When travelling, we like to bring home an artwork as a memory of our adventure. On our recent New Brunswick adventure, it didn’t take us long to find our treasure. In less than 24 hours, we found the Iron Lady in Moncton, not to be confused with Margaret Thatcher.
Back Story
While flaneuring Moncton’s St. George Street, we came across a huge, red brick old school and we thought would be fun to explore. As we got closer, we could see it was the Aberdeen High School, a Neo-classical/ Greek Revival building built in 1915. Later we found out this building replaced the original school built in 1898 and destroyed in a fire. The school has a storied past, including the fact world-renowned literary critic Northrop Frye graduated from it in 1928 at the age of 15.
By the 1970s the three-storey school was decommissioned, and local Acadian artists started to repurpose it into studios, galleries and performance spaces. In 1996, the building was formally recognized as a heritage site and became the Centre Culturel Aberdeen with the Parc du Sommet surrounding it becoming an art park.
Today it is a bustling art centre with two galleries, printmaking studio, dance studio, preschool/daycare, several artists’ studios and one of Canada’s top 100 restaurants (more about that in an upcoming blog). It is a happening place. The park on the other hand could use some attention.
In addition to formal exhibition spaces, the Centre Culturel Aberdeen also has art in the hallways.
Iron Lady
Just off the lobby of the building was an open door. Seeing someone inside, we decided to pop our head in to ask if we could wander around. Before we could even say Hi! we were gobsmacked with the plethora of old irons converted into fun artworks at the front of the artist studio.
I quickly asked if I could photograph them. When she said “yes”, my phone was out faster than a dog on a bone. Turns out artist Anne-Marie Sirois has been converting old irons into funky artworks for decades. In 2010, she even published the book “Pourquoi 100 fers or Ironic irons” featuring 118 of her quirky artworks. Here is a sample of her irons and her studio full of fun things for her to incorporate into more irons and other artworks.
Anne-Marie was very gregarious and generous with her time, spending 30 minutes with us sharing stories about her irons and her past as a filmmaker, children’s book author/illustrator as well as the importance of storytelling and having fun. It goes without saying one of her iron artworks came home with us.
Anne-Marie’s studio is work of art with finished and works-in-progress everywhere.
Aberdeen School vs King George School
We had fun exploring the hallways full of art, other studios, talking to some of the artists, learning about how the building functions and the conversion process.
I couldn’t help but compare it to Calgary’s cSPACE, located in King Edward School (built in 1912) also a decommissioned early 20th century school. For some unknown reason I had always thought cSpace was a unique initiative but quickly realized it was not.
In addition to studios, both have exhibition spaces, cultural association offices, a performance space and daycare operations. cSPACE’s Alberta Craft Gallery and performance space outshines Aberdeen’s, but Aberdeen’s café is bigger and more upscale (albeit limited hours).
And both have a unique sense of place with Aberdeen being more bohemian and cSpace more bourgeoise.
The transformation of Caglary’s King Edward school included not only the creation of an arts centre, but a luxury condo building on the westside and luxury seniors housing on the Eastside. It also includes a craft/farmers’ market in the summer on the front lawn.
The Alberta Craft Council’s Gallery at cSPACE is a hidden gem.
Last Word
When travelling, it pays to look for old inner-city schools and libraries (public buildings) as they often are architecturally significant and get converted into cultural centres. And it is a reminder, that we don’t build stately schools like we used to.
