By Lisa Schick

New curator to take over soon

Apr 3, 2011 | 8:25 AM

Prince Albert artists will have a friend in the Mann Art Gallery’s new curator.

Griffith Aaron Baker was announced as curator/director at the newly re-named gallery’s annual general meeting on Mar. 29.

Baker said he’s excited about the job.

“The gallery itself is really quite a special place, the board of directors seems to be very interested in making the organization better and as good as it can be, and I’m hoping to work with them to do that, so I think it’s going to be really exciting in the future.”

Pat Grayston, board chair for the gallery said Baker was chosen because he is very qualified and he has experience in a curator/director position.

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Baker is from Saskatchewan originally – he was born in Saskatoon and he grew up in and got his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Regina.

He got his Masters in Fine Arts at Concordia in Montreal, but moved back to the prairies about three years ago to curate/direct a gallery in Estevan.

Baker said Estevan is a really unique place but, as an environmentalist, he’s excited about moving to Prince Albert.

“It’s going to be really exciting moving to a city where there (are) some trees around and it’s not just the flat prairies and constant oil drilling and what-not.”

Baker will be the director as well as the curator of the Mann Art Gallery – The Estevan gallery was his first time in both positions, but he said he prefers it that way because he can have more control over the direction of the institution.

As director he would have control over things like marketing, advertising, setting up shows and overseeing education programs.

Baker said he already has some ideas about what he might want to do with the gallery.

He said Prince Albert has such a large First Nations segment of the population, so he’d like to build a balanced collection to reflect that.

“What I’m planning on doing is hopefully bringing in some guest First Nations curators to augment our programming. And we’ve talked about maybe changing our mandate to reflect an ideal of certain percentage of First Nations work that will hopefully work its way into the future,” said Baker.

Baker also talked about creating satellite spaces to showcase work in places in the city other than the gallery, and expanding the permanent collection.

Baker has been helping out artists in his current position, and hopes to work well with the large community of artists in Prince Albert.

He said he likes to give local artists, with good proposals, shows in the gallery no matter their training or background.

“I’m in it to see artists better themselves and play a more important part in the community – to educate people who don’t necessarily like art or appreciate art or even know what art is about and eventually that improves all our quality of life and it starts with artists.”

Baker said he has already started looking for a home in Prince Albert, but he doesn’t take over the position until Jun. 1.

lschick@panow.com