World Tea Party, Victoria

Read about it in the article “’Tea for Two’ oft-heard but well off mark” by Jeanine Soodeen, featured in the Victoria News; 7 July 2004; in the article, “World Tea Party celebrates brew’s history and tradition,” by Pam Grant, featured in the Times Colonist, 10 July 2004; and in Where Magazine, Victoria Edition, summer issue, 2004.

Art Gallery of Greater Victoria

TEA PARTY COMING TO THE ART GALLERY OF GREATER VICTORIA IN JUNE-AUGUST 2004

"The Tea Party," an exhibit of teawares and works of art dealing with the ritual of tea from around the world, accompanied by tea tastings, tea demonstrations, lectures, videos, a tea fashion show and other special events, will open at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria June 25, 200 4, and runs to August 29.

The exhibit is a collaboration between the SSHRC funded Community University Research Alliance (CURA), represented by Dr. Judith Patt of UVic's Dept. of History in Art, and The World Tea Party Society, represented by Bryan Mulvihill of Vancouver, a contemporary artist and student of the Japanese tea ceremony.

Bryan Mulvihill has organized and participated in tea centered exhibits and events ranging from an exhibit at the National Gallery in Ottawa and a Tea Salon during the Pan Am Games in Winnipeg to a garden tea party for 4,000 people at the 2002 re-opening in London, England of the Horniman Museum, originally founded by a tea merchant.

"The Tea Party" will draw on private collections as well as those of the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, the Maltwood Museum at UVic, and the BC Archives. It will include historical and contemporary teawares, in porcelain, stoneware, silver, pewter and glass, from China, Japan, Europe and North America, as well as prints and paintings, dealing with tea and tea drinking. Tea bowls range in age from 10th century examples from Sung dynasty China to examples by contemporary B. C. potters. There will be unusual tea implements like English mote spoons and lemon strainers and Japanese tea ceremony incense containers and food serving dishes.

Contemporary artists and potters who have already indicated an interest in participating in the event include Joseph Plaskett, Pat Martin Bates, Michael Morris, Karl Spreitz, Glenn Howarth, Robert Amos, Sara Amos, Robin Hopper, Judi Dyelle, Kinichi Shigeno, Gordon Hutchens, and Pat Webber, as well as Japanese tea master Robert Macrae.

Other institutions and businesses who will be collaborating with tea related events of their own or with those at the Art Gallery include Craigdarroch Castle, Emily Carr House and Silk Road Tea Company.

The co-curators, Patt and Mulvihill, would like to locate other historically interesting tea items for the exhibit, particularly some of the teawares that were used at the Takata Gardens Tearoom along the Gorge in the early 20th century. If you have tea items of interest that you would be willing to loan to the exhibit, contact Judith Patt at 478-7876 or at japatt@shaw.ca .

Menu of events for World Tea Party - Victoria exhibition at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, June 25 - August 29, 2004

The CBC Radio 3 website recently featured the World Tea Party project in a series of interviews with the curators and tea experts from Celestial Seasonings, a sponsor of the event.

The co-curators of World Tea Party, Victoria, Dr. Judith Patt and Bryan Mulvihill, would like to locate other historically interesting tea items for an exhibit at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, June 25 to August 29, 2004. In particular, they are seeking some of the teawares that were used at the Takata Gardens Tearoom along the Gorge in the early 20th century. If you have tea items of interest that you would be willing to loan to the exhibit, contact Judith Patt at 478-7876 or at japatt@shaw.ca .

CURA's World Tea Party, Victoria was featured in a three-page article, “PARTEA! Victoria's Cuppa Runneth Over Next Summer,” by Richard Watts in the Times Colonist, August 31, 2003, pages D1, D6-D7.