas bar to be seen.

became nervous as i mentioned it is hard not to be influenced by the landscape and dilapidated buildings are so picturesque it is part of the place but so are tim horton's, molson canadian maple leaf tops, irving and ultramar , where is the line drawn. to-day at saltwater books the clerk - vicky hynes- whose cd i listened to last night not knowing - talked about this in literature - her father hated the shipping news as it was all fishing - no it wasn't. as soon as i could discern the difference between lisa moore and joan clark, she stopped trying to sell me random passage and talked about writers who live in newfoundland and labrador. her cd was the same way of the province but not fishing songs that a great noise would parody.

earlier in the day i had met erin and josh who were staying in the pipe house and had just returned from camping along the irish loop. right now they were camping in pippy park overlooking st.john's. told them to meet me at the duke at six and i'd drive them north. had my samosas from authur authur. a pint while reading the globe and then we were off.

they stopped by later to do laundry and chat. travel, art,

-where is it that you work?