A round up of things we have been following this week.

Beatty Street wall repaint. Painting is finally underway on the new Beatty Street wall mural. The project is jointly funded by the City of Vancouver and Concord Pacific and depicts figures from Vancouver’s past and present. More information can be found on the project’s Facebook page and Youtube.

Shortly before the Olympics the Beatty Street Wall was painted over by city workers conducting what was apparently routine maintenance. The move sparked the ire of a large number of people in the community. For those of you who may be feeling nostalgic, the original artwork is still visible on Google Street View, here. >>Read more

Our weekly round up of local news, events, and cultural happenings we’re tracking. Off we go…

One more whale skeleton and we’ve got a trend. The soon-to-open Beaty Biodiversity Museum at UBC has devoted their atrium to a blue-whale skeleton. On Saturday, Ottawa’s Museum of Nature will unveil an exhibit of a juvenile blue-whale skeleton, on view for the first time since it was donated in 1975. The museum has undergone an extensive six-year, $250-million overhaul that was part renovation (a view of the show-stealing staircases inside their ‘lantern’ addition is pictured left), part restoration, and aimed at showcasing Canada’s rich natural heritage. “Probably the only thing Canadians agree on is their pride in the physical beauty and remarkable nature of the natural environment of the country,” says Joanne DiCosimo, the museum’s president and CEO. “And our public wants to learn more about their impact on the natural environment as well as, as much as we can tell them about the changes through time in the natural landscape.” Image slideshow, video tour, and article found on Globe and Mail.

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A round up of news stories we’re following, plus other events and cultural happenings worth a notice.

Whales, actual and pixelated. Last week, a grey whale swam deep into False Creek, apparently drawn to the rehabilitated shoreline fronting the new Southeast False Creek neighbourhood. Then, a new public artwork depicting an orca whale was installed on the plaza outside the Vancouver Convention Centre. According to artist Douglas Coupland, Digital Orca “breaks down a three-dimensional Orca whale (they are really dolphins not whales, but I digress…) into cubic pixels—making a familiar symbol of the West Coast become something unexpected and new.” It’s already drawing crowds. (Price Tags)

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We’ve reached the halfway point in our “Vancouverism by Bicycle” tours, which examine the recent history of urban planning and architecture downtown and around False Creek. (The tours run Saturday mornings at 10 a.m. from now til August 22. Click here for details or to register.)

Condensing decades of history into a two-hour format—including riding time between stops—has been a fascinating, challenging project. We’ve been forced to reconsider how people, be they tourists or locals, experience the city’s built form. One recurring discussion point has been the role public art plays in creating a sense of place, particularly in shiny, new neighbourhoods that have been all but wiped clean of their past, or were previously undeveloped. Two examples stand out.

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