ArtBeat

ArtBeat Podcast
  • 5.0 (2)
  • Arts
  • Updated Weekly

Welcome to ArtBeat, where we explore the heart of Canada’s art scene. Join host Katie Marks as she brings you into the personal journeys of the artists shaping our culture. Through candid, thoughtful conversations, we uncover the truth and passion behind their work, offering a glimpse into the creativity and resilience that fuel the art we love. Tune in to discover the stories behind Canadian art and the people who bring it to life.

  1. 2d ago

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Erin Armstrong

    ArtBeat concludes its special series with Art With Heart, in support of Casey House, with Toronto painter Erin Armstrong. As a child, Erin would fake being sick so she could stay home in her mother’s studio. She grew up assuming she would become an artist, and still says painting is the one thing she knows “for sure in my bones” she was meant to do. She has also been preoccupied since childhood with how strange it is to be alive. That feeling sits underneath much of her work. Her figures are not portraits so much as placeholders for whoever is looking, set within scenes that seem familiar until something slips slightly out of place. Erin gives us enough to enter the image without ever resolving exactly what has happened. For most of the last decade, one figure carried that unease. Now the canvases are filling with people. Erin has returned to classical picnic scenes, recasting their pastoral ease for a moment when uncertainty feels more collective. She has been thinking of the new body of work as “a picnic at the end of the world.” Erin’s first contribution to Art With Heart is Spades. Art With Heart takes place October 19, 2026, at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto. The silent auction opens October 13. Purchase your tickets here. Artist Bio Erin is a contemporary figurative artist working and living in Toronto, CA. Her work looks into the human imagination as it is expressed visually. She is particularly intrigued by the ways in which the mind can conjure and create worlds by piecing together memory, experience, and the ability of the mind’s eye to render a non-reality. She draws on the genre of portraiture as a foundation for these explorations, but chooses to depict not a person or sitter, but an atmosphere or sensation expressed inside the formal qualities of human shapes.

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Erin Armstrong

  2. Oct 6

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Craig D'Arville & Spencer Shevlen

    ArtBeat’s special series with Art With Heart, in support of Casey House, continues with Spencer Shevlen, one of the curatorial committee’s co-chairs, and committee member Craig D’Arville. Spencer has been attending Art With Heart with his family for years, often bidding alongside his mom. Part of what keeps bringing him back is the possibility of discovering an artist he has never encountered before and getting behind the work early. Over seven years on the committee, listening to how other people see has also expanded his own instincts as a collector. Craig arrives from another side of the art world. After decades of working directly with artists, he is acutely aware of how much visibility can matter, particularly for accomplished practices that exist outside traditional gallery representation. Art With Heart can put that work in front of collectors and dealers who may otherwise never come across it, sometimes before the final collection has even been decided. Those perspectives meet around a table where people are expected to make a case for what they believe in. A committee member can arrive convinced about one piece and leave persuaded by another. The collection has to work as a whole, appeal to the people who will eventually bid and, above all, raise meaningful support for Casey House. Spencer and Craig also challenge the idea that collecting requires expertise or a particular kind of life. Art With Heart offers a way to encounter established names alongside artists who may be entirely new to you. Their advice is refreshingly uncomplicated: pay attention to what excites you, buy what you love and let your eye develop from there. Art With Heart takes place October 19, 2026, at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto. The silent auction opens October 13. Purchase your tickets here.

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Craig D'Arville & Spencer Shevlen

  3. Sep 29

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Phuong Nguyen

    ArtBeat launches its special series with Art With Heart, in support of Casey House, with Toronto artist Phuong Nguyen. Early in her practice, Phuong felt a pressure to make work about where she came from. Being Vietnamese seemed to come with an expectation that identity should become subject matter, something she was reluctant to let define the work. Her work eventually found another route through chinoiserie. What interested Phuong was the distance between lived culture and the version of Asia imagined through European decorative traditions. From there, she began looking more closely at ornamentalism and at the ways Asian women have historically been defined through decoration itself. Historical sources often become part of the making process, leading her toward forms that can suggest both ornament and the body. For Art With Heart, Phuong returned to a motif found in a French colonial publication and translated it into a carved wooden form. Its shape begins to suggest a torso or ribcage, with a small ceramic heart placed inside. Phuong also speaks about her work as an art therapist and registered psychotherapist, and about the role stigma can play in preventing people from accessing care and support. Her connection to Casey House is tied closely to that understanding, as well as to something she has been reconsidering in her own life: love and care are not passive. They are things we practise through action, again and again. Art With Heart takes place October 19, 2026, at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto. The silent auction opens October 13. Purchase your tickets here. Artist Bio Born and raised in Toronto, Phuong Nguyen is a visual artist working across oil painting and sculpture. Her practice explores ornamentalism, Orientalism, and the relationship between personhood and objecthood, drawing on the aesthetics and history of chinoiserie in relation to Southeast Asian and Vietnamese femininity. Nguyen holds a BFA from OCAD University (2014). Phuong is currently represented by Vin Gallery in Asia and Tian Contemporain in Quebec.

    ArtBeat + Art With Heart: Phuong Nguyen

  4. Apr 14

    Kyle Scheurmann: We Could Have Been A Mountain, Part Two

    The next day, Kyle Scheurmann continues further north, moving through wildfire sites and clear cuts as the trip begins to come to a close. He reflects on what it’s like to come out of those environments and sit with what you’ve seen, and how that begins to affect the work. An encounter in a remote valley turns into an exchange, and the final stretch of the trip leads to standing at the edge of protected land while wildfire burns on either side. It’s a moment that’s difficult to reconcile, and one that continues to inform We Could Have Been A Mountain, on view at Bau-Xi Gallery in Vancouver until April 28. This is Part Two of a two-part release. Part One is available here. Kyle is the founder of Art Auction for Old Growth, an online charity auction supporting the protection of endangered old-growth forests in British Columbia. The initiative is in partnership with the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation, with the next edition returning in September 2026. An award-winning short film by filmmaker Lachlan Ross follows Kyle through at-risk old-growth regions as he documents environmental change in real time. The film is available via Bau-Xi Gallery’s YouTube channel. Follow ArtBeat on Instagram.

    Kyle Scheurmann: We Could Have Been A Mountain, Part Two

  5. Apr 6

    Kyle Scheurmann: We Could Have Been A Mountain, Part One

    Kyle Scheurmann spent much of this past summer out in the field, moving through active logging sites and wildfire zones, witnessing firsthand the pace and scale of what’s unfolding across the landscape. In this conversation, he reflects on what it meant to be that close to it. What began as observation became something more immersive, where distance fell away and his understanding of the work, and his role within it, began to shift in real time. We talk through salvage logging, heli-logging, and the realities of being in environments that are constantly changing. These experiences carry into a new body of work, We Could Have Been A Mountain, opening Saturday, April 11 at Bau-Xi Gallery in Vancouver. This is Part One of a two-part release. Part Two will be out Tuesday, April 14. Kyle is the founder of Art Auction for Old Growth, an online charity auction supporting the protection of endangered old-growth forests in British Columbia. The initiative is in partnership with the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation, with the next edition returning in September 2026. An award-winning short film by filmmaker Lachlan Ross follows Kyle through at-risk old-growth regions as he documents environmental change in real time. The film is available via Bau-Xi Gallery’s YouTube channel. Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba in 1988, Kyle Scheurmann completed his Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto in 2013. In 2018, he completed his Master of Fine Arts at Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver, where he was named Valedictorian. Since 2019, Scheurmann has maintained studios in remote, wooded locations, documenting the incremental impact of climate change while contributing to conservation and activism efforts. In 2021, he was invited to participate in the Eden Grove AiR residency at the Fairy Creek blockades on unceded Pacheedaht territory. During his four-month stay, he worked as a resident artist, journalist, and legal witness, documenting the experiences of Forest Protectors working to safeguard some of the last remaining ancient forests in Canada. Follow ArtBeat on Instagram.

    Kyle Scheurmann: We Could Have Been A Mountain, Part One

  6. Mar 20

    Russna Kaur: Between Appearance and Truth

    Russna Kaur grew up in her mother’s Indian bridal boutique in Brampton, Ontario - surrounded by glittering fabrics, ornate surfaces, and the performance of joy. But behind the embellishment, she was watching something else: how beauty can mask vulnerability, how colour can distract, and how appearances rarely tell the whole story. In this conversation, Russna reflects on growing up as the eldest daughter in a Punjabi household, moving through a biology degree and commercial design, and eventually choosing painting as the first place she didn’t need permission. She speaks openly about surviving a turning point that forced her to reconsider her path, and finding in abstraction a way to express what can’t always be said directly. We discuss repetition as persistence, restraint after excess, imperfection as revelation, and the friction between illusion and exposure. Her paintings appear immersive from a distance, but up close they intentionally misalign - revealing process, fracture, and the refusal of a perfect surface. Russna joins us from Vancouver as she prepares a new body of work for her upcoming exhibition at Cooper Cole, opening March 28. Russna Kaur (b. 1991, Brampton, Ontario) is a painter currently living and working in Vancouver, British Columbia. Kaur completed a Bachelor of Arts at the University of Waterloo (2013) and a Master of Fine Arts at Emily Carr University of Art + Design (2019). Russna Kaur is the recipient of the Takao Tanabe Painting Prize (2020) and the IDEA Art Award (2020). She has exhibited works nationally at institutions including the Kamloops Art Gallery (2021), Remai Modern in Saskatoon, SK (2023), Vancouver Art Gallery (2024), Audain Art Museum in Whistler, BC (2024), College Art Galleries at the University of Saskatchewan (2025) and internationally at Galerie Isa in Mumbai, India (2023) and Gajah Gallery in Yogyakarta, Indonesia (2024). Kaur has an upcoming exhibition at the Art Gallery of Burlington in Ontario (2025). Kaur has been an artist-in-residence at the Burrard Arts Foundation (2020) in Vancouver, the Centrum Emerging Artist Residency (2020) in Port Townsend, Washington, an Independent Artist Residency in Los Angeles, California (2024), and the Wassaic Project in New York (2025). Upcoming residencies include the Annandale Artist Residency on Prince Edward Island (2025). Russna Kaur was commissioned to create public artwork for the Translink Art Columns in the City of Richmond, BC (2018), Boren Banner Series at the Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA (2021), Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives in Brampton, ON (2022) and Square Nine Developments in Burnaby, BC (2026). Kaur’s work is held in numerous private, corporate and institutional collections including the TD Bank Collection, RBC Art Collection, Audain Art Museum, the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Surrey Art Gallery, and the Gordon Smith Gallery of Canadian Art.

    Russna Kaur: Between Appearance and Truth

  7. 11/13/2024

    Peter Hong-Tsun Chan: As Luck Would Have It

    In this ArtBeat episode, artist Peter Hong-Tsun Chan guides us through a landscape of half-formed memories, where shapes and scenes echo with a subtle nostalgia. Reflecting on a childhood set between Hong Kong’s bustling energy and Toronto’s calm, Peter finds meaning in the objects, rituals, and places of his past—each carrying a resonance both grounding and elusive. His paintings hold these fleeting memories, allowing them to flicker gently between recollection and imagination. Peter’s fascination with games of chance began in family Mahjong games, where laughter mixed with whispered strategies and a sense of thrilling unpredictability. These early moments with risk and luck sparked his journey into exploring the rituals and unknowns that shape our lives. His art doesn’t settle on conclusions but holds within it an openness, where chance and choice intertwine. Next, Peter’s work will appear in a group show at New York’s Plato Gallery starting November 26, 2024, where he unveils a new motif: bread—simple, universal, and layered with symbolism. His journey continues next year with exhibitions in Beijing, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, expanding his exploration across cultures and memories. Follow Peter’s work on Instagram at @peterchanart or visit peterchanart.com. Join us as Peter’s art opens a window into the interplay of memory, identity, and life’s subtle mysteries. Remember to follow ArtBeat on Instagram, subscribe to our podcast, and leave a rating on your preferred platform.

    Peter Hong-Tsun Chan: As Luck Would Have It

  8. 11/06/2024

    Julie Moon: Ornamentation as Rebellion

    Julie Moon’s journey into ceramics unfolds with captivating depth. From an early curiosity for materials to an unexpected shift from textiles to clay, her story reveals a process led by intuition and a love for experimentation. Julie’s vibrant use of ornamentation, patterns, and striking colours, paired with her unique take on human forms, offers a fresh perspective that challenges traditional views in the world of ceramics. In this conversation, she discusses her inspirations, particularly her fascination with natural elements like fruits, flowers, and other everyday objects, which bring new layers of symbolism to her practice. As for upcoming exhibits, Julie is currently part of the group show “Elaborate” at Harbourfront Centre, which runs until December 29th. In the new year, she will be featured in a two-person show with Kate O'Connor at Hunt Gallery and will also have a solo show titled “Fruits” in one of the gallery spaces at the Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery. You can find Julie’s work at Patel Brown Gallery and glimpse her artistic process on Instagram @juliemoooon, or explore her portfolio at juliemoon.com. Remember to follow ArtBeat on Instagram, subscribe to our podcast, and leave a rating on your preferred platform.

    Julie Moon: Ornamentation as Rebellion
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
2 Ratings

About

Welcome to ArtBeat, where we explore the heart of Canada’s art scene. Join host Katie Marks as she brings you into the personal journeys of the artists shaping our culture. Through candid, thoughtful conversations, we uncover the truth and passion behind their work, offering a glimpse into the creativity and resilience that fuel the art we love. Tune in to discover the stories behind Canadian art and the people who bring it to life.

Information

  • Creator
    ArtBeat Podcast
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    44
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © ArtBeat Podcast
  • Show Website
    ArtBeat

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